My year in reading

Happy New Year! I have been a bad blogger (read: AWOL blogger) recently, and there are many reasons for that. One of the big ones, though, is that my life has changed a lot in the last eight months and that has thrown a lot of my reading habits into disarray. I love reading and I love blogging about it, so I'm going to really think about how to better prioritize those two things in 2013.

In the meantime, here's what I read in 2012:

Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov (translated by George Bird)
The Winter Palace by Eva Stachniak
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
The Antagonist by Lynn Coady
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh by Michael Chabon
The Paris Wife by Paula McClain
Dr. Brinkley’s Tower by Robert Hough
Coventry by Helen Humphreys
Radio Belly by Buffy Cram
Irma Voth by Miriam Toews
Touch by Alexi Zentner
Alone in the Classroom by Elizabeth Hay
Seen Reading by Julie Wilson
Hark! A Vagrant by Kate Beaton
Instruction Manual for Swallowing by Adam Marek
The Headmaster’s Wager by Vincent Lam
Magnified World by Grace O’Connell
Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger
A Complicated Kindess by Miriam Toews
All Wound Up by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee
Above All Things by Tanis Rideout
That Summer in Paris by Morely Callaghan
Open by Lisa Moore
The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
The Reading List by Leslie Shimotakahara
Better Living Through Plastic Explosives by Zsuzsi Gartner
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
One Good Hustle by Billie Livingston
The Blue Book by A.L. Kennedy
The Deception of Livvy Higgs by Donna Morrissey
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
Mister Roger and Me by Marie-Renée Lavoie
Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card
The Blondes by Emily Schultz
My Life in France by Julia Child
Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner
84, Charring Cross Road by Helene Hanff

That's 41 books. I'm partway through the 42nd book I started in 2012 (Sleeping Funny by Miranda Hill) and also listened to 3 audiobooks (When You Are Engulfed in Flames, Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, and Me Talk Pretty One Day all by David Sedaris, who I think his hilarious). 
As a total number, it's fewer books than last year, but in a way I'm happier about what it represents. It can get really easy to start reading for numbers – choosing short or easy books because you know you'll get through them quickly and they'll pad your total. Competitive reading may sound silly, but on the Internet there is always someone to compare yourself to, especially if you admire them. Certainly one of the reasons my reading list is shorter this year is because I have partially changed jobs and thus have much less of a commute during which to read. Another big reason is because of all the knitting I did (that, at least in part, explains the audiobooks). I also joined a couple of book clubs, and experience I'm really enjoying because they push me to read outside my comfort zone. 

Here's what my reading looks like, by the numbers:
Novels: 27 Non-fiction: 7 Short-fiction: 6 Comic: 1

Female author: 28 (two novels by Miriam Toews) Male author: 12

I had a great year for short-fiction and non-fiction, and I can remember plot details about every novel I read, as well as how I felt about them, which is pretty great. Overall, I'm happy with my reading, and that I let myself linger with books I loved rather than trying to race through them on some self-imposed deadline. 

2012 was, for me, a great year for reading. I've been debating whether to do a best-of list, and I think instead I'll just make a list of the books that still stand out as memorable and recommendable now that I have the whole list in front of me (it's easy to be enthusiastic while reading or just after finishing, only to have the book recede after some time has passed). In no particular order, here are the books I read this year that I want to reread (or want you to read, so we can talk about them):

The Antagonist by Lynn Coady (I stil think about Rank sometimes and wonder how he's doing.)
Irma Voth by Miriam Toews (She needs to write something else soon!)
Touch by Alexi Zentner (I still get a little breathless when I think about this story.)
Seen Reading by Julie Wilson (So inventive and fun – as a TTC rider/reader, this is omnipresent.)
Above All Things by Tanis Rideout (Mountaineering is fascinating, and the writing is so excellent.)
The Blue Book by A.L. Kennedy (More than any other book this year, this one threw my heart around.)
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (It pissed me off and you should probably read it.)
My Life in France by Julia Child (One day, I will live in France again.)
Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner (The writing is so, so beautiful and frustrating and real.)

What were your top reads of 2012?

S.T.E.L.L.A.A. & Child Literacy

Not that long ago, I listened to a Radiolab podcast about colour and it blew my mind. Now, I'll be the first to admit that their brand of science-y storytelling can often do that, but this was different. In the show (which I highly recommend you listen to), they talked not only about how colour works and where it comes from and that sort of thing – they also talked about the language of colour. Specifically, they spoke to a linguist Guy Deutscher about William Gladstone's reading of The Odyssey and how, even though that book takes place mostly in locations surrounded by water, the word "blue" is never used. Not once. The conclusion? That blue didn't exist for Homer. He didn't have a word for it, so he couldn't express it (he instead describes the sea as "wine-dark"). Colour words, it seems, develop in stages that are consistent across cultures, with blue being the last major one to come into play. Crazy, right?

I have been thinking about this a lot since I listened to that podcast, so when Carrie MacMillan contacted me about being part of the S.T.E.L.L.A.A. blog tour, the two ideas meshed. S.T.E.L.L.A.A. works to eradicate poverty in Africa by providing literacy and educational tools to communities. It's a small thing, but it can have a huge impact. One of the ways S.T.E.L.L.A.A. provides these tools is through books donated in Canada and delivered to various African communities (part of their philosophy is to promote environmental responsibility, and reusing books is a great way to do that).

When I was a kid, I was lucky enough to grow up in a house filled with books. My parents were (and remain) readers, so from the word go I was surrounded by books. I was read to, I was encouraged to pick up books and flip through them (and later, of course, to read them myself). For me, books were a way to go somewhere else. I was never going to experience 19th century Prince Edward Island or the pioneer days in the U.S. for myself, but Lucy Maud Montgomery and Laura Ingalls Wilder could take me there. I was never going to take a boat past Patagonia, but thanks to Sue Scullard's Miss Fanshawe and the Great Dragon Adventure I not only got to see the mountains of Patagonia, but also to follow along as the heroine discovered dragons at the centre of the Earth. I still have never been to the Netherlands, but because I was read (many, many times) The Cow Who Fell Into the Canal by Phyllis Krazilovsky, I was given a way to imagine it anyway.

That's the point, really. Reading, and being read to, as a child feeds your imagination with a world of images and and situations and places that you might never experience first-hand, but can dream about nonetheless. As kids, my sisters and I weren't allowed to watch much TV, so our free time was spent reading and playing, and the vast majority of our games were fuelled by our incredibly active imaginations. Even though there were certainly times when, like Homer I suppose, we lacked the word for whatever it was we wanted to describe, we had the imaginations to come up with something else.

In Orwell's 1984 there is the suggestion that if we lack the word for something, we can't think it; fostering active imaginations in children defeats that, because if you have an imagination, there is always a way to express yourself. (No word for blue? Fine then, I'll say it's "wine-dark.")

As my contribution to the S.T.E.L.L.A.A. blog tour, I'd like to encourage you to donate your (gently) used books to their cause. Local libraries are certainly deserving as well, but even if you put every second or third book aside, it makes a difference. In addition to picture books and fiction, S.T.E.L.L.A.A. needs text books. Subjects such as math and basic science – in which not a lot really changes between editions – are greatly appreciated, and put to excellent use. Education and imagination are extraordinarily empowering, although it's easy to forget that living as we do in a society where both those things are so normalized.

Now, it's tempting to say that every book will be appreciated, but it's important to remember the context in which these books will be read. Cookbooks, books about home decor, etc. are of little use to communities looking to improve education. Yes, they can be tools for imagination, but they depict a reality so incredibly different that at best they are useless and at worst, insulting. S.T.E.L.L.A.A. also stays away from evangelical and political work, so please consider that when planning books to donate (an illustrated book of parables may have been a family favourite in your house, but may not jive with a community it's sent to, and respecting that is important). The full list of guidelines for donation are here – for the most part, your books are welcomed with open arms.

All the drop-off points are in Toronto; however, I asked about sending books by mail, and was given this address:

STELLAA 

9200 Weston Road

PO Box 92092

Vaughan, ON L4H 3J3

If it's a big donation, though, they ask that you get in touch with them about sending it.

Although I often have the opportunity (both through this blog in in my day to day life) to champion books and literature, it's rare that I get the chance to do more than simply recommend a book or encourage someone to shop at local independent bookstore. If you feel similarly, consider donating books S.T.E.L.L.A.A. – Allegra Young is planning to run a book drive in the New Year, so perhaps I'll talk to her about co-hosting. Either way, stay tuned!

Also, this is the second-last day of the blog tour, but if you'd like to read more about S.T.E.L.L.A.A., and learn more about the organization, please take a tour through all the stops:
Sept. 8: Tour launches with Terry Fallis
Sept. 9: Vanessa Grillone
Sept. 10: Amy McKie
Sept. 11: Jenn Lawrence
Sept 12: Allegra Young
Sept. 13: Here!
Sept. 14: Mara Shapiro

Summer reading list

Instead of the regularly-scheduled review I would normally run, today is going to be all about summer reading. If this seems like a cop-out, well, it is and it isn't. Besides being a place where I get to think and write about books every week, this blog is where I point people who ask me what I've been reading lately and ask what they should read next. Never do I have this conversation more than in the summer, when people want to know what to bring with them to the beach or the cottage, or just what they should be reading on the weekends. It seems that, even when people aren't on vacation, summer is their designated time to read for pleasure, whether that means it's filled with guilty-pleasure books of just time to read, period. 

So, in the spirit of summer, I thought I'd do what I did last year and recommend some great summer reads, and also come clean about what I'm planning to read (I mean, you'd find out soon enough, but I guess this way you can track my success, or read along with me). I did this last year as well and people seemed to like it, so I thought I'd try it again.

Six books you might want to read this summer:
The Antagonist by Lynn Coady – Suitably set in the summer, The Antagonist is a one-sided epistolary novel about Rank, a one-time enforcer, who is trying to set the record of his life straight. It's funny, it's heartfelt, and Rank is so fully-realized you'll almost think you've stumbled across a trove of someone's private correspondence. It's riveting.
Irma Voth by Miriam Toews – The story of Irma, a mennonite living in Mexico, has a lot of elements that, now that I'm thinking about it, hearken back to the summer books I loved as a kid. It's a kind of coming-of-age story – certainly it's about discovering who you are and what you're capable of – and it's filled with Toews' signature humour and insight. It's exactly the kind of book that offers up equal parts excellent writing and entertainment, and it is not to be missed.
Touch by Alexi Zentner – If you are not such a fan of the heat, perhaps you can take vicarious comfort in the dark and freezing winters Zentner evokes in his haunting, beautiful, and magical story about family legends and how thin the line between folklore and reality becomes in the dark, empty woods. It's a masterful story, beautifully told, and offers a little something different if you're a fan of the mysterious but tired of detective fiction.
Up Up Up by Julie Booker – Summer reading is often done either in long leisurely chunks, or in short breaks in between lots of activities, and a short story collection is an excellent way to bridge the two. Booker's stories are especially suited to summer because many of them have to do with travel, as well as how to fill the boredom that can set in when our regular schedules are suddenly altered. It's great reading, perhaps even better because it gives you the space to pick it up and put it down guilt-free.
The Forgotten Waltz by Anne Enright – Romance is traditional summer fare, but Enright turns things around a little by writing about a relationship that began as an affair, told from the perspective of Gina, one of the lovers. I've written quite a lot about it already, but suffice to say, it is a gorgeously constructed novel and will more than hold your attention wherever you engage in your summer reading.
The Paper Garden by Molly Peacock – Non-fiction doesn't make everyone's summer reading list, but it almost always makes mine. This is an alternate to the juicy celebrity memoir, telling instead the story of an 18th century woman who invented her own art form. Truly, Mary Delaney's life story is absorbing and juicy enough to stand up on its own, that she managed to become such an incredible artist is the icing on the cake. I'm tempted to point this book toward gardeners especially, since Delaney's art was the immaculate recreation of flowers out of paper, but really it's the kind of intricate and inspiring story that would capture the attention and imagination of almost any reader.

Five books I'll be reading:
Better Living Through Plastic Explosives by Zsuzsi Gartner
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
The Water Rat of Wanchai by Ian Hamilton
The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce
The Age of Miracles by Karen Thompson Walker
(Obviously I will be reading more books than this, but these are at the top of my list.)

So, there you go. What would you recommend people read this summer? What do you plan to read? And, perhaps most importantly, where do you plan to read your books and does that affect what they are? (For example, I try not to take hardcovers to the beach so I don't get sand in the spine, but maybe that's just me?)

Bookshelf nostalgia

In the last month or so I've been thinking a lot more about kids' books that I usually do. Firstly, a good friend of ours became an uncle and has been talking about wanting to prioritize giving books to his adorable new niece; secondly, my cousin's son turned 1 a couple of weeks ago; and thirdly, I spent the weekend at home in Nova Scotia (hence no post last week) and it's pretty much impossible to sleep in my childhood bedroom without being reminded of all the books I enjoyed there – especially the bedtime stories my parents read to me as a kid.

On top of all that, I've been knitting like crazy, which means that my Aunt Pat is constantly on my mind. She was an incredible knitter and sewer, but she was also a wonderful book-giver, and worked as a librarian when my mum was a kid (she is, technically, my Great Aunt Pat, but we never called her that). Aunt Pat had a list of books she felt it was important for her nieces and nephews to read and so, each Christmas, along with a gorgeous piece of handiwork (always accompanied by an identical, Barbie-sized article) came books. I can't remember all the books Aunt Pat gave me over the years, but I do remember getting classics like The Wind in the Willows and The Secret Garden and somewhere I have a scanned copy of the handwritten list she kept that let her know she was on track. 

Anyhow, all of this has combined to make me start thinking about what I would consider my essential childhood reads. I loved, for example, the Anne of Green Gables books and the Little House on the Prairie books – both series my parents read me – and I gobbled up the original yellow hardcover Nancy Drew books, but before that, when I was reading picture books, there were some definite household classics. 

Beatrix Potter's books, for example, were a staple. Both my parents have an English background, and so knew about her world of talking mice and frogs in waistcoats, so when the gas station had a promotion (something like: fill your tank and pay $1 for a hardcover Beatrix Potter book – don't you wish that still happened?) they took advantage and eventually amassed the entire set. I still love those books. The Little Critter books by Mercer Mayer were also a big family favourite, and although I remember liking the Berenstain Bears books by Stan and Jan Berenstain ("no space grizzlies at the table" remains a Hickman saying to this day), I also remember my dad not liking them so much, but still.

Here are some more of my favourites (although I'm sure to miss a few):

The Joy of Books

What happens when you leave the bookstore at night? A book party, of course.

This was shot in Type, one of my very favourite Toronto bookstores and it is just beyond delightful. The fun thing about seeing books in a video (for me, anyway) is that somehow seeing a book you've read flash by on the screen is like seeing someone you know appear as an extra in a movie – it's silly that seeing something you recognize should be so exciting, but it's like you're proud they made the cut. Anyway, enjoy!

What I wrote about in 2011

Yesterday I broke down what I read in 2011, and, it may surprise you, that does not entirely reflect what I blogged about last year. Certainly, many of the books I read I then wrote about (although often not in the order I read them), but I also try to write about older books, literary awards, and various things that interest me. Thus, in 2011, of my 93 posts, 52 were reviews and 41 were tagged as "extras". 

Here's how those reviews break down:
novel - 40
non-fiction - 5
poetry - 5
short stories - 3

Twenty-two of those reviews were of works written by men (with two of Alan Bradley's novels), and 31 were of works written by women (with two novels by Margaret Atwood in there). 

So, what is the point of doing all this? Mostly, I think it's important (for me) to take a step back and look at what I'm reading and writing about. Certainly I write mostly about fiction (which reflects what I mostly read), but it's easy to get caught in a cycle of just reading a book and then writing about it without thinking about how it fits into the bigger picture of what's out there and interesting to read and talk about. These lists help me think about what I should try to focus on in the coming year and, as always, offer you the chance to tell me if there's something you'd like to see more of.

So yay! I'm getting pretty excited about all the reading I'm going to do this year. Top of my list are:
The Antagonist by Lynn Coady
The Emperor of Lies by Steve Sem-Sandberg
The Winter Palace by Eva Stachniak
Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov
Magnified World by Grace O'Connell

What I Read in 2011

I've been doing this list since I started blogging and, I'm pleased to say, every year the number of books I get to read in a year has increased. I was a little worried about this year, since I had a master's thesis to research and write (and none of that work really qualifies here), but I managed to make up for my slow start. In all, I read 51 books (I'm part way through the 52nd), which is pretty alright I think. I'll break down the list at the bottom, but in the meantime, here's what my 2011 bookshelves look like (with links to relevant reviews that I wrote for Books Under Skin) in chronological order of reading. As always, a star indicates a reread, of which there were surprisingly few this year.

Best of 2011

I realize this may seem like a cop-out (especially after I took last week off for the holidays), but rather than post a recommendation today I offer you my top 5 books of 2011, plus a few I read this year that were published earlier. There are lots of year-end lists going up right now, and my usual year in review post will go up on New Year's Day (or thereabouts) as it always does. 

I thought about doing this last week as a last-minute gift guide, but decided instead to wait so it could be a list of books to enjoy in the New Year rather than a stress-inducing buybuybuy reminder. Anyway, here are my Top-5 books that came out in 2011 (please bear in mind that I have not read all the big books of the year yet – my to-read pile is not empty) – links go to the full review, in case you missed it the first time around.

1. The Sister's Brothers by Patrick deWitt (House of Anansi Press)
What can I say about this book that I didn't already say? When I read it, I had no idea I was going to enjoy it so much. Cowboys? I thought, I'm not sure about this. Then of course I realized it wasn't really about cowboys, but instead a vision of the Old West that is just as wild and funny and violent as I could ever have wished, told through a voice so distinct I can still hear Eli Sisters rattling around in my head complaining about his horse. If you have been avoiding this book because of the hype, I suggest you let it cool off and pick it up in February or something – it is really and truly not to be missed.

2. The Forgotten Waltz by Anne Enright (McClelland & Stewart)
In the interest of fair warning, if you're in a relationship beware the power of Enright's writing. I'm not saying this book will make you cheat, but the Gina's voice is so consuming I'll admit it stressed me out a lot. Written as a kind of confessional about an affair, The Forgotten Waltz is a love story that picks apart relationships and love and feels very much like a conversation with an over-analyzing (but perhaps not very self-aware) good friend. It's honest, beautiful, and deeply moving, and even though it made me think all kinds of crazy things, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it.

3. Various Positions by Martha Schabas (Doubleday)
A lot of people seem to search "ballet sex" on Google, and a number of those people have found my blog (and my review of this book, specifically) with that search term. They don't usually stick around. Various Positions was one of the most surprising books of the year for me, because Schabas' treatment of physicality, femininity, control, and sexuality – all explored through ballet and the life of 14-year-old Georgia – were so stunning that I found myself captivated by the beauty of the writing and the darkly original story it told.

4. Midsummer Night at the Workhouse by Diana Athill (House of Anansi Press)
I love short stories, and this collection of Diana Athill's early stories felt like one of my great discoveries this year (I can't really take credit for it though, since it was sent as a review copy). This collection is mostly stories about women in their 20s, feeling their way into an adult life. The stories are all set in the 1950s and maybe the early 60s (as far as I can tell), but nonetheless resonate because of their humour, language, and incredibly distinct voices. I loved this book, and already its stories are on my re-read list.

5. The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht (Random House)
I love a layered narrative, where stories fold into other stories getting put down and picked up as the larger plot progreses, and The Tiger's Wife is perhaps the best example of that I read all year. It's sad, beautiful, and filled with the kind of wonder that comes from hearing about the life of someone older than you. After the death of her grandfather, Natalia returns to the mythology he offered about his life as a way to deal with her grief and attempt to understand him better – the result is one of the rare books you hope will never end, but manages to leave you gracefully when it inevitably must.

I would also recommend The Little Shadows by Marina Endicott and Blue Nights by Joan Didion. 

I also read lots of books that weren't new releases, so here were some of my favourites (not all of which I wrote about):

1. Storyteller: The Authorized Biography of Roald Dahl by Donald Sturrock
2. Come, Thou Tortoise by Jessica Grant
3. The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley (I actually managed to read all the books so-far released in this series in the last year – they were excellent)
4. Nikolski by Nicholas Dickner
5. Holding Still For As Long As Possible by Zoe Whittall

The Unread

In the last few weeks, newspapers and magazines have been unrolling their "best of the year" book lists, and I am once again realizing that I have only managed to read a handful of them. Certainly I've read about many of the books, and I've read some of them, but every trip to a bookstore reminds me of all the books I've been wanting to read and have not yet gotten to. For new releases, I don't feel too bad, but when I spot a book on a shelf (such as The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot) that I've been meaning to read since before this time last year, I start to feel a pang of guilt. Were there books I read this year that I should have put aside in favour of these other books I've been looking forward to? (The answer is definitely yes, but when reading is part of your job, you sometimes read books you otherwise would not.)

I've saved 1Q84, Haruki Murakami's latest, for the holidays, but it's so big (and the holidays so inevitably full of non-reading activities) that I probably won't get through the other books I had planned to read. 

Over at the National Post, this trouble of The Unread has become an on-going series, started by books editor Mark Medley coming clean about some of the classics (traditional and modern) that he has not yet read. Certainly, I've read many classics. I've read The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, all the Anne of Green Gables books, 1984 and Animal Farm, The Great Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises, among many others. But, like Mark, I have not read Moby-Dick or The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series (despite having all three volumes on my shelf and having read Stieg Larsson's widow's book). I also bought the first Hunger Games book in the spring and have yet to crack the cover. Until last year, I hadn't read any of Margaret Atwood's novels (I've since read three); I still haven't read Watership Down or Brave New World, and I managed to get an English degree without reading any T.S. Eliot, Jane Austen, or myriad other big and influential authors. Despite having bought a book of Chekov short stories almost eight months ago now, I still have not read any of the Russians. And, although these are all books and authors I'd like to get to, there are a bunch of recent releases I'd also like to read.

For some reason, it seems easier to put off reading classics. Likely, it has something to do with the sense that they've always been around, so it won't hurt to wait a little, whereas new releases sometimes feel so of the moment, waiting seems impossible. Partly too, many of the classic stories are so classic I feel I know them already. Of course, knowing the story of Wuthering Heights isn't the same as immersing yourself in the language and drama of the novel, but nonetheless, there is less urgency there.

 Miraculously, I managed to read all five of the books I set out to read this year, so perhaps next year I'll  as a classic to the list and see if that helps. In the meantime, what are the unread books that weigh most heavily on you? Will you try to read one over the holidays?

On book blogging

A few days ago, Rebecca Schinsky (an American book blogger and very activer Twitterer) tweeted about a letter she and other book bloggers received from HarperCollins U.S. imprint William Morrow that stated a change in their policy regarding review copies. Essentially, the letter (as discussed in the L.A. Times and The Guardian) laid down the law: no more unsolicited review copies; reviews are expected to be written and posted in a timely manner (within weeks of publication); and if bloggers won't play by these rules, no more review copies. But! William Morrow loves book bloggers, the letter assures recipients. So no worries.

Certainly, this letter may not have been worded to the greatest affect, and it seems William Morrow was taken aback by the angry response the missive received and has since tried to explain that the change in policy isn't meant to be punitive. Be that as it may, the wider response has been interesting. On the one side, bloggers are angry at being treated like free marketing labour – most don't get paid and look at free books as a way to help justify a sometimes very time-consuming endeavour; on the other side are those who see this letter and its response as further evidence of the entitlement of the blogosphere – hacks who think they're real journalists and should be treated accordingly. It's messy and ugly, and I'm not sure either side has it right, but rather than wade into the wider debate, I'll simply explain how it all works here.

So many award-winners: Writers' Trust and a very belated Man Booker

It seems I'm much better at posting shortlists than I am at keeping up with who wins what (or at list posting the winners), but three big awards nights have already passed and with the Giller and the GGs coming up, it's high time I recapped. I could probably pretend that I was planning to do all the Writers' Trust winners in one list (despite the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Nonfiction Prize being handed out in a separate gala last week), but that wouldn't be fair. It did work out nicely though.

Anyway, here are the various Writers' Trust winners:
Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Nonfiction Prize: Charles Foran for Mordecai: The Life and Times (Incidentally, I did a whole series of posts on this award for the Toronto Review of Books, if you're interested in reading up on the other finalists as well)
Writers' Trust Fiction Prize: Patrick deWitt for The Sisters Brothers (He's 1-1 so far, but with two more awards yet to come we'll have to see how he does)
Writers' Trust of Canada/McClelland & Stewart Journey Prize: Mirand Hill for her short story "Petitions to Saint Chronic," published in the Dalhousie Review
Writers' Trust Engel/Findley Award (for a writer in mid-career): Wayne Johnston, from Newfoundland, author Navigator of New York, The Colony of Unrequited Dreams, and World Elsewhere, among other titles
Matt Cohen Award: In Celebration of a Writing Life: David Adams Richards, author of Giller co-winner Mercy Among the Children, among other titles
Vicky Metcalf Award for Children's Literature: Iain Lawrence, author of Gemini Summer, among other titles
Writers' Trust Award for Distinguished Contribution: Alma Lee, founding Executive Director of The Writers’ Union of Canada, the founding Executive Director of The Writers’ Trust, and founder of the Vancouver International Writers Festival

And, two weeks late, but nonetheless still noteworthy, Julian Barnes won the Man Booker Prize for his novel Sense of an Ending.

Phew. I will certainly try to keep these more up-to-date as the season roles on.

Finalists for the Governor General's Literary Awards

I'm about a week late on this,  but the Governor General's Literary Award finalists were announced last week. The GGs award prizes for both English- and French-language work in seven categories: fiction, nonfiction, drama, poetry, children's text, children's illustration, and translation.

Both Esi Edugyan and Patrick deWitt made the fiction shortlist, which means they're each finalists for Fall's four major literary awards: the Man Booker Prize, the Giller Prize, the Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, and now the GG. I still have not read Edugyan's book, but I loved deWitt's and it was probably my most recommended book this summer. Apparently, I was not alone in that. Actually, several of these nominated books have shown up on other longlists and shortlists this season, but it really is nice to see that no two lists are the same.

Here are the English-language finalists (click here for French-language finalists).

Fiction

• David Bezmozgis, The Free World (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Patrick deWitt, The Sisters Brothers (House of Anansi Press)
• Esi Edugyan, Half-Blood Blues (Thomas Allen Publishers)
• Marina Endicott, The Little Shadows (Doubleday Canada)
• Alexi Zentner, Touch (Knopf Canada)

Nonfiction

• Charles Foran, Mordecai: The Life and Times (Knopf Canada)
• Nathan M. Greenfield, The Damned: The Canadians at the Battle of Hong Kong and the POW Experience 1941-45 (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Richard Gwyn, Nation Maker: Sir John A. Macdonald: His Life, Our Times (Random House Canada)
• J. J. Lee, The Measure of a Man: The Story of a Father, a Son, and a Suit (McClelland & Stewart)
• Andrew Nikiforuk, The Empire of the Beetle: How Human Folly and a Tiny Bug are Killing North America's Great Forests (Greystone Books)

Poetry

• Michael Boughn, Cosmographia: A Post-Lucretian Faux Mini-Epic (BookThug)
• Kate Eichhorn, Fieldnotes, A Forensic (BookThug)
• Phil Hall, Killdeer (BookThug)
• Garry Thomas Morse, Discovery Passages (Talonbooks)
• Susan Musgrave, Origami Dove (McClelland & Stewart)

Giller Prize shortlist

After the longest longlist in the history of the Scotiabank Giller Prize was announced last month, the judges (Annabel Lyon, Howard Norman, and Andrew O'Hagan) had quite the job of narrowing down the 17 titles to six finalists. But, that was their job and they've done it pretty well:

• David Bezmozgis, The Free World (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Lynn Coady, The Antagonist (House of Anansi Press)
• Patrick deWitt, The Sisters Brothers (House of Anansi Press)
• Esi Edugyan, Half-Blood Blues (Thomas Allen Publishers)
• Zsuzsi Gartner, Better Living Through Plastic Explosives (Hamish Hamilton Canada)
• Michael Ondaatje, The Cat's Table (McClelland & Stewart)

The winner will be announced on Nov. 8, which means you still have time to try and read all five of these titles (if you haven't already). I will admit a certain fondness for The Sisters Brothers, which I absolutely loved, but my record of picking the winner isn't great. Who do you think will win?

Writers' Trust Fiction Prize finalists

The finalists for the Writers' Trust Fiction Prize were announced in Toronto this morning and, since the Writers' Trust doesn't do longlists, this is the first fiction shortlist of the Can Lit awards season (the Man Booker shortlist came out earlier this month and the Giller shortlist doesn't come out until next week). Esi Edugyan and Patrick deWitt are on this list – they've been on all of them so far – but strangely, Edugyan is the only female author up for the Writers' Trust's $25,000 fiction prize.

Here's the full list of nominees:

• Clark Blaise, The Meagre Tarmac (Biblioasis)
• Michael Christie, The Beggar's Garden (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Patrick deWitt, The Sisters Brothers (House of Anansi Press)
• Esi Edugyan, Half-Blood Blues (Thomas Allen Publishers)
• Dan Vyleta, The Quiet Twin (HarperCollins Publishers)

Blaise and Christie are both also on the Giller longlist with DeWitt and Edugyan, but Vyleta has yet to come up on any of the lists so far. That's one thing I love about the Fall books season. Not only do a ton of great titles come out, but all the awards spring up to remind you of books you might have missed previously, or that might have been launched more quietly than some of the buzzier books of the season.

The winner of the Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, as well as the winner of the Journey Prize and four other awards for a writer's body of work, will be announced on Nov. 1.

Finalists for the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction

I went to a very nice press conference this morning where the finalists for the inaugural Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction were announced. (To clarify, the Writers' Trust has had a nonfiction prize for years, but this is the first prize under the new name, which came about in May when the Writers' Trust announced Weston was the prize's new sponsor.)

Anyway, there were many President's Choice snacks (Weston's son is Galen Weston, executive chairman of Loblaws Companies Limited, who is frequently featured in ads for PC products) and, to add to the drama, before each finalist was named, a CBC Radio personality read an excerpt from their book. It was quite nice, I thought, to get a taste of how different each book's style and content are. And they are perhaps the most dynamic group of finalists for a literary award I've seen.

• Charles Foran for Mordecai: The Life and Times (Knopf Canada), which also won the 2011 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction. In his Skype session with Eleanor Wachtel, Foran said he didn’t encounter Mordecai Richler’s work until Grade 10, when he read The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, a novel that seemed purposefully rough-edged compared to the others on the reading list. 
• Charlotte Gill for Eating Dirt: Deep Forests, Big Timber, and Life with the Tree-Planting Tribe (Greystone Books/David Suzuki Foundation). Gill is a veteran tree-planter who planted over a million trees in 17 seasons. Her short story collection Ladykiller was nominated for the 2005 Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction and won the Danuta Gleed Award in 2006. 
• Richard Gwyn for Nation Maker: Sir John A. Macdonald: His Life, Our Times (Random House Canada), which is the second volume of Gwyn’s biography of Canada’s first prime minister. The first volume, John A: The Many Who Made Us was published in 2007 and won the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction. 
• Grant Lawrence for Adventures in Solitude: What Not to Wear to a Nude Potluck and Other Stories from Desolation Sound (Harbour Publishing), which was also a finalist for the 2011 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction. Lawrence is the lead singer in the Vancouver band The Smugglers and hosts several shows on CBC Radio 3. 
• Ray Robertson for Why Not? Fifteen Reasons to Live (Biblioasis), is the product of Robertson’s struggle with serious depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder. He is the author of six other books including, What Happened Later, which was nominated for the Trillium Award in 2008. 

Each finalist receives $5,000 and the eventual winner (who will be announced on Oct. 25) will receive an additional $55,000, which makes this the richest prize in Canadian literature.

Helen Humphreys on why she chose to reconstruct a historical footnote

I had a piece in the National Post's Saturday Books section about Helen Humphreys and her hew novel The Reinvention of Love. I plan to write about the book here sometime in the next few weeks, but until then, here's a bit of my feature.

When Helen Humphreys stumbled across Charles Sainte-Beuve, it was a complete accident. She was reading something else, and then there he was, mentioned in a passing reference to his affair with Adèle Hugo, wife of Victor Hugo. It wasn’t much, but Humphreys’ interest was piqued and she started to research Sainte-Beuve’s life and his love for Adèle.  

After nearly five years of writing and researching and rewriting, Humphreys’s novel The Reinvention of Love tells the story of Sainte-Beuve and Adèle.  

Unlike Humphreys’ previous novels, which stay in a specific moment, The Reinvention of Love is set over several decades in 19th-century Paris, and recreates not only the affair, but also what came after, allowing it to billow out from France to the Channel Islands and then to Nova Scotia.  

This is not the first book to be written about the affair: In 1834, Sainte-Beuve himself published his autobiographical novel Volupté, and although his novel was written shortly after the affair ended, and all the memories and emotions were still fresh, Humphreys describes Sainte-Beuve as feeling that his time with Adèle was less real after having written about it.  

“When you write about something it becomes a story,” Humphreys says. “When you’re in the midst of your life, in the chaos and the swirl of all of the things that are happening simultaneously, there’s a reality to that experience that is not present when you write about something, because the moment you put something in order, you’ve essentially made it a narrative, fiction. That takes it away from you; that removes it a little bit from yourself.”

Read the rest on The Afterword...

Giller Prize longlist

Well, Tuesday morning are usually much less eventful. But, this is Sept. 6 and that means not only the Man Booker Prize shortlist, but also the Giller Prize longlist. It's a good day to be a reader, is what I'm saying. So, without further ado, here are the longlisted titles for Canada's largest fiction prize:

• David Bezmozgis, The Free World (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Clark Blaise, The Meagre Tarmac (Biblioasis)
• Michael Christie, The Beggar's Garden (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Lynn Coady, The Antagonist (House of Anansi Press)
• Patrick deWitt, The Sisters Brothers (House of Anansi Press)
• Myrna Dey, Extensions (NeWest Press) – Readers' Choice Winner
• Esi Edugyan, Half-Blood Blues (Thomas Allen Publishers)
• Marina Endicott, The Little Shadows (Doubleday Canada)
• Zsuzsi Gartner, Better Living Through Plastic Explosives (Hamish Hamilton Canada)
• Genni Gunn, Solitaria (Signature Editions)
• Pauline Holdstock, Into the Heart of the Country (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Wayne Johnston, A World Elsewhere (Knopf Canada)
• Dany Laferrière, The Return (Douglas & McIntyre)
• Suzette Mayr, Monoceros (Coach House Books)
• Michael Ondaatje, The Cat's Table (McClelland & Stewart)
• Guy Vanderhaeghe, A Good Man (McClelland & Stewart)
• Alexi Zentner, Touch (Knopf Canada)

Having just looked at the Man Booker shortlist, there are two repeating titles: congrats on the double nominations for both Patrick deWitt and Esi Edugyan, both of whom are from British Columbia. Congratulations are also due to the small publishers on the list: House of Anansi Press has two nominated titles (deWitt's being one of them), Coach House Books, and NeWest Press. Many of these books have been on my to-read list for a while, so now it's time to move them up to the top, I suppose.

The shortlist of five books will be announced on Oct. 4 and the winner will be named on Nov. 8. Besides getting a whole lot of prestige, the winner of the Giller receives $50,000 and each of the other four finalists receive $5,000.

Man Booker Prize Shortlist

The Man Booker shortlist came out today and features two novels by Canadians – Patrick deWitt's The Sisters Brothers, which I loved, and Esi Edugyan's Half Blood Blues, which I have not yet read – which is always exciting. The Booker winner will be announced on Oct. 18, but until then, we'll have six books to be in suspense about.

• Julian Barnes The Sense of an Ending (Jonathan Cape - Random House)
• Carol Birch Jamrach’s Menagerie(Canongate Books)
• Patrick deWitt The Sisters Brothers (Granta)
• Esi Edugyan Half Blood Blues (Serpent’s Tail)
• Stephen Kelman Pigeon English (Bloomsbury)
• A.D. Miller Snowdrops (Atlantic)

Each of these authors has won £2,500 by virtue of making the shortlist, and the winner receives and additional £50,000.

In overdrive: Randy Bachman on Vinyl Tap Stories

I moved this week, and in the chaos of boxes and moving trucks and no Internet, I didn't have a chance to post. I will be back next week, but in the meantime, here's a piece I wrote for the National Post about Randy Bachman and his new book Vinyl Tap Stories. It's in today's paper, or you can read it online. 

The first time Randy Bachman heard himself on the radio, he cried. He thought he’d made the big time.  

Of course, that was back in 1962 and Bachman was only a kid, and his band, Chad Allan and the Reflections, was still years away from becoming The Guess Who. Nevertheless, when the local after-school radio program played the band’s first single, Tribute to Buddy Holly, it felt like the real deal. 

“You actually sit and listen to it and you’re in awe and disbelief and you actually cry,” Bachman says, his voice slowing down as he remembers. “We actually had tears. This is your Elvis moment or your Beatles moment or your Madonna moment.”   

Bachman has come a long way since then, both musically with The Guess Who and BTO, and with his radio presence. In 2005, Bachman started hosting Vinyl Tap on CBC Radio. Although it started as a summer replacement show, thanks to the CBC strike that year it got replayed and became a hit. Small wonder: Bachman pours his years of experience and anecdotes into weekly themed shows, playing music and telling backstage stories on topics from everything to girls’ names to transportation.   

The show, which also has a podcast on the way, is the basis for Bachman’s new book,Vinyl Tap Stories. The project collects the anecdotes and insight Bachman offers up on his two-hour show and distills them into themed chapters, each of which ends with a suggested playlist. 

Read the rest...

Why that book changed your life

When people ask me what my favourite book is, I'm a little proud not to have an answer. There are a lot of books that I reread annually, and there are many more that greatly affected me while I was reading them, and continued to afterwards. I like to think I'm lucky that no one specific book stood out. The question, though, of our favourite book(s) is implicitly tied to the bigger idea that a book can change you somehow. I looked into that question for the National Post and here's what I found:

The claim that a book can change someone’s life is one that’s made over and over again. Usually, we brush it aside as a cliché, but what if it was actually possible?

“The idea was to say, ‘OK, now what really are the psychological effects of reading?’ ” Oatley says. To try and work out an answer, he and Maja Djikic put together a study to measure how personalities can be changed by literature. Participants were given either Anton Chekhov’s story “The Lady with the Little Dog” or a version of the story rewritten in a nonfiction style by Djikic, which included all the same information, was the same length and at the same reading level. Participants did personality tests before and after reading. 

The question of the psychology of fiction is one that Keith Oatley, professor emeritus in the department of human development and applied psychology at the University of Toronto, has been working on for 20 years. He and some colleagues started the website On Fiction in 2008 to track work related to the psychology of fiction.

“The people who read the Chekhov story, their personalities all changed a bit,” Oatley says.

Read the rest on The Afterword...