Category: Books

Dear Reader* *A practical guide to helping support a book

DSC02963.jpgDear Reader,

Say you’ve read Girl Runner. Say you’ve liked it. Or even, like this reviewer, say you’ve loved it. You think others should read it too. And you can’t wait to read the next book by this writer. Dear Reader, if this is you, please consider. There is much you can do to help. Small things. Practical things. Things that could make a huge difference in the life of this book.

Here are some ideas:

* Review and rate Girl Runner at the big online bookstores. You know the ones. (Visit here and here.) Positive reviews and ratings help move the book higher up in the rankings and bring it greater visability. (Negative reviews don’t help; if these exist, rate the review itself as unhelpful.)

* Ask for Girl Runner at your local bookstore. If they don’t have it, tell the owner/manager/book-loving-employee why they must.

* If Girl Runner is already at your local bookstore, hurray! Tell the owner/manager/book-loving-employee how happy you are to see the book, and how much you like/love it. Make sure the book’s cover is visible, facing forward on the shelf.

* Buy the book. Sounds obvious, and you already have, right? It may surprise you how often this practical step is overlooked.

* Tell your friends about the book. We choose books for lots of reasons, and a personal recommendation might just be the most compelling reason of all.

* If you have a book club, suggest Girl Runner for an upcoming pick. (Sometimes I even visit book clubs; visit my contact page for more info.)

* If you have a blog, write about Girl Runner. If you’re on Goodreads or Facebook or Twitter or Pinterest or Instagram or whatever the kids are using these days, post about Girl Runner. (And please tell me what the kids are using these days! I need to keep up with my teenager.) Tell people why they’d enjoy the book. “Like” my author page on Facebook.

Dear Reader, Virtually all of this holds true for any book you love. And virtually all writers are just like me: hoping their offering gets found and read. Spread the love, pass it on.

xo, Carrie

P.S. This post has been shamelessly plagiarized from this other post, which I wrote two and a half years ago, immediately after the publication of The Juliet Stories.

Today’s the day

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I feel like I should mark the moment somehow. Today, my third book and first novel, GIRL RUNNER, is officially published here in Canada. Dreaming of this day as a teenager in high school, plotting and hoping to become a real writer, what did I imagine it would be like? Feel like? I no longer know. There is excitement, but it is muted with a weight I probably wouldn’t have guessed, as a teenager. There is satisfaction, joy, even, but tempered by perspective, by years of struggle, by a kind of wondering at my own persistence and determination, and I don’t mean that in a self-flattering way — I mean, I wonder at my ridiculous, stubborn refusal to give up this singular dream, even when it made absolutely no sense, financially or practically or even artistically. I had to write a lot of very bad prose on my way to learning how to write like I wanted to be able to write.

I’m thinking this morning of writers I have admired. How I loved L.M. Montgomery’s stories of orphaned girls, soaked though they may have been in sentimental romance. I didn’t want to grow up to discover that Montgomery’s own life had been unhappy. I wanted her as happy as her heroines, as plucky, as daring, as beloved. There can be such a distance between what a writer puts onto the page and her own life. We may write what we wish to have been or done, we may write to seek forgiveness for a wrong or to seek peace, we may write to escape, because the imagination is powerful enough to carry us somewhere else, somewhere better, for awhile.

I’m not sure where I fit into this, exactly, as a writer and a human being.

I was thinking today that my ever-present theme is the connection between past and present, and how the past leaves its imprints on the present. I have an interest in history (thanks, Dad!). But it isn’t the interest of an historian, who tries to piece together from available evidence the most factually accurate narrative. It’s the interest of a story-teller, who needs facts only as stones tossed into a wide lake, so she can see the ripples spreading out across the disturbed surface of what only seems to be.

I’m going hifalutin’ this morning, I see.

I wonder how L.M. Montgomery felt when her first book was published? And her next, and her third? How did she feel when Anne of Green Gables became so beloved that the author herself was subsumed by her invented character? Isn’t it strange how these characters we create can come to seem more real than us? That is a possibility I’m considering this morning, as I think about Aganetha Smart, the girl runner in my book, and Juliet, of my JULIET STORIES, and the man with the hair hat, from my first collection HAIR HAT. I don’t know quite how to express this idea, but it seems those characters are more real, more knowable, more plausible than I myself could possibly be. I’m human, after all. I’ve done all kinds of things that make little sense, or don’t fit neatly into a plot or storyline. I’m contradictory. Sometimes I’m selfish, sometimes generous, sometimes oblivious, sometimes keenly attuned to the needs of others, sometimes a good friend, and no doubt, sometimes not. I’m trying, like we are all.

But my characters, they’re there, fully formed, on the page, comprehensible. Complete in a way I’ll never be.

Tonight, I’m going to the launch party for GIRL RUNNER here in Waterloo. It’s a party for the book, for the character of Aggie and all that she is, all of her accomplishments, and the richness of her life. I’m going to celebrate her existence. How she came to me, and came through me, is a mystery I’ll never know or be able to explain. This is not something I could have imagined, as an aspiring writer in high school — how separate from my creation I would feel. How grateful. How small. How glad.

Wistful thinking: on being part of a team

 

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Today’s post is an unusual one, for me. While this is a literary blog, of sorts, I write it as a writer going about her daily life, not as a reviewer or critic. This means I don’t review books on my blog, don’t take part in blog tours, nor do I accept review copies. Which makes today’s post an odd fit — I was asked to be part of a blog tour for Michelle Berry’s brand new novel, Interference, and I said yes.

I said yes because I really loved Michelle’s book. In fact, I blurbed for it. That’s my endorsement, or part of it, on the book cover above. Here’s what I wrote, in full: “Michelle Berry’s Interference is an immaculately constructed page-turner that is also, miraculously, a redemptive meditation on loneliness and community. Read it for the beautiful writing, the cast of unique characters, and for a certain tender brutality that infuses the telling — by turns moving, darkly funny, and ultimately warm and illuminating.”

So I said yes to Michelle’s blog tour … then wondered how to make this subject not feel shoehorned in to the larger purpose of the blog. And that’s when it came to me: soccer. (There’s no soccer in the book, I hasten to add; but my life contains up to 60% soccer some days, so it was a natural leap. Stay with me.)

Interference is a book with many threads pulled together around an unusual focal point: adult women, who don’t necessarily know each other very well, gathering weekly to compete in a team sport together — in this case recreational hockey. Until last summer’s concussion, this was me: an adult woman joining other women to compete in a team sport (see: soccer!). I miss playing soccer. This book made me miss it even more. So I decided to ask Michelle (whom I haven’t yet met in person) about her connection to sport. Here follows our somewhat abbreviated conversation, for the record.

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〉 Me: What’s unique about the team experience that made you want to write about it? Were you part of sports teams when you were younger, or is it something you came to as an adult?

Michelle: Four years ago my friend signed me up for hockey. Our daughters had signed up together and, as my friend said, “If they can do it, we can too.” Neither of us had played before. I knew nothing. The hardest part was putting on the equipment. I really had to concentrate on the order in the first season — what goes on first. Several times I had my skates on before my pants and had to take them off again. But when I was finally bundled up in my equipment, when I had figured out my hockey skates, and when I went out onto the ice, it was life-altering. To be a woman covered in equipment (no jewelry, no makeup, no worry about clothing or hair — I was a giant, hulking body draped in ugly, smelly second-hand pads) was freeing. To be a woman in a competitive sport working together with other women as a team was freeing. 

〉 Me: In my case, as an adult and a beginner, I came to a soccer team wanting to play soccer, without giving much consideration to the social aspects of being on a team — and quickly discovered that social dynamics play into how well a team works together. But it was also completely different from being part of a neighbourhood playgroup or book club, in terms of building relationships and friendships around a shared interest. I feel like your book captures the way that being on a team is a bonding experience that leaves a lot of room for privacy.

Michelle: Yes, being on a team works better than playdates and book clubs because it’s a group of people who probably have nothing else in common sharing one same goal. We are there to win (although my team never does and we don’t really care…. not really). And we aren’t there to form friendships and bonds and to make sure our kids play together nicely. We aren’t competing intellectually or emotionally. We are there to do a job. Play a sport. Although friendships and bonds do get formed in the change room, we tend to leave those friendships there. Book clubs, playgroups, those kinds of things, are more about trying to make connections intellectually and emotionally. Hockey is all physical — play well, even play not-well but try, and you belong.

For more information about Michelle, or to purchase the book, click here to visit her publisher’s web site.

So, what do you think? Do you play a team sport, or did you once upon a time? Maybe someday, I keep telling myself. Maybe someday, I’ll play on a team again. Because as much as I love running and spinning and yoga and kettle bells, I’ve yet to find anything that replaces it.

xo, Carrie

A new home in Blogland

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Welcome!

I am posting to you from my new home in Blogland! If all has gone according to plan, the transition has been seamless and you’ll find yourself here even if you’d gone looking for my former address. If I’d moved houses in real life, the same could not be said. This is much easier.

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As with all moves, I expect there to be a few glitches as I figure out the plumbing, so to speak. I welcome your comments and thoughts, and hope you’ll feel just as much at home here as you did in the old blog. If you take a look around, you’ll see there’s more space now, rooms upstairs for events listings and news and information about my books, and the pictures are bigger, but the light feels the same to me. And the colours. And the faces. Just look at those faces.

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Plus, I’ve brought along ‘most everything from the old place. All posts and photos are here too, going right back to the beginning. You can still subscribe via email, if you don’t already. Recipes and books-I’m-reading-now can be found in “Extras.” Packing up and moving all those boxes was easy too: my brother Cliff did the heavy lifting. (His company 10AM.ca does great work, if you’re considering a digital renovation, redesign, or move.)

So c’mon in. Keep your shoes on, we’re not fussy (even if we’re dressed up in this post; trust me, this is not the new normal). Stay awhile. And please come back and visit again soon. I’m really excited to share the new place with you. (Enough with the extended metaphor! Enough, I said! Okay. Stopping now.)

xo, Carrie

Bedside summer reading

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I’m waiting on my new web site to be completed before posting photos from my sister’s wedding this past weekend. I hope that won’t be too long; as with any renovation project, it all comes down to those last technical, finicky details. The new blog is going to look so much prettier than this one that I can’t bring myself to post those gorgeous wedding pics here. Meanwhile, above, here’s what I’ve been reading this summer. Yep, that’s Girl Runner in the pile. With the fall booking up quickly, and the launch party set for Sept. 6th, I need to start selecting and rehearsing scenes for readings. (I did theatre; I’m a big believer in rehearsal before performance, and that’s exactly what a reading is.)

Oh, and about that launch party: invites are on their way, but meantime, consider yourself invited! It’s free, we’ll have food, books, entertainment, maybe even karaoke. I hashed up the Facebook invitation, by confusingly creating TWO pages for the same damn event, which is the sort of problem that comes from being a non-procrastinator born before the existence of the internet. I’ll send you to the event listed on my author page (click here), because it has far fewer confirmed guests, which doesn’t look good, somehow. Is it all about the optics? It’s social media. Of course it is.

I’m in a rambling mood, a confessional end-of-week mood. It’s been a week of big emotions and travel and hard work and waiting and celebrating and a lot of running, literally, including a personal best 10 kilometres this morning, which is nowhere near the personal bests of the best, but nevertheless had me shouting “Yes!” as I crossed my imaginary finish line. Such is the pleasure of achievement for its own sake. I even cleaned half of the house yesterday evening. A whole half of the house! And I played the piano and sang hymns. To sum up: that’s the kind of week it’s been.

All my puny sorrows

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I keep a record of the books I’m reading here (which is to say, there), but occasionally I feel the urge to write about a book I’ve read here (which is to say, here).

Last night, up far too late, I finished Miriam Toews’ ALL MY PUNY SORROWS. This is the kind of book for which book clubs were invented — a lot of book clubs are about friends getting together and drinking wine and the book is the excuse, I get that, but nevertheless there’s a genuine need underlying the concept of the book club. After finishing a heartbreaking resonant emotionally complex narrative don’t you just want to gather some friends immediately and talk about it?

ALL MY PUNY SORROWS is a semi-autobiographical novel about the relationship between sisters, one exquisitely talented and suicidal, and the other a bit of a mess and desperate to save her sister’s life. As in all of Miriam Toews’ novels, the bit characters are as vividly drawn and unique as everyone else, and humour hums silvery through the anguish and grief. But this novel feels different to me, too. It is more raw and immediate, less polished, a straight throughway from beginning to end of almost (seemingly) unmediated experience. People don’t behave like you want them to. They behave like people.

The mother of these two sisters, who has also lost her husband to suicide, is the most brilliantly drawn loved and loving independent fearless woman I can remember reading in a book, ever. Her depth of soul and lightness of spirit anchors the narrative. But even her love cannot anchor her daughters. And that seems to be part of the book’s message (though it’s not a “message” book): that we are responsible for our own lives, that we can only carry the weight of responsibility for the things that are ours to change. And the lives of others do not belong to us, even when we’re mothers. We raise our kids up with love and care, and we offer love and care pretty much forever, as long as we’re living, but that’s all we can do. The mother tells her daughter near the end of the book that letting go of a grief is more painful than holding onto it, but it’s what she hopes her daughter will be able to do.

Maybe if you’ve lost a husband and a daughter to suicide, you understand profoundly how little your love can cure or save someone who doesn’t want to be saved. That doesn’t mean you don’t try to save someone. That means that life is not about problem-solving, even though we may wish it to be so. We may wish to pour our minds into solutions and fix what’s broken, especially on a personal level, especially in families, and that’s a good impulse, I’m not saying it’s not. But to survive trauma and grief without becoming bitter, we have to recognize that we’re not that important. We’re not in charge of other people’s choices. We’re in charge of our own puny sorrows.

What we can offer are small, ordinary gifts. But a gift is a gift, isn’t it. It doesn’t ask for anything in return.

There’s some strangeness to reading this book, knowing Miriam Toews’ personal history, which cleaves closely to the book’s story. It’s difficult to read it as fiction, I guess.

One final observation: it’s been awhile since I’ve read a book that references so many other books. Entire poems are recited by characters, for example. I loved that. Reading as comfort and connection, as a way to speak the unspeakable. Words might not save us, but they may just console us. We read and we are less alone.