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20 April 2011

Snowball, Dragonfly, Jew — the Cobourg launch! the Toronto launch!

OK, I'm breaking the champagne bottle over the bow of my novel tomorrow. The first launch of Snowball, Dragonfly, Jew is happening in Cobourg, at 7 pm at the Human Bean on King Street West. ECW editor Michael Holmes is coming to town to host the event, and local singer-songwriter Shannon Siblock will be doing four or five songs. I'll read for about 15 or 20 minutes. I think it's going to be pretty full-up at the tiny Bean.



Then, on May 11, ECW is holding what it calls its Spring Literary Party. Seven books will be launched. Along with mine, there'll be titles by Frank Davey, Gil Adamson, Tony Burgess, Gillian Sze, Jonathan Bennett and Natalee Caple. Darn nice company.

Back when I did poetry books with ECW in the last decade, I used to grumble at the six-minute time limit at ECW launches. For this event, we each get three minutes (180 seconds!). So I'm hoping some series in Toronto will invite me so I can read more substantively. ECW likes their launches to have the emphasis on the "party" aspect. Fair enough!



Hoping also to launch the book in Windsor, Kingston, Ottawa, and Montreal, perhaps with the spring titles from Mansfield. And then I'll be heading out to launch in Vancouver — maybe in Clint Burnham's backyard — and in New Denver.

But I don't think it's a very good book. It's too literary.

Over and out.
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4 comments:

  1. ZenaApril 21, 2011 10:27 pm

    Oh c'mon, Stu, I think 180 seconds is more than adequate to present a rousing "synapsis" of your book...

    I know, I promised to stop, but it's just too funny a word to let go. I think we should campaign to have it added to the dictionary.

    p.s. Have some champagne for me. I hate the stuff, but I think the circumstances would call for an exception. Heartfelt congrats, and

    Slainte!

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  2. StephApril 26, 2011 9:18 pm

    Are you kidding me about not thinking it's a very good book and that it's too literary?

    Stop talking shite, man! The book is excellent, and it is not too literary. I love literary. But if it had been "too literary" (wait, what does that even mean?), I would likely have got annoyed. Maybe too literary means too self-conscious, too deliberate. And yours was neither of those things.

    I mean this.

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  3. RazovskyApril 26, 2011 9:47 pm

    Aw, thanks, Steph.

    Really, though, I was quoting a blogger who "reviewed" the book, and one of her commenters. The same blogger who said she couldn't write a "synapsis" of it, and that it was a real "mis-mash."

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  4. StephApril 26, 2011 11:09 pm

    Ah yes. I saw that mess.

    Well, I hope my review will make more sense and more accurately project the book. I'm just finishing it now. Complete with photos.

    ReplyDelete