BookLust

Swimming Through That Slush

Oh, and since I was talking about Chronicle Books in my previous post, I thought I'd mention them again, for good measure. They've got a great blog you should check out, which talks about their most recent funky books, and sometimes they venture into some very interesting subjects, such as how their editors deal with the many submissions that they get from all over the world.

Lisa Campbell, an Associate Editor at Chronicle has recently written two very helpful posts for those folks considering submitting a book idea to Chronicle Books. Her first blog entry, written not long after Christmas, is entitled The Grinch Who Opens Your Book Proposal. Ms. Campbell basically writes out a list of all the annoying things that people have done in the past, as a warning to others not to repeat the same mistake, because as we all know (for those who want to be published) you don't ever want to piss off an editor. Kiss of Death. For example, Ms. Campbell suggests that it is not really a good idea to put food samples inside your cookbook proposals:

They almost never travel well…crumbs everywhere. (Plus, taking candy from strangers seems like a bad idea, even though we realize it makes no sense to poison the person you’re trying to woo.)

Good advice, I would think.

In Ms. Campbell's next post on submitting to Chronicle, Skiing Slush Mountain, she gets delves into what she calls her Philosophy of Slush – key concepts which will hopefully guide prospective creators on to a successful publishing path. For example, it's important to have a good base knowledge of who the audience is for your book submission:

When the author says that their book appeals to “everyone” or “everyone who watches Oprah,” I am skeptical. Not even the Bible is for everyone and that’s the biggest selling book of all time! Think it over and give me information I can use. If your book actually only appeals to 20-something urbanites, Don Rickles fans, or suburban moms of teenagers, that’s still a whole lot of people. It’s often easier to publish successfully to a smaller, specific audience–just look at our publishing to see what I mean.

Some very helpful stuff, which could be applicable in many publishing houses, not just one that specializes in art and gift books.

So get going and create some high quality slush!

Pay the Writer!

Oh do I love this little film clip of Harlan Ellison. He's my new best friend. Just a little warning about the content, though: Harlan has a potty mouth, ok?

This is exactly how I feel about working as a freelance artist. I cannot begin to express how bloody infuriating it is to be approached by someone who wants me to give them my work for free. I really get sick and tired of having to pull out that ol' speech about how my talent and time is of value, just like an electrician, a plumber or a lawyer. But I still gotta do it. Just used that ol' speech very recently, in fact, for a very large corporation. Sigh.

Go get 'em, Harlan!! You da man!

Good Granny/Bad Granny story winner 4!

And our final winner in the Good Granny/Bad Granny contest is Sandy Zita with his delightful Bad Granny story. Congrats, Sandy!

Well it was 1979. The place... Woolco’s on Weston road. We were sitting in the restaurant. I was 9 or 10 and working on my rubbery jell-o. My grandmother lit a cigarette (my how times have changed).

As she tapped out the ashes into the glass ashtray she remarked to my mother how much she liked the ashtray. My mother and Bubbie (I’m half Jewish) continued with idle conversation about nothing in particular. As she finished the cigarette, she again remarked how much she liked it. And sort of gave my mother this look.

My mother said “Do you want it?”

Bubbie said “I’d like to have it”

“Take it” said my mother as if it were the natural thing to do.

Bubbie knocked the ashes out into a saucer, wiped it out with a napkin and put it in her purse. I gave my mother a pleading look. I knew it was wrong... I had been told it was wrong.. And here they were.. Working together on the heist.

We got up and left the restaurant and headed for the front door of the store, which felt like miles. I was sure we were going to get nailed. I just knew it.

We got to the front door.

We passed through the front door.

We got in the car and drove home.

Nothing. No one said a thing. I couldn’t believe we made it without getting nabbed.

Bubbie’s gonenow... But the ashtray remains.

Once again, thank-you to everyone who entered, and thank-you to everyone who helped promote this contest on their blogs. I hope people enjoyed this little bit of fun, and if nothing else, took some time to think about their own grandmothers, be they good or bad.

Good Granny/Bad Granny Story Winner 3!

Today's wonderful story from the Good Granny/Bad Granny contest is written by Rachel Green. Congrats, Rachel!

Buckets of Love

Every summer mum and I would have a week in Newcastle. It’s where she came from after meeting my dad and moving to Birmingham. She was seventeen when the war ended and my Nan asked her to write to the soldiers serving overseas. She didn’t know who she was writing to at first, but her replay came from a man in the RAF serving in Burma and they fell in love through faded ink before ever meeting in person.

Mum didn’t drive. Dad did, but we didn’t have a car and he didn’t like my nan and da anyway so we always went on the train. I’d begin to get excited when the train passed through Durham and sped over the river. I’d look out for the Tyne Bridge and the Swing Bridge and then, when we’d got off and stumped over the platform bridge, I’d look for Nan.

She’d be watching for us from the concourse below wearing her fur-collar woollen coat with the big black buttons. She always wore that, rain or shine, summer or winter, though we never visited in winter. I’d run down the steps and into her arm, inhaling the scent of mothballs and leather gloves, Winston cigarettes and Guinness.

I’d have to wait while mum and Nan hugged. Mum would always cry and Nan would wipe away her tears with a white lace handkerchief. Sometimes she’d spit on it first, but I think Nan only did that to me.

Then we’d get the bus back to Benwell and Nan would open the big heavy door with a brass knob right in the centre and I’d run down the corridor past the piano and into the living room where Da would be waiting with his pipe. Nan would follow more slowly with mum, but within half an hour I’d be settled at the table with a glass of Tizer and a plate of egg and chips. Nan always made egg and chips the first day I was there. Even now I love that simple meal for the memories it invokes.

After tea she’d sit in her chair by the fire and tell us all the news about my aunt and uncle and cousins, then at seven o’clock she’d get down the bathtub from the kitchen wall and fill it with water from the copper kettle on the fire. She didn’t hold with trains because they made you dirty and I had to have a bath before bed. I slept in a pair of easy chairs pushed together to form a cot, with a pouffe in the middle to make it long enough. I dreamed of the seaside then, only a bus ride away.

The only toilet at Nan’s house was outside at the far end of the yard. It had a paraffin lamp you had to light with a match, newsprint toilet paper and spider’s eggs in the cracks between bricks. The best thing about Nan was that when I was in my pyjamas she didn’t make me use it. Instead she taught me to wee into a bucket which she emptied herself after I’d gone to a bed

My nan was a good granny, because she let me wee in a bucket.

Good Granny/Bad Granny story winner 2!

Today's winning Good Granny/Bad Granny story comes to you from the always delightful and delicious Cipriano of Bookpuddle fame. So what kind of story did Cippy write? A Bad Granny story, of course! Congrats, Cippy!

The Sudden Disconnect
[An Incidence of Bad Granny]

    I was resting peacefully on the couch, reading a magazine. It was always so nice to come home after a grueling semester of college, relax, and enjoy the pampering from mommie.
    No, I don’t mean she put diapers on me. Often.
    I refer to the constant feedings! Mmmm… she would cook, cook, cook, according to the speed with which I could eat! So, this one evening I was on the couch digesting, and she was at the stove, cooking.
    The phone rang, and I reluctantly got up and answered it.
    “Yes. Sure.” I said into the receiver, setting it down and adding, “Mom, it’s for you. Sheila.”
    Now Sheila is my niece, living in Calgary. My sister Pat’s kid. My mom’s grand-daughter. Sheila has many kids of her own. And she loves to talk.
    Mom turned whatever was currently boiling, down to simmer, and went to the phone. I returned to my magazine.
    For the longest time, the one side of the jibber-jabber I could hear was just a bit of peripheral noise to me. I paid not the slightest attention to it, and buried myself further into the article I was reading. Food being my only real concern, I noticed that once or twice mom even set the receiver down to go and stir my next meal, then she’d return to the phone and pick up where she had left off.
    Jibber. Jabber. Jabber. Jibber. Is anything other than actual chickens more poultry-like than two women on the phone?
    At one extremely animated portion of the conversation, while Granny-laughter filled the room, I looked up at her and calmly said, “Mom, do you know that is a collect call?”
    Beak instantly not flapping! Eyes real big.
    And even as my question mark still hovered in the air between us, the receiver was being slammed into its cradle!
    Not one second of hesitation!
    Not one moment of reconsideration.
    Not a good-bye.
    Not a, “Oh, sorry. Gotta go! Talk to you later, Sheila.”
    Nothing. None of the above.
    BOOM.
    Conversation finished. Decapitated!

    She ran back to the stove, and I flipped to the next page. But I remember thinking, “Ooooooh. Bad granny! Ba-a-a-a-a-a-d granny!” 

Good Granny/Bad Granny Winners!

Apologies for posting the winners late today, but we went away for the weekend, and didn't get back until later this afternoon. But I'm here now, and happy to announce the wonderful winners of the Good Granny/Bad Granny writing contest! First I must thank everyone for entering, and as cliché as this may sound, it really was hard to pick the four winners; everyone's entries were funny, charming, entertaining and heartwarming. But unfortunately I could only pick four, and those four folks are:

Julie Quirke from New Zealand
Cipriano of Bookpuddle fame
Rachel Green
Sandy Zita

Big congrats to you all! Starting to day I will post one of their stories on my blog, and will post the rest this week for everyone's enjoyment. Today's story is a Good Granny story, written by Julie Quirke:

When I was about six I desperately wanted a Barbie doll.  Would anyone get me one – oh no!  I grew up  in New Zealand, much like the suburbs everywhere.  So being trotted off to the local department store, or toy store I would beg and plead – “pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease can I have a Barbie for Christmas or my birthday”.  Of course those were the seventies and you never ever got toys at any other time and you never could guarantee you would get what you wanted anyway.

Well my mum listened, and dad listened with one ear, so I got a huge succession of plastic poppa beads, a ukulele (that must have been dads idea), and lots of hand-knitted cardigans, (just what I needed, when we celebrate Christmas in the middle of summer).

My nana had saved for years, and in the summer of 1976 she hopped on a big cruise ship and sailed across the Pacific ocean.  She toured and tripped all over the USA and saw the sights of  Europe.  How exotic a big trip like that seemed.

That year, at Christmas my nana gave to me a Barbie doll. Not just any Barbie, one with the biggest breasts and tiniest waist I had ever seen.  She came dressed in the tiniest  orange and white striped bikini .  Nana bought a couple of extra dresses, one was a lovely bicentennial dress styled in 1776 fashion, in red white and blue.  Of course I took it out and dressed Barbie up, I should have kept it in its packet – it would make big dollars in an online auction today!

Every time someone asked “ what did you get for Christmas?” I would shove my Barbie doll out so they could admire it, and tell them “my nana gave me this Barbie because she loves me!!”.

When I was ten, I found my nana on the floor, she had collapsed into a diabetic coma.  She died a week later, but I always knew she loved me, because she was the only one that listened to that little six year old me.

Last Chance To Get Yer Granny On!

Just a quick reminder that today is the deadline for submissions to the Good Granny/Bad Granny contest! I'll be accepting stories until I go to bed tonight, so it's still not too late!

Go granny or go home!

Back to School

Tonight I'm going back to school! I haven't been in any type of a classroom since I graduated from my graphic design course five years ago. I'm excited and a tad nervous. And I think I'm catching a cold, dammit! (This is not good because I'm attending a very special party tomorrow night, but more about that later).

I have mentioned  in the past that I am quite serious about wanting to pursue writing for children, with the goal of writing and illustrating my own picture books. Well, talk is cheap, but continuing education classes sure ain't. But that won't stop me – I've signed up for Peter Carver's Writing For Children, to be held Tuesday nights at Mabel's Fables Bookstore.

Mr. Carver is highly respected in the children's publishing industry – he's a writer, editor (formerly of Red Deer Press) and teacher, and just recently was given the Claude Aubrey award for distinguished service within the field of children's literature (I attended the award ceremony – very nice!) So yeah, I'm a little nervous about doing well in this class. But I've talked to quite a few former students (some of whom have gone on to be successful published authors), and everyone raves about this course. Hopefully it will help me in my dream.

Wish me luck!

Madeleine L'Engle, RIP

Oh no. I just read on A Fuse #8 Production that Madeleine L'Engle, author of one of my most treasured children's books A Wrinkle In Time, has passed away at the age of 88.

"When you underestimate your audience, you're cutting yourself off from your best work."

Guts and Gore

Wednesday night, if you may recall, was my evening with my Guy and Gore Vidal. As part of the Luminato festival, Gore Vidal was speaking at the Elgin Theatre, in the company of Adam Gopnik, author and staff writer for the New Yorker.

The tickets were general admission, and we got there an hour early, which I thought was enough time to get a decent seat, but goodness, all the Vidal-lovers came out of their caves that night – the line-up was already quite extensive. And as the minutes passed, the line grew longer and longer outside the theatre. People walking along the sidewalk were curious as to what was going on – who could possible get all these old folk to stand outside on hard concrete for so long? (I haven't got cold hard stats, but I'm willing to bet the average age of the ticket-holders that night was well over the age of 30). At one point a fire truck drove by and one of the firemen asked me what was going on, so I told him Gore Vidal was speaking tonight and he smiled and gave a big thumbs up, but I'm pretty sure he didn't have a bloody clue whom I was talking about.

You know what? I'm ashamed to say that until June 6th 2007, I'd never been inside the Elgin Theatre. It's simply stunning. The perfect venue for Mr. Vidal, I'd say. Very lush and grand. Here's a pic of inside the theatre:

We actually ended up getting pretty darn good seats because although many of the front row seats were reserved for all the grand media muckety mucks, many of them didn't show up, so hoi polloi such as ourselves were able to scramble up to better spots.

Now, should I mention the excruciatingly dull speeches given by Tony Gagliano and Greg Sorbara before Mr. Vidal came on stage? No. Suffice to say it was like getting the cod liver oil before the chocolate cake. Oh, and then John McFarlane, editor of Toronto Life magazine had to say something, too (though thank goodness he had the presence of mind to be extremely brief), and by this time you could see all the people on the edge of their seats, chomping at the bit, ready to kill the next person on stage who wasn't Mr. Vidal. Ok, they weren't going to kill Mr. Gopnik. Maybe. And then finally Mr. Vidal was wheeled on stage by a tall, young man with very long golden dreads. Yes, wheeled – Gore Vidal is over 80 now, and though I don't know what his condition is, he is sadly in a wheelchair, though his mind seemed to be quite intact, at least for the next hour or so.

What to say about Mr. Vidal? He is charming, of course. Very charming. Lovely voice, though not as strong as it once was – there were times that it trailed off into an almost inaudible whisper, and I had to crane my neck and really concentrate so I wouldn't miss what this great mind was telling us. And what did he tell us? So many things. The conversation was obviously not rehersed – Mr. Gopnik asked a variety of questions throughout the evening, but it was clear to all that Mr. Vidal was the one in charge, and he pretty much led the conversation to wherever he wanted it to go.

It's hard to remember all the subjects discussed that evening, because it was just like sitting in a friend's room, relaxing and listening to wonderful conversation (sadly without the alcohol), but let me think....let's see...Mr. Vidal talked a great deal about Franklin D. Roosevelt, and especially Eleanor. Vidal obviously has a great deal of respect for Eleanor Roosevelt, and all that she achieved throughout her life. Though he did refer to FDR in a rather snide tone as 'The Emperor', Vidal did concede that Roosevelt's creation of Social Security and the GI Bill made the US the great country it once was. Was, because of course, Vidal has no love for Dubbya and the Republicans. As far as Mr. Vidal is concerned, it's just a matter of time before "the chickens come home to roost" as a result of George W's inadequate presidency. Which chickens will that be? Well, Mr. Vidal didn't get specific. He left it to our own imaginations.

Some things about Gore Vidal that I didn't know...I had no idea that he was hired as a screenwriter for MGM, and that he worked on the screenplay for Ben-Hur. Nor did I know that he was friends with Orson Welles. Can you imagine what their conversations were like? Two giant, witty egos in one room?

At one point in the conversation, Mr. Gopnik asked Mr. Vidal if he could choose only three of his books to take with him on a desert island, which ones would he take, and Vidal being Vidal, said only one, Creation. As far as he was concerned, that was, and still is, his best work. When asked if he could name any writers that he really admired from the 20th century, Mr. Vidal said the only one was Calvino, because as far as Vidal was concerned, Italo Calvino was the only 20th century writer with imagination – all other writers in the U.S. are unimaginative hacks who only seem to write about domestic matters. I don't agree with the guy, but I wasn't about to stage a demonstration over the issue.

Another interesting tidbit – Mr. Vidal claims that most of the clever quotes found online attributed to him are not true. I think he's just being modest. Who else could come up with great lines like, "Write something, even if it's just a suicide note", or "Whenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies"?

The evening ended rather abruptly– at the end of a sentence, Mr. Gopnik suddenly thanked Mr. Vidal, and that was it. I wonder if Gopnik noticed that Mr. Vidal was beginning to get really tired – he did talk pretty much non-stop for well over an hour. That's a lot for anyone, especially an octogenarian in a wheelchair.

One thought that keeps crossing my mind since Wednesday night, and since that evening with Nader – people like Gore Vidal and Ralph Nader have lived a long life and have amassed a great deal of knowledge, and contributed so much to our society, be it through writing, or political activism. Can you name any contemporary writer or leader who could fill the shoes of these men? Who are the great thinkers and intellectual rebels of this generation?

If you'd like to read some more about Mr. Vidal, here's an interview he gave with the Toronto Star while he was in town.

And if you want to see the ol' crank being interviewed by George Stroumboulopoulos, click here.

As far as I know, Mr. Vidal has been mentioned twice on the Simpsons – once when Lisa Simpson is lamenting the fact that Gore Vidal's kissed more boys than she has, and of course, that episode with Chabon, Franzen and Wolfe:

Yup – you know you've really made it when you're an animated cartoon.

Anyway, it was another amazing evening with another amazing writer and thinker. Now if I can just finagle a way for Guy to see Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn speak, my work on this planet will be done.