This week’s Booking Through Thursday question:

Would you say that you read about the same amount now as when you were younger? More? Less? Why?

Definitely, I don’t read as many books as I did when I was young, when I made trips to the library almost every week. As a publishers’ sales rep, I hardly read anything that was not on our list of books to be sold to the booksellers. My focus was narrow. We moved to Bequia eleven years ago, after retiring, and I packed along about 16 moving-boxes of books I’d accumulated with which I refused to part. Dennis built me a “wall of words” (as Marty calls it) - high shelves in both the living room and kitchen - to store them all. For the first years I read voraciously, but also worried (a bit paranoid…) that I’d soon run out of good reading material. I even made up a reading schedule so I would give every book a fair chance, and even began rereading (and reassessing) old favourites. (I know, very anal of me, but then I also have all of those books shelved in a rather strict personal ordering system.) So I continued to “acquire.” I now have stacks of unread books - but books that I do plan to eventually get around to reading - on the shelves and the floor of the closet.

I got off to a good start 11 years ago and literally consumed books at a great pace. But when I began writing my own stories, then studied writing and publishing online, I found my focus (not to mention my time) narrowed, and I became much more selective in what I read. I never liked reading trashy novels in the first place (a degree in English Lit will do that to you), but after studying editing I’ve now become even more discerning and can spot bad writing a mile away. If I could just figure out how to keep that same bad writing out of my own novels…

But back to the main part of the question - No, I definitely read less now than I did when I was younger. It’s a matter of quality being more impotant than quantity. I’ve become much more particular and prefer to read good books slowly, to savour the words and stories written by master authors, to see and try to understand how they work their magic. Just as Tom Conti’s main character in the 1983 film Reuben, Reuben said, I don’t know why anyone would ever want to learn how to speed-read; I’d rather learn how to slow down my reading so I can enjoy every word (or something like that…). Great movie about a writer, by the way. It’s a pity that it doesn’t seem to be available any longer.

And then there’s this to look forward to… A friend in his seventies told me that the best part about getting older and suffering from a failing memory is that you can reread all of the books you read when you were young and it’s like reading them for the very first time - because you don’t remember a damn thing about them!

Griz’ favourite author seems to be Cormac McCarthy. That kitten has good taste!

Here’s this week’s discussion on the Booking Through Thursday blogsite:

I said in August, when we talked about fan mail, that I planned on expanding that to live meetings when the time was right. Well, that time is now!

Have you ever met one of your favorite authors? Gotten their autograph?
How about an author you felt only so-so about, but got their autograph anyway? Like, say, at a book-signing a friend dragged you to?
How about stumbling across a book signing or reading and being so captivated, you bought the book?

A great question for me this week, given my almost twenty years in the book business, first as a bookseller and then as a publishers’ sales rep. I had the pleasure of meeting, and obtaining autographs from, oh-so-many authors over those years. Most were gracious, interesting, fun, engaging, and generous with their time. They were as eager to promote their books and find new readers as I was to tell them how much I enjoyed reading their work. I can honestly say there were only a very few in all that time who were either a pain in the butt or completely shattered any illusions I’d had of them. Only a very few, and I refuse to post their names here. But allow me to reminisce and tell you about some of the highlights…

As a rep, I usually didn’t have to escort the authors when they visited Calgary on their promotional tours. That job (sometimes extremely thankless) was left to the two freelance publicists, Marilyn Wood and Donna Gillmor, who were contracted by the publishers. But I did get to meet most of the touring authors, often lunched with them, or accompanied them, along with the publicists, to readings and signings at various bookstores, the library, and special events. Two authors I had the pleasure to escort became my good friends, and have remained so over the years. I’ve met their families and hear all the news whenever something happens.

It was Linda Granfield’s first trip out West; she was promoting Cowboy: A Kid’s Album. She asked me to drive her outside the city so she could see the Rockies from a bit closer than she’d been able to from her Calgary hotel room view. After she finished her obligations in town, we drove south on what was then called Highway 22X and down the Longview Road, my favourite drive through the foothills. She suddenly screamed out in that great Bostonian accent of hers, “Stop the car! Stop the car!” I pulled over immediately, thinking, Oh, no! Medical emergency! (It was always a great fear that an author would expire during one of these gruelling cross-Canada promotional tours.) Linda flung open the car door and leaped out, spread her arms wide, and exclaimed, “It’s beautiful! These mountains are beautiful!” She thanked me profusely on the way back into the city, as though I had been responsible for putting the mountains in place just for her to experience that day. In my copy of her book, she inscribed, “For Susan, You can be my buckaroo sidekick any day! Happy Trails!” And I’m happy to say I have remained just that to this day!

And Gail Bowen has also been a firm friend over the years since she published Deadly Appearances with Douglas & McIntyre, the first of her so-far ten-volume Joanne Kilbourn mystery series set in Regina and elsewhere in Saskatchewan. Right from the moment we met, Gail and I hit it off and we’ve remained in regular contact ever since. After I moved to the Caribbean, it’s become kind of a rigmarole to buy a hardcover copy of each new book (always from my friends at Pages On Kensington in Calgary), have her sign it when she’s there on tour (or get them to mail it to her), and then mail the book to me. She’s been a great support to me as I’ve developed my own writing, and is always quick to offer a sympathetic email-shoulder to cry on whenever things aren’t going well.

A third author became a friend through a chance meeting. Dennis & I were on Bequia for a vacation while we were both still working in Calgary (early 90s), staying at The Old Fort up on Mt. Pleasant. We had been the only guests in the small hotel until another couple arrived. The four of us dined, at separate tables, in the hotel restaurant that evening and got to talking, as people do while on holidays. They were from Montreal so we had being-Canadian in common. The man asked what it was that I did for a living that allowed me a month-long vacation at Christmas. I blurted out that I was a sales rep for Canadian publishers and started naming them, as I always did, beginning with Douglas & McIntyre. He said, “Why, that’s my publisher! I wrote one book that they published and now I’m writing another…” Oops! I said… But he promised not to tell anyone that I wasn’t back home dutifully selling books into stores right up until the day before Christmas, as I should have been doing… That was Don McKay, author of The Square Mile, The People’s Railway and a number of other non-fiction titles. He and his wife Barbara have remained friends with us over the years and we keep in touch, at least annually. Both stayed with us at different times when they visited Calgary, but they have never returned to Bequia. We’re hoping they will come back again some day.

But in thinking back over my career, and to specifically answer today’s question, there were two other author-book-signing-encounters that stand out in my mind as having been special.

Early on, in the late 70s, when I first started working at The Guild Gallery in Calgary, I discovered that the store could host virtually any author published by McClelland & Stewart because the sales rep, the wonderful Bertha Hanson (who deserves a post of her own some time) was open to promotional suggestions, and that store was almost the only game in town at the time, aside from the chains. So, I met Margaret Atwood, Hugh Maclennan, Morley Callahagn, Pierre Berton, Aritha van Herk, and so many more Canadian icons that were writing at the time. The most memorable was Mordecai Richler who was a very gracious man in person. Yes, I would even say he was humble, although that’s not exactly how he’s known from the public persona he preferred to convey. Richler, I discovered, generally liked people, but did not suffer fools. Bertha surreptitiously pulled a tour-requisite bottle of scotch out of her bag and asked me to find a glass. Then Richler politely requested some water, and accompanied me into the tiny staff washroom where we added a bit of tap water to the glass. (So I can honestly claim to have shared a washroom with Mordecai Richler…) A friend was in the store at the time and called out, “Would you like some ice for that, Mr Richler?” He dashed off to the little cafeteria across the way. The store didn’t get a crowd at all for the signing, unfortunately, so the book sales suffered. But the few of us there did get complete access to this man whose writing I considered to be the best in Canada at the time. I had brought my stack of books to be signed and lovingly took off the elastic band holding together my well-read high-school-then-university-paperback-copy of The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. Richler was visibly pleased to sign that one.

I also felt extremely fortunate to meet Richard Ford, who currently holds the honour of being My Favourite Living Author (a position previously held by Graham Greene and Brian Moore until their demise – it’s a lifetime honour). He was in Calgary promoting Independence Day and I managed to convince his sales rep that I just had to meet the man, I thought so highly of him. I gathered up the books I already owned and purchased the few that were missing. When we finally met, I thought I would melt (yes, his eyes really are that intense in person!) and I literally gushed about what a wonderful writer I thought him to be, and how good Independence Day was in particular. He shook my hand, and in that wonderful Southern accent, said, “Why, thank you. It’s so kind of you to say so,” staring me straight in the eyes the whole time. It was all I could do to push my stack of books across the counter for him to sign. In my copy of Independence Day, his inscription reads, “For Susan, with my gratitude and with the pleasure of meeting you. Richard.” Eeeek! Since then I have always tried to snaffle a signed copy of Richard’s books in harcover as soon as they’re published. Again, my pals at Pages On Kensington have always obliged.

It’s like opening a veritable floodgate to ask an old bookseller/rep to remember the “old days when…” There are so many more stories about authors, and publishers, that I could tell. If you’ve already read this far I congratulate you, but will bore you no more. The Calgary publicists always said they could write a book about some of the author-encounters they had, but would have to wait until most of those people were dead before writing the truth of what really happened on book tours. Oh, if the reading public only knew half of what goes on…

This week, Booking Through Thursday has asked:

Buy a Friend a Book Week is October 1-7 (as well as the first weeks of January, April, and July). During this week, you’re encouraged to buy a friend a book for no good reason. Not for their birthday, not because it’s a holiday, not to cheer them up–just because it’s a book.

What book would you choose to give to a friend and why?

I’m going to turn this week’s question on its head and recommend a friend’s book instead… as it’s certainly something I would recommend to all my friends to read anyway, and have done so previously, now that I think of it. (Still being essentially a bookseller/sales rep at heart and through and through, I enjoy leading the cheer for any deserving friends whenever they succeed in achieving their goals.)

Darcie Hossack has a story, Ashes, included in the collection Half In The Sun: Anthology of Mennonite Writing, published by Ronsdale Press, Vancouver, in 2006. The book was edited by Elsie K. Neufeld and includes an introduction written by Sharon Butala. It’s available in most bookstores across Canada or through the various usual online sources.

I first “met” Darcie in cyberspace last year when we were enrolled in the Humber School of Creative Writing, online division, and she studied under the very effective mentor, Sandra Birdsell. As I recall, the first discussion board posts that got our friendship rolling had to do with food – an exchange of muffin/scone recipes, suitable for baking and eating to aid in the writing process. We soon discovered not only a common love of food, but a shared sense of humour, love of cats, an equal enjoyment of the written word and the craft of writing, and an ambition to one day have our work published in book form. Over the past year-and-a-half we have supported each other through rewrites, edits, hair-pulling agony when things didn’t work, excitement and congratulations when they did, writing contests, and publishers’ rejections. I’m very pleased to say that Darcie is the first of our Humber Alumni Email Support Group (17 members strong!) who has managed to grasp that golden ring we writers all strive to reach. I don’t know anyone who works harder than Darcie, continuing to write a weekly food column published in Kelowna, BC, where she lives (I have posted a couple of her columns on my blog), as well as preparing a collection of twelve short stories for future publication. (All fingers and toes crossed, Darcie!) Her blog is listed to the right in my Blogroll. I can’t think of anyone more deserving of success, which she will now surely achieve, with her chosen career.

So do yourselves a favour – discover a new, and rising talent. Buy Half In The Sun and enjoy Darcie’s story, as well as writing by other Canadian women. And stay tuned – I hope to be able to report more, and very soon, about the continuing, successful writing career of my good friend, Darcie Hossack!

By the way, Darcie and I have never had the opportunity to actually “meet” in person, living as we do so far away from each other, in our respective lush gardens of Eden - she in the Okanagan Valley, me on Bequia. We’re planning that our eventual meeting will be part of a book on which we hope to collaborate…

This week on Booking Through Thursday:

The reverse of last week’s question:

Imagine that everything is going just swimmingly. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and all’s right with the world. You’re practically bouncing from health and have money in your pocket. The kids are playing and laughing, the puppy is chewing in the cutest possible manner on an officially-sanctioned chew toy, and in between moments of laughter for pure joy, you pick up a book to read . . .

What is it?

In my answer to last week’s question, I suggested that How To Be Good by Nick Hornby would be the book to turn to for consolation. I hadn’t read it for a while so have been doing so this past week and I think I have to say it might be my choice for this week’s question as well. It’s so funny! And a far better book than I remember it being when I first read it a few years ago. I think it would make a good film, and I’m imagining that as I read along, starring Emma Thompson as Katie, Hugh Grant as David, and Colin Firth as Stephen. But wait! Stephen gets cut out of the action early on. Maybe the director could call for a lot of flashbacks so that Colin gets more screen time…

Actually, when looking over my shelves again, my answer to this week’s question would likely be two books by Ivan Doig, the first two in a trilogy about the McCaskill family (I never really cared as much for the third). English Creek and Dancing At the Rascal Fair are wonderful reads about the early days of Montana statehood, lovingly written by Doig (most of whose other books are among my favourites), all beautifully written, I might add. Doig, like Wallace Stegner, is one of those unsung masters of the written word who received little attention during their careers because they were always wrongly ghetto-ized as being merely “western” writers, of interest only to people living in Western North America. Wrong!! Their writing dances circles around most of the long-established and highly praised “eastern” writers.

There is a point in Dancing, referring back to English Creek, that always makes me gasp and cry with its surprise, even though I know what it is and anticipate it coming into the story. And, hands down, Doig wrote the very best description, ever, of seeing the Rockies for the very first time…

There in the gap, Herbert whoaed the horses.

What had halted him, and us, was a change of earth as abrupt as waking into the snow had been.

Ahead was where the planet greatened.

To the west now, the entire horizon was a sky-marching procession of mountains, suddenly much nearer and clearer than they were before we entered our morning’s maze of tilted hills. Peaks, cliffs, canyons, cite anything high or mighty and there it was up on that rough west brink of the world. Mountains with snow summits, mountains with jagged-gray faces. Mountains that were free-standing and separate as blades from the hundred crags around them; mountains that went among other mountains as flat palisades of stone miles long, like guardian reefs amid wild waves. The Rocky Mountains, simply and rightly named. Their double magnitude here startled and stunned a person, at least this one – how deep into the sky their motionless tumult reached, how far these Rockies columned across the earth.
– Ivan Doig from Dancing At the Rascal Fair