Eden Mills!

What a weekend!

A celebration to justify four exclamation marks!!!! 

   
I was really thrilled to be a last-minute addition to this year's Eden Mills Writers' Festival. I'd attended the festival a few years ago, and it has held a special place in my heart ever since. 

The first night was an outdoor dinner in a gorgeous backyard with a magnum of champagne, Wellington's beer, the lovely cake above (which was even more delicious than it looks and upon which Leon Rooke pronounced the most amazing and booming benediction), and getting to sing Four Strong Winds around the campfire before boarding a school bus with the other writers heading back to the hotel in Guelph. (That's the abbreviated version.)

Then it was the big day, where hundreds of writers and booksellers and booklovers descended upon the beautiful town of Eden Mills. 

The lovely stone mill.

Stunning scenery around town

Lilypads galore

One of the highlights of the weekend was finally meeting Amanda Leduc and Allegra Young in person, aka the Bare it for Books girls. And I saw the (amazing!) calendar, too... but more about that later.

I wish I had taken off my sunglasses! But I was too giddy to think straight.

Then, after a quick wander up and down, we went to check out the beautiful venue for the "Young Writers to Watch" event. It was the same place I'd read the last time I was there, and as pretty as I remembered.

Scoping out our reading site, pre-event

My absolutely brilliant reading buddies, Grace O'Connell and Iain Reid.

The lovely Jael Richardson tweeted this photo of me reading!

I especially like the photographic evidence of people actually in attendance.

I was happy our set was first, as it meant I could relax and enjoy the rest of the day. The only downside was that two of the writers I was most looking forward to hearing, Catherine Bush and Wayne Johnston, were each reading in separate sets at the same time. (This happened again later, when everyone was forced to choose between Miranda Hill/Tamas Dobozy/Emma Donoghue and Andrew Pyper/Linwood Barclay/Ailsa Kay and Michael Winter/Joseph Boyden/Colin McAdam.)  Talk about hard choices!

Along with spending time with my fellow "young writers to watch," some of the major highlights of the weekend included meeting and hanging out with David Bergen, as well as getting to meet Catherine Bush, whose books I have loved. Regrets: not tracking down Wayne Johnston and Emma Donahue to meet them and get books signed. I neglected to realize that the Toronto-area authors could and would pop out at any time to drive home. I also really enjoyed meeting some Twitter folks (readers and writers), as well as some very kind readers and listeners who came to talk to me after our event.

So, to conclude: meeting readers and other writers and hanging out with one's literary idols --- pretty awesome!  Plus there was pie:

Pie!

Ottawa, Walrus Talks, Blue Met, photo shoot...and after.

I wanted to start this post with talking about how great a time I had at the Ottawa International Writers Festival, but reading over my last post, I see I already did that!  But really, though, the lovely time just continued through the reading, the post-reading fun in the hospitality suite, my delicious breakfast in my room the next morning...even the nice chat with the volunteer who drove me to train station.  I was sad not to be able to stay longer to visit friends and attend even more of the festival!

In terms of the event itself, I thought it was stellar. Shyam Selvadurai read from his novel, and now I can't wait to de-smokify my hardcover copy and start reading.  And Cathy Buchanan gave an amazing PowerPoint presentation showing the background on the inspiration and real historical details in her novel.  She also very kindly gave me her own copy of The Painted Girls, as she'd heard about my fire.  I couldn't bring myself to turn it down because I'd been in the middle of reading it and was forced to put aside due to smokiness. But I was so excited and distracted by everything going on that I forgot to get her to sign it...doh!! But the bright side is that when I do get my books taken care of, I'll be able to pay it forward by giving one copy of this wonderful book to somebody else.

The festival venue...
(just down the street from my old high school!)

There were lots of familiar faces at the reading, including high school friends and friends' moms, and my writing instructor from Carleton (Rick Taylor)!

With Cathy Buchanan and Shyam Selvadurai 

at the Ottawa Writersfest

I got back to Montreal on Saturday afternoon, one hour before soundcheck for the Walrus Talks event, where I met so many smart people, including fellow writer-types Pasha Malla and Vincent Lam.  I really enjoyed all the talks, especially Rachel Giese's on adoption, and Will Straw's on French and English.  Jonathan Goldstein's was (as you might expect!) hilarious.  And although I have been anxious about my own talk for weeks, I think it went over just fine.  A number of people came up to me to speak to me about it afterwards...and only some of them were family members...so I'm really pleased.  (And even more pleased it is behind me.)

Later on, I gave a reading at Blue Met with other local writers (all happy new discoveries for me, as I hadn't read any of them before: Peter Kirby, Rae Spoon, and Barry Webster).  I wish my own reading had been a little more energized, but I was running on empty at that point.  When I got home just before nine that night, I was so happy to change into warm, comfy clothes and finally eat a real meal (nothing by canapes since breakfast) and watch SNL (a repeat, but we hadn't caught it the first time around, and it was hilarious). 

And Sunday was the photo shoot for Bare it for Books!  I slept in, made coffee, then walked down the street to the nail place for a mani-pedi --- an indulgence I spend lots of time thinking about but actually haven't done since my wedding.  (Strategically, it probably would have been a better thing to do before my two-day whirlwind of events, but I just couldn't find the time.) Then Dallas Curow came over and did my makeup (reading Dallas' makeup tutorials is one of my favourite ways to relax on the internet these days) before doing her genius photographer thing until we had some promising shots. Compared to apartment fires and public talks, the shoot was a breeze (and, ahem, breezy). Thanks so much, Dallas... you are amazing! 

A selfie before I took off the makeup. (Eyelashes!)

The rest of the day was equally perfect: a quick supper, an impromptu movie (Silver Linings Playbook), a Sens win, and watching music videos online. 

I feel almost ready to face the week...and work, and taxes, and the smoky apartment again. 

Baring my soul...anxiety, renos, and Bare it For Books

Emails are languishing, coffee dates are being cancelled, my blog posts are backed up.  This is due to two things:  looming public speaking events for which I need to prepare, not to mention the photo below:

Renovations!

My anxiety over these public events (or rather, my very real need to set time aside to think about what I am going to say) is clashing with an increasing daily need to make difficult decisions (closets! tiles! flooring!) about EVERYTHING under the sun to do with the place we’re moving into. Our renovations are relatively modest, but nevertheless require a lot of attention.  Book promotion and home renovations are not terribly complementary activities, let me tell you. 

I also wanted to share a reminder about the Bare it for Books fundraising campaign for PEN Canada.  There are 63 hours left to contribute on Indiegogo!  There’s also a great article about it today in the Montreal Gazette.  I had a really fun chat with Mark Lepage about the project! 

The amazing Dallas Curow is going to take my photo for the charity calendar, and I’m so happy she agreed to do it!   I’m nervous about posing, but I almost have too many other things to be nervous about to get too worried just yet….

Bare it for Books -- and PEN Canada

All day I’ve had too much caffeine – and excitement – and I’ve got the leg twitch going. 

 

So here is one of those things that I wanted to tell you about…the fun but scary thing I was invited to do:

Bare it for Books organizers Amanda Leduc and Allegra Young

Read about it here and here.

 

I am pretty nervous about this, I have to tell you.  Some parts of a Catholic upbringing die hard, and general unwarranted embarrassment about these human bodies of ours is one thing that has been hard for me to shake.  I have actually turned down free massages because it’s not really worth the stress of having to get naked in front of a stranger.  But that just seems like another reason to do it, really.  

The main reason, of course, is because PEN Canada is an amazing organization that defends freedom of expression around the world.