On November 20th, from 7:00 to 9:00 PM, Faith Family Books and Gifts in Toronto hosted an event with more than 30 Canadian authors at their store in Toronto. Here are two photos taken by author Deborah Gyapong, one of me and one of the reading areas. You can see many more photos on Deb's blog here and here. The last four photos are courtesy of author Fay Rowe. If you put your cursor on each picture, you'll see who's in them.
So last night, I'm reading a book by Lois McMaster Bujold called Miles Errant, which is really two books and a novella in one, and after finishing the novella (which is very good, by the way) and after hitting myself upside the head for not seeing the ending coming, I happen to glance at the back cover. On it is an endorsement by Anne McCaffrey, which begins with the words, "Georgette Heyer has met her match for intrigue and style…." I sit up and begin to laugh. It's midnight, and even though my husband has just fallen asleep, I [ Read more...]
This is a guest blog by Violet Nesdoly, a freelance writer from BC whose special interests are writing non-fiction, fiction, activities, and poetry for Children, and writing articles, devotionals, and poetry for adults. I have to say i totally relate to Violet's feelings and believe many other writers will too. It's also why I feel we need to work together to develop a new model for publishing. No one has to tell writers that they're up against some pretty big obstacles these days. The latest Tsunami to hit the writing/publishing world was the news last week that some online bookstores [ Read more...]
I spent Saturday in Pickering at Michael's Family Bookstore, along with about a dozen other authors. Here I am with my little section of the tent we had – in front of the store. And on Sunday I had a booth in the Artist's Alley at the Markham Classic Car Show just off Main Street. As you can see, we had beautiful weather on both days.
I posted a little while ago that Shaded Light and another book of mine, Hot Apple Cider, were both nominated to be the "one book" for the Church Library’s of Ontario "One Book / One Conference" October 3rd along with a number of other great books, including The Shack and The Book of Negroes. (See complete list.) I’m delighted to announce that the winner was named today, and it’s Hot Apple Cider! I’m sure it had something to do with getting to know 30 authors, and also the variety in this hope-filled book. Congratulations to everyone who was nominated. And thanks to [ Read more...]
I saw the upcoming topic for Mystery Reader - “Scandinavian Mysteries” – and thought, “Nothing to do with me.” A few days later, I got an email about it and deleted it. Several weeks passed. Then, one day while my husband and I were babysitting our grandson, Leif, we got talking, for some reason, about Christmas and about some of the traditional foods we eat, like julekake and potato lefse. All of a sudden, I slapped myself upside the head and shouted, “Scandinavian Mysteries!” My husband, naturally, was confused. I rolled my eyes. “I’ve lived for 35 years in a [ Read more...]
Although my choice of reading material is normally mysteries, I’ve been reading books on writing memoir and memoirs lately, trying to get a feel for what is acceptable or perhaps desirable. Just finished Who Do You Think You Are? by Alyse Myers. A difficult story of a young girl growing up in a dysfunctional, somewhat abusive home. The greatest strength of the book is the author’s ability to show the complicated nature of perception, and how despite lacking adequate information to make accurate judgments, children are a product of their environment as well as their genes. Before that, I read [ Read more...]
This is our first video, so it may need some work. It shows me taking our 17-year-old miniature poodle Silx for a walk. The interesting this is that Silx is pretty well blind and deaf. But she still asks to go for walks by going in circles in the hallway near our front door – especially on warm days. While it looks as though I'm pulling Silx, she's actually on a leash that expands. So she's going pretty well wherever she wants to go. She used to like to lead me by the full length of the leash; now she [ Read more...]
If you aren't familiar with the Susan Boyle story, or if you haven't seen this interview, I highly recommend watching it. Susan Boyle interview with Meredith Vieria Three things about this interview intrigued me. 1. The way that Susan handles herself, seeming to take control of each situation she's in, yet with a great deal of modesty. For someone with so little training or experience in public speaking, she exudes strength and calmness. 2. I think a lot of creative people will relate to her. Somewhere inside we think we know who we are, but the rest of the world [ Read more...]
Last week was very busy and I'm still recovering. You go like crazy for a week or so and tehn eventually the adrenalin runs out and you kind of crash. But it's fun while it lasts. Anyway, on Wednesday night, I attended The Word Guild Awards Gala in Mississauga, where I received three Canadian Christian Writing Awards. Here is part of the press release: June 18, 2009 For immediate release NEWCOMERS AND VETERANS TOP THE WORD GUILD 2009 AWARDS National writing awards highlight talents of Canadian authors, including poverty activists and a rugby-playing romance novelist Toronto—A novel set [ Read more...]
I've been working hard each day this week to find time to do a little work on my writing, even if it's just 15 minutes a day. Doesn't matter what I work on as long as I do something! Tonight, I started thinking about my next Manziuk and Ryan Mystery. I know what the setting is (decided on that about 10 years ago, and refined it recently :0 ) and I know who the characters are, more or less. But I didn't know who the murder victim is or what the catalytic event that starts the story is or who [ Read more...]
Unfortunately, the way it works is that when there are urgent things needing doing for The Word Guild, my own writing gets sadly neglected – including this site. I've actually been working like mad on Write! Canada and on starting a new site for The Word Guild Awards. But I was reminded last night that I ought to mention that I have been shortlisted for three awards. well, two stories. Both of them from Hot Apple Cider. "The Diamond Ring" is shortlisted for the General Readership article, along with three others. And both it and "My Letter to the Editor" [ Read more...]
Some days it feels as if I'm being eaten alive by a million little mosquitoes. I look at my to-do list of maybe 20 items, and I try to work through them. But at the end of the day, my list is always longer, instead of shorter! None of the items that have been added are usually that huge, but each one seems to take just a little bit of my blood out and leave me tired, frustrated, and wondering where I went wrong. Okay, that's my explanation for not posting here recently. And now, I will respond to a [ Read more...]
I posted this on the Write! Canada website today. Even if you aren't a writer, you might find it a fun read. In the fall of 1995, when Audrey Dorsch resigned as the editor of Faith Today and director of the God Uses Ink Conference, I was part of the planning committee. Even though Faith Today was short-staffed and assistant editor Marianne Meed Ward knew she could not handle the workload of both putting out the magazine and organizing the conference, we decided to go ahead and hold the 1996 conference. Larry Matthews, who had been part of the committee, [ Read more...]
Today is my husband's last day with IBM. He just left to turn in his laptop. I'm sure it must be a strange feeling. In actual fact, he hasn't worked in an office for over 15 years. He simply walked to a room in our house, turned on his computer, picked up his phone, and dialed in to "work." I remember during the winter Olympics a few years back, one of our sons looked in at 6 in the morning to see his dad wearing a housecoat, sipping coffee, and talking on the phone while watching Olympic coverage on the [ Read more...]
I have begun work on my novel in progress (nip?) – the one I began 9 or so years ago and then basically ignored. Step one has involved massive characters change. I'm basically sticking to my original group of people, but they're all going under the microscope. Renata Torres is now Renee Beachamp. And from being from Puerto Rico, she's now Metis. (Note: I have no idea how to make e's with accents in WordPress.) Tony Miller (formerly Devalano) is now of German/English ancestry instead of Italian/English. Elinor Entwhistle is now Loewen, with a Mennonite background. And so on. And [ Read more...]
