Tag Archives: Q and A

Q and A with Author Cassie Stocks of Dance, Gladys, Dance

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Photo Credit: Terry Gasior

I want to welcome Cassie to the blog, and hope you enjoy her answers to the questions I posed to her recently via email, I enjoyed her answers immensely!

What was it that made you want to become a writer after having so many adventures yourself?

When I was about seven, I wrote a couple of sentences on a scrap of paper about two people I was having trouble with. I folded up the piece of paper, put it in my pocket, and carried it around all day.  Somehow, I knew I’d done something both powerful and comforting.  As preteen I wrote poetry illustrated by feminine hygiene advertisements from Reader’s Digests (you know – women in billowy gowns walking on beaches). I wrote a gang novel on the back of my worksheets in elementary school and I kept journals for years.  I wrote throughout my adventures in later life as well but it wasn’t until I settled down a little that I had both the time and the brain space to tackle a larger project.

How much of yourself or have you added parts of yourself  into your book?

I think there is something of myself in all the characters in Dance, Gladys, Dance. The details in the novel are a mixture of pure fantasy and real life. I did have a deaf cat called Beethoven that walked across the piano. I didn’t ever sleep with any of my professors or instructors. Like the main character Frieda, I did have a feeling of displacement in the ‘real world’ from trying to live as and have a career as an artist. I have both painted and made papier-mache projects but I’ve never crocheted. I did travel in a bus with a bar band (for a very short while).  I’ve never been a Goth or a ghost.

You are a fellow Canadian. What would be your most favorite “Canadian” thing to do?

I’m not sure, I’ve never skied, climbed a mountain, or played hockey. I was in a canoe once. I’ve drank a lot of Tim Horton’s coffee and spent my share of Canadian Tire money.

What gave you the idea for this novel?

About fifteen years ago, I saw an ad for a stereo. The ad actually said “Gladys doesn’t dance anymore, she needs the room to bake.” I clipped the ad and kept it for years. It might have been a joke, but I wondered who Gladys was and why she would ever give up dancing for baking. In the novel, I changed the stereo in the ad to a phonograph, but it ultimately led to Gladys’ story.

The stories of Frieda and the other women are a combination of my own sentiments, research I’ve done on women and creativity, composites of people I’ve met, and the results of a caffeine saturated imagination.

Besides writing, what other talents would you like to have?

I’d like to be able to do psychic grocery shopping and cleaning by telekinesis (when I’m in the middle of a project, I buy paper plates and plastic cups and cutlery. Bad for the environment, but if anyone wants to start a Save the World – Get Cassie a Cleaning Woman Fund, I’m up for it).

If you died and were able to come back as anything you wanted, what would it be and why?

If I could come back in the past, I’d come back in the roaring twenties. I want to be at a literary salon, as the woman writer wearing tweed pants, paisley silk scarves, and leather ballet slippers (no matter the weather), sitting cross-legged in an over stuffed armchair with a martini, making bitter pronouncements about poodles and the world economy.

Do you have any favorite writers? Who are they and why?

Off the top of my head, I love Kurt Vonnegut (Bluebeard), Nick Hornby (A Long Way Down), Roddy Doyle (Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha), George Orwell (Keep The Aspidistra Flying), Charles Dicken’s (Oliver Twist), Miriam Toews (A Complicated Kindness), Paul Quarrington (Whale Music), F. Scott Fitzgerald (Cannery Row), Stephen Leacock (Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town), Douglas Adams (The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe), John Irving (A Prayer for Owen Meany) and Mark Childress (Crazy in Alabama).  I enjoy a good story simply told, both intelligent and accessible. I like the sense of a story being about itself, but also about something bigger, with a sense of political or social awareness.

Are you working on anything new?  When can we expect it to come out?

I’m working on my second novel called The Amazing Adventures of Mattress Boy. I’m not sure when it might be out. Stay tuned.

Do you have any heroes in real life? Who are they? Why?

My English Spaniel Frieda (named after the main character in Dance, Gladys, Dance to remind myself to write every time I called the dog — sad I know). I got Frieda from the humane society. She was terrified of the world and literally crawled everywhere. With time she overcame her nervousness and decided to befriend the entire world. Two years later she jumped off a second story porch, got tangled in a wrought iron railing on the way down and had to have one of her back legs amputated. Within a week, she was up and around and still runs around now like mad and approaches the world with endless enthusiasm.

What is the one trait that you most deplore in others? Yourself?

Judging others seems to be a recreational sport for some people. I think we need to choose not to evaluate people based on their skin colour, gender, social standing, monetary worth, religious beliefs, shoe size, or whatever the heck people choose to judge others by. Compassion, not criticism should be our beginning point. I work on this myself; it’s easy to get caught up in gossip and nit-picking.

The Beggar’s Opera – Peggy Blair – Q and A

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I would like to welcome Peggy to my blog,  and thank her for taking the time out of her very busy schedule to answer some questions about The Beggar’s Opera.

SR – In The Beggar’s Opera, the book is situated in Havana, Cuba.  What is about Havana that mesmerized you so much to write a book based on this location?

PB -  I’ve traveled to quite a few countries that were once communist dictatorships. I was an election observer during the “Orange Revolution” elections in Ukraine; I monitored elections in Kiev and also in towns very close to the Russian border.  I did human rights work in Serbia with the UN Development Program, training judges and mediators in dealing with human rights violations, and I have visited the Czech Republic several times as well.

Cuba is different from anywhere I’ve ever been. It has a dictatorship with a charismatic leader who is larger than life, and the subject of over six hundred assassination attempts by the American CIA, who even poisoned his cigars. It’s a country that is desperately poor, thanks to the American trade embargo, but has one of the most educated, literate, and healthy populations in the world.

I watched the police in Havana closely when I was there – I was a criminal defense lawyer and Crown prosecutor for decades – and I wondered how on earth they could investigate crimes with such limited resources. You can’t even find pencils or batteries, and there are constant fuel and food shortages. Meanwhile, thousands of tourists wander around, completely oblivious to the harsh reality of the daily lives of most Cubans. I thought that was something worth writing about.

I also visited the Callejón de Hamel  (the inspiration for my fictional Blind Alley) with a pair of hustlers, or jineteros, as they’re called, who were quite happy to rip me off. It was incredible– the centre of Havana’s Afro-Cuban community, bursting with music, art, and Santería, the religion brought by slaves from Africa. (As in the book, there really was a plastic bucket with these poor turtles trapped in it so that people could collect and drink their urine in the hope of living a long life.)

Put all of that together with gorgeous, crumbling architecture; feral dogs and cats, crazy anti-American billboards, and music everywhere, and setting a story in Havana was irresistible.

SR – On the back of the galley I received as part of the Blog Tour for your book; it states that you have been a lawyer for many years, as well as selling houses in the Ottawa area.  I have noticed in the few years that many lawyers who have made the transition to writing books.  What was it for you that you wanted to hang up your robes for more of a literary pursuit?  What is it about selling houses that you like about it?

I was a lawyer for thirty years. For the first ten or fifteen of those, I was in criminal law, and then after winning an important case that involved a treaty rights defense,  I kind of fell into the highly specialized area of Aboriginal and human rights law. ( I actually have a PhD, or LLD, as they call a doctorate in law in this area. Most of these are awarded honorarily to retired politicians at university convocations: I’m one of the twits who actually earned one.)

I ended up involved in long-term negotiations over fisheries and when we finally resolved those issues,  I moved into the Indian residential school claims process. I heard claims of serious sexual and physical assault involving children  as a senior adjudicator, and then as a Deputy Chief Adjudicator. I finally hit a point where I knew I had to stop – I was starting to feel the effects that they warned us about going into it.

After that, I got back into land claims business and quickly realized I could end up sitting around the same negotiating table for the next twenty years, discussing the same files with the same government negotiators,  and not have anything resolved. At that point, I realized the time had come to do something else.

The Beggar’s Opera was actually written while I was working on my realtor exams.

I’ve always loved renovating houses, and I knew  my background in law and negotiations would be  an asset to me as a realtor. It’s one of those things that, looking back, I wish I had done ten years earlier. I love my office and my colleagues and I really like  working with clients. Unlike law, or writing, which can be quite isolating, the real estate community is surprisingly supportive. I’ve enjoyed every file I’ve worked on.

SR - Do you think Cuba in the future would be better off staying as it is, or becoming a democratic community like Russia and other countries have?

I don’t think the current status quo is sustainable, frankly. I think most Cubans are willing to wait to see what happens when Fidel Castro dies. But they are a highly educated, bilingual population (English second-language training is required in the schools) watching economic development take off in South America while they struggle to get enough to eat and live in atrocious conditions.

I think they are apprehensive about what the future will look like without Castro, particularly given their proximity to the U.S., but they are ready for change. That said, there is a real fear that American money will flood into the country and turn it back into the kind of place it was under Fulgencio Batista – a sort of Las Vegas of the south — with a government even more corrupt than the current dictatorship

SR – Who is your favorite character in the book and why?  Mine would have to be Ramirez – the detective who is suffering from dementia, who still believes that the truth is out there and strives to find the truth before time runs out.

PB – It’s funny how many readers have that take on Ramirez. I always think of him as balancing on the knife-edge of corruption, not quite sure which way to go.  I’m glad you like him. I’m quite small and therefore   I probably identify the most with Apiro, who may be short but is much larger than he appears.

SR - Can you give us a hint of what to expect in book two, or am I being a bit too anxious?

The King’s Indian is the name of the second book and it picks up the story right where The Beggar’s Opera leaves off. Inspector Ramirez goes to Canada and while he’s away, women start dying in Havana, prompting the Canadian government to consider issuing a travel advisory warning tourists against going to Cuba. Needless to say, there are ghosts.  I  have a big crush on Charlie Pike, a new character. He’s the Aboriginal detective who escorts Ramirez around Ottawa. (Charlie Pike appears in Book Three, Hungry Ghosts, as well.)

So thank you Peggy so much for doing this.  Below, is a list of the other blogs that are on the blog tour for Peggy’s book, so make sure that you check out what they had to say, what they asked Peggy, or if she just wrote something.  It is bound to be interesting regardless the topic!

Blog Tour Hosts and Dates

The Placebo Effect – David Rotenberg – Q and A

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Please welcome David to the blog, read on what he had to say about what I had asked and a special peek inside something he is writing this moment…..

SR:  If you had to choose would you rather write books for the rest of your life or continue to teach, direct actors? Why?

 DR:  I actually need both. The writing makes me a better teacher, the actors I work with make me a better writer. My initial profession was as a professional stage director. I ran an American Regional Theatre for years an actually directed a few times on Broadway. When I came back home, to Canada, I couldn’t manage to get into that line of work up here, don’t really know why

SR:  In your novel, synesthesia is prominent in the main characters attributes, have you or someone you know come across a person with these abilities? If so, was that one of the main reasons you had used it in your novel The Placebo Effect?

DR:  No one I know has such abilities. I’ve always written about people with special abilities, the five Zhong Fong novels are about a man with exceptional talent in a world where special talents are not honored. When I directed the first Canadian play in the People’s Republic of China the first thing the Artistic Director of that theatre said to me was, “You must remember that you can always be replace”-a fine hello, how was your flight!

Synesthesia simply gives and access to the ‘other.’ There is a lot of material on synesthesia; some of the most interesting is actually the documentary on Mr. Tammet and his extraordinary abilities. There is also a gentleman called the human camera, you can find YouTube stuff on both, and BBC documentaries. As well Mr. Tammet has an interesting book.  Rainman was based loosely on the man who Mr. Tammet thought of as his spiritual father-he passed away a few years back.

SR:  Do you think the world as a whole could make use of Decker’s talent of knowing when people are telling the truth given the state of the world today?

DR:  Sure would simplify a he said/she said situation, don’t you think?

SR:   Is there a special place that you read? Write? If so, where and why?

DR:  I’ve had a private locked room for over 40 years. I usually write there. When I’m stuck I go to the store and buy a nice pad of paper and a new pen and write in long hand for a while. I tend to read in bed, quite late into the night, although often when I’m writing I’m not able to read.

SR:  When can we expect book 2 and three of the Junction Chronicles? 

DR:  Book two of The Junction Chronicles is with the publisher, it’s entitled A Murder of Crows. You’ll have to ask them when it’s going to come out! As well, I have a subseries that I’m working on called Seth’s Dream. At this point it’s two volumes long, very much speculative fiction, don’t know when/if it will get published.

Here’s the opening of A Murder of Crows

Ch. Prologue – An Idyll of Thoughts at T – Plus 4 Days and 16 Seconds

THOUGHTS: This is a foolish country. And this town with its obsessively symmetrical old church is ridiculous.
These people believe they will live forever. They hide death behind walls and bury it in places with names like Pleasant Valley and Peaceful Rest. We in the East know that death is neither pleasant nor restful.

Perhaps we spend too much time thinking about our deaths – but death is real. It is the only certainty. And to refuse to confront a certainty is foolishness. A foolishness that all these Americans will be forced to abandon when we force them to understand that Judgement awaits everyone – everyone.

Look at all these kids and their parents. Look at them. So self-satisfied. So convinced they are special – the chosen ones. And they all love America. Well why not? America has made the parents wealthy and is going to make most of these privileged kids rich too. While backed by their military might this horror of a country makes the rest of the world its slaves. And these science profs up there on the stage invented much of the military prowess of this country while these students all around me are preparing to take their places.

All are soldiers of the oppressor.

But there will be justice – even here, on this pampered campus in Upper New York State there will be justice. It will come – as surely as putting NAME OF CHEMICAL together with NAME OF CHEMICAL will cause a massive explosion – it will come.

Be sure to be on the lookout for this first installment into the Junction Chronicles.   Thank You to David and the Publicity Team at Simon and Schuster Canada for allowing me to be a part of this blog tour. I’m really looking forward to A Murder with Crows.

Now, get reading !!

Q and A with Geraldine Brooks

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How much of yourself exists in your characters ?   Occasionally I hear my own voice a little…Marmee’s thoughts on war, Hanna Heath’s description of working to glimpse the past before the genie fogs it over again, Bethia’s love of the landscape and avidity for learning…When Anna describes her boys in year of Wonders, most of it was about my own young son…

With so many differences in terms of the books you have written, what is it about the subject matter that appeals to you to write a novel about it/ on the subject matter ?  – The books are set in different times and different places, but the themes are fairly constant, I think:  how are people changed by catastrophe/  What does faith do for people, what does it do to people?

What was it that made you or persuaded you to write novels after being a journalist for so long ? -  I wanted to have a baby, and the kind of mother I wanted to be wasn’t all that compatible with the kind of journalist I wanted to be…so I took a chance on a career change, and, happily, it has worked out… so far.

Who are your favorite authors? What have they instilled in you? –   Too long of a list to enumerate.  But I would say Mary Renault’s fiction set in the ancient world is a model for what I try to do.  Marilynne Robinson’s books, Home and Gilead also have been inspirational.  And Jane Austen, of course…

If you were to die, what would you like to come back as, and why? –   An osprey–they have it all–the gift of flight, waterfront real estate, an endless summer and a nice family life.

I am wondering how Caleb would see this world now, do you think he would like it? -  I think he would love the access to information and lament our irresponsible treatment of our environment.

Is there a historical figure you most identify with? Why? –   No, but I would like to be Rachel Carson or Harriet Beecher Stowe, and write a book that changed the world for the better.

Are there and phrases you use/overuse? -   Dessicated. Gnarled.

Besides you talent for writing, what other talent(s) do you have/ wish you had?   I wish I could sing, and I wish I could speak at least six languages.

What is your idea of perfect happiness ? -  In nature, with family (including the dog of course) by water, with something scrumptious to eat and someone telling a hilarious story.

What in your mind is considered the most over-rated virtue? – If it is a virtue, then it can’t be overrated. We need all the virtue we can have in this rather un-virtuous world.

Thank you so much Geraldine for such great answers to the questions I asked ! I hope everyone enjoys them as well.

For my review of People of The Book or  Caleb’s Crossing just click on the titles.

 

Mini Q and A With Author Robert Rotenberg

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I have to say this man is so busy, I cannot see where he finds the time for everything he does! I am even tired reading about it !

Without further interruption, please welcome Robert Rotenberg who has published his 2nd book entitled The Guilty Plea.  It has been released in Canada today, so go out and get it, trust me, you will love it !

With such a busy schedule, what or where, when were you hit with the writing bug? – It is hard for me to remember a time when I didn’t want to write. Tell stories. But the reality of my chaotic life, is that it wasn’t until I was finished being a magazine editor and radio producer that I really sat down to write. Logical time. I’d just started practicing law, was broke so was working about 100 hours a week, we were just having our first of three kids, and of course I was still playing hockey every Monday night. Hey, you need energy to do this job.

Have you taken some or many details from your real life cases and incorporated them into this novel or your previous one? – As you know I’m a criminal lawyer and client confidentiality is paramount. (Unfortunate sometimes, you wouldn’t believe the stories I hear. The other day a new client came in and told me…). In fact it’s not a joking matter, I would never betray a confidence.  So the stories are not from my own cases, or any others. But I truly believe the adage, that the great advantage that fiction writers have over non-fiction writers is that we can tell the truth.

Does life imitate art in some circumstances? – Well, in Old City Hall when Nancy Parish, exhausted, flops into the chair in her office and is overwhelmed by the volume of voice mails, emails, letters, demands on her time. Ask any criminal lawyer.

As the lawyer in the book, do you follow the same principles in your real life practice – not letting yourself believe or disbelieve your clients? – The best chess players always try to see the board from their opponent’s point of view.

If you could choose between being a lawyer for the rest of your life or being a writer, what would you choose? – Simon & Schuster want to sign me for two million dollars a book for the next ten years. Brad Pitt wants to star in Old City Hall, and Angelina (I call her Angie now) is dying to play Sam in The Guilty Plea. John Grisham and Scott Turow want to spend the winter with me in Hawaii working on the screenplay.  I think I’ll go back to bail court (where I was on Monday) for a few more clients.

If you had died and had the chance to come back as anyone or anything you wanted what would it be? Why? – See answer to question 5

What is the one talent besides writing would you want to have? – A better slap shot. Thirty years of playing hockey and it still sucks. But hey, I’m an excellent passer.

If you could live in one place in the whole world where would it be? Why? – Paris me manque. With money this time.

I see on your website that you volunteer for a Rehab Clinic in Toronto.  What was the main reason you decided to go this route?  Have you seen  the worst case scenario ever, and the person has turned around to make a full recovery and a good representation of being clean and sober? – I am the least addictive person you will ever meet. But for 20 years I’ve seen people and families torn apart and destroyed by addiction. And yes, I am extremely proud to say that I’ve seen so many of my clients totally turn their lives around. It is the greatest part of my job.

Do you have any pet-peeves? What would they be? – Those tiny tea pots you get in restaurants that always spill no matter what you do. The way we treat poor people in this rich city.

Q and A with Author Margaret Peot of Inkblot

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Please welcome Margaret to Serendipitous Readings. Thank you Margaret for allowing me to ask a few questions.  She has also sent along a few of her designs to compliment the Q and A!

What is it about ink blotting that has made you such a fan for over 30 years? I think inkblots are magical—an inkblot is composed only of dried ink on a piece of paper, applied in various ways, and yet the swirls and washes, the positive and negative space, gives our brains a little jolt.
When I teach inkblot making, it is always amazing to me, despite the seemingly random mark making process—drip, fold, unfold—that the blotters’ blots all look so different, and yet so akin to the makers. The oncology nurse’s blots look like MRIs, the quiet, contemplative writer’s blots look like serene calligraphic forests, the artist who likes creatures (me) makes blots that all seem to be creatures, the child who loves robots makes one robot blot after the other.

Are there one or two favourites among all of the ones that you have done? This one is one of my all time favorites, unaltered:

And this is one of my favorites, altered (meaning drawn in to with colored pencils):

I am curious, have you ever tried to ink blot on a piece of fabric for one of your other projects? Would it even be possible to do? I haven’t quite worked out how to do it. I know Andy Warhol made inkblots on canvas, which he then stretched. It would depend on the stiffness of the fabric, I think. If you were able not only to stiffen the fabric, say by backing it with paper, but also affix it within the fold line to ensure that the print at the fold was crisp, I think it would be possible. I will have to experiment with this more.

With the amount of different images, thoughts, variations, will there be an ink blot album next to be published as a work of art?

That would be a wonderfully fun book to make! I could include blots that people sent me as well—an extended version of the Gallery section in the back of Inkblot. But, I am always on a mission to help non artists—and artists, too—make interesting marks, loosen up, generate new ideas. I am currently working on two books with North Light, one on Alternative Sketchbooks and another on making a living as an artist: The Successful Artist’s Career Guide: Finding Your Way in the Business of Art.

You talk about inspiration being a huge factor in doing ink blots, what is so inspiring about them to you? I think that inkblots sidestep our inner critic in a wonderful way. You can’t really control the outcome—it is a tiny act of faith to blob the ink and water on the paper and then mash the other half of the paper down on it. And what you see is made by you and yet not made by you—so part of you, the kid part, is purely delighted at the making of something, and the critical part—the part that sometimes doesn’t let you make anything at all because it might not be “good enough,” sort of fades away—because it wasn’t really responsible for the mark, right?
When I am stuck—sad or tired, a little overdrawn at the creativity bank, or at the start of a project when blank paper makes me feel jumpy—I make inkblots. They never fail to delight and inspire me, and take me to the next surprising step.
I made this one yesterday:

What amazing talent !! What do you think everyone ?

Thank you to Margaret once again for being able to share her insights and creativity, the book gives you endless possibilities when doing these.  My son actually said right after coming home from Camp in the United States that he wanted to start on them right away!

Margaret’s Website

Inkblot Book on YouTube ( where she has created many videos for you to get started on your own projects!

These are just so incredibly easy to do, with some india ink and water, paper, you are on your way !

Quickie Q and A with Catherine McKenzie

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Where or what gave you the idea for the main premise in Arranged? – A lot of ideas that were floating around in my head collasced at once. I knew a few men who’d had “traditional” arranged marriages. The Bachelor and similar shows were everywhere. One day I asked myself  – “if an arranged marriage service existed in North America, who would use it?” -  and then I got excited.

Was there something about arranged marriages that made you want to include it in your latest novel? – I think it’s a logical extension of what we see as entertainment these days – people letting others choose their mates for them. I wanted to explore why so many people are willing to do this, and how far they’d go if they thought it would bring them happiness.

What is it about chick lit that made you want to write 2 already, will you continue to write more in this genre, or will you change gears and write another genre? – I write the stories that come to me. I never intended to specifically write chick lit (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) – not in the traditional sense of say, The Devil Wears Prada. What I want to do is write the best books I can and make them as entertaining as I can.

With the advent of more and more people going online to find the loves of their life, do you think arranged marriages or a similar type of introduction services will make a comeback from being a mostly old custom for certain countries, or even larger than it was or is? – I think it is entirely possible. At the very least, I expect a reality television series based on this idea to pop up any minute now.

Do you think that attitudes have changed since the time arranged marriages have been a way of life in some cultures? – I think it depends on what culture you’re talking about. If you mean North America, then definitely, though the idea of marrying for love goes much further back than some people think, depending on the social sphere in which you lived. I think most people in our culture expect to marry for love, and a lot of people expect that love to be the love-of-their-love-soul-mate kind. Which is setting the bar pretty high.

Thanks so much Catherine for you time and the book !

If you would like to win a copy of the book stay tuned after this post to learn how you can.

If you would like to read my review of Spin, it is located here

Here is my previous Q and A I did with Catherine, when her first book SPIN came out.  SPIN just came out re released as a P.S. edition, go and check it out.

 


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Q and A with Author Tish Cohen

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Please Welcome Tish Cohen to Serendipitous Readings.  I became a fan of her work when I read Inside, Out Girl about 2 years ago, so, I was really excited when she agreed to answer a few questions.

1.  In Inside, Out Girl, you discuss a young girl who has a learning disability and bullying, in Town House agoraphobia, and in your latest The Truth About Delilah Blue you tackle parental abduction and Alzheimer’s.   Was there something that struck you about these issues that you wanted to know more about them, then decided to write a novel based or around the topic?

I was fascinated with the issue most of us face as adult children: aging parents. There comes a point where the parent/child roles reverse themselves and the child must take care of a vulnerable mother or father. It is easy to imagine how an adult child will cope with this given a typical upbringing. But I started to wonder what would happen if the parent had grossly wronged their son or daughter in childhood. How would that child eventually cope with taking care of that parent when his or her health is failing? Victor is that parent, and Alzheimer’s is what is rendering him vulnerable and frightened. The Truth About Delilah Blue is largely about Delilah’s confusedness given the above scenario.

2.   Parental abduction seems to be a growing trend nowadays with parents becoming more and more disenfranchised with the legal system and the amount of time it takes to settle a custody battle.  Do you think this has an effect on how or why parents take matters into their own hands?

I do think a desperate parent is more likely to act if he feels the law is not on his side. Often the parent knows he will not have the custody arrangement he desires and decides to do something extreme. I don’t think it is a result of the legal system, which is largely fair and just. It’s more a result of one person’s perception that the system is working against him or her.

3.  Delilah is considered an outsider.  Do you think that her father’s abduction cemented that facet of her into her personality?.  Do you think a child who has been abducted by one of their parents feel or become the same or with more severe traits?

Any abducted child is bound to feel isolated. Typically, they are moved to a place where they know no one and might be sequestered from all family and family connections. These kids are torn not only from siblings and the left behind parent, but also their school and friends and hobbies. Often their names are changed, or their appearance altered. They may be taken to another country. And more often than not, the child is kept away from potential friends. It is a terrible life for a child, definitely not conducive to fitting in.

4.   Is there a Historical Figure you most identify with? Why ?

I do identify somewhat with Virginia Woolf and the way she lived too much inside her head. I don’t, however, have any plans to follow her into the river.

5. Which words or phrases do you use/overuse?

Stared, shrugged, and smiled.  My characters are, henceforth, forbidden to do any of these things!

6.Besides your talent for writing, which other talent(s) would you like to have and why?

I would love to be a ballet dancer. But given the choice, I’d rather be a writer.

7. Who are your favorite writers? Why?

I am obsessed with Elizabeth Strout, Michael Cunningham, and Anne Tyler for their prose and their incredibly real characters.

8.  If you were to die, what would you like to come back as and why?

A less lazy, less neurotic version of myself.

9.   What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Perfect happiness = sitting around with people I care about after writing, working out, and getting incredibly good news from Hollywood!

10.  Which person alive or dead do you most admire and why?

I admire Alice Munro for her gorgeous stories.

A huge thanks to Tish, her publicist, and the beautiful people over at HarperCollins Canada  you know who you are !

My Review of The Truth About Delilah Blue


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Q and A with Kathleen Winter

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You are so in for a treat !  I welcome Kathleen Winter as my guest for my infamous Q and A today.  So, please welcome her to the blog, sit back grab whatever your are drinking and enjoy !

In Annabel, you bring a controversial if not taboo topic to light: individuals who are intersex. What was it that made you want to include this topic in the book and in such a unpopulated place among Native Indians? I began hearing stories of children who were born intersex and wrote a short story exploring this. I had spent time in Labrador and the land there had a big effect on me. In Annabel, I describe it as having a kind of magnetic energy. I decided to expand the story into a novel because the short story did not give all the issues enough room to breathe. The questions involved became too constricted. The subject needed more space, so not only did I give it the structural space a novel provides, I also set it in the wild, strong space I knew Labrador to be.  The culture in which Wayne/Annabel lives is primarily a white European culture with some Inuit influence (his father is both Scottish and Inuit). The Innu also live nearby, and there is German and French influence too. I felt that the land of Labrador, while wild and at times harsh, also had room in it to accept a lot of ideas including the idea of a child born both male and female. While I was writing the book, I came across some modern Inuit art that includes images of people who possess both genders at once.

Is there or would there be a metaphor for being in this location and the topic that Wayne is dealing with – how nature sometimes makes mistakes, but isn’t changed or altered? In the book is mentioned an important lake, deep inland, where the waters flow in two directions. This lake is unnamed, or has a secret name, and it is where Wayne’s father, Treadway, goes when he leaves home to hunt and meditate in the wilderness. This location is modeled after a real location and I feel it reflects the duality in Wayne’s life, a duality I don’t regard as a mistake at all.

How do you think other people would have reacted in the novel had they known about Wayne’s condition – would they humiliate him, or would they embrace who he is and it not matter? In the novel there are people, like his teacher Thomasina, who accept his condition exactly as it is. Then there is his father, who does not judge or disown his son, but who has a huge struggle with the fact that he wants his son to fit into the ordinary world. Then there is another character who knows, but we do not find this out until later in the story, and this character also has a combination of acceptance and judgment. Then there are some characters who exhibit outright, horrific reactions that create danger for Wayne. These are the ones who know his condition. Of the characters who do not know it, I think a similar spectrum of responses might be latent within them. I find it an interesting question to look at the secret and its effects, and to think about what might have happened differently depending on who knew the secret.

Of all of the other characters in the book, which one in your mind is the one that sympathized with Wayne more? Why? On the surface, Thomasina, his teacher (who was also present as a midwife at his birth) is the most sympathetic character. She is the one who insistently believes it would have been all right from the beginning to accept the dual nature of this child. She is the one most at peace with ambiguity, and she is also the person who tells Wayne the truth at times when no one else will. However, there is more than one kind of sympathetic gesture, and I think that through the novel Wayne’s father, Treadway, comes to show a depth of understanding that even I did not know he had when I began to write the book.

What is your idea of perfect happiness? My husband is Quebecois and he has a term: “l’ordinaire”, which he applies to the small, everyday forms of happiness, like being with your child and eating potatoes and laughing at the cat. There is another French phrase, “le petit bonheur”, which I think might mean the same thing. I love rain falling on the window, and I love clotheslines hung with fresh-washed towels flapping over the back lane. These, to me, are perfect happiness. There is a part near the end of Annabel where Wayne looks at things like this from his seat on the train: shovels left against fences, tumbledown trellises at the backs of towns, coffeepots left on balconies.

Besides having a talent for writing, what other talent(s) would you like to have and why? I would like to have developed my musical abilities more. As it is, I have taken voice lessons and sung in choirs, and some of my observations in those places have helped me write about what happens to Wally Michelin, Wayne’s soulmate, in Annabel. While I think I can express a lot of the beauty and sadness and humour of life through writing, I don’t think any art can do this as well as music can. I do compose some songs, but this is an amateur hobby since I do not write music in a literate way and I do it mostly in the house and no one hears the songs outside my family.

Do you have any favourite writers? Who are they and why are they favourites? I love Roald Dahl and E.M.Forster. What I love about Dahl is his unadorned and sometimes shocking truth, especially in books intended for young people, who we normally try to protect, but who see through this. Dahl is a breath of fresh air, and his portrayal of brutality and ignorance in the world is exceeded only by his portrayal of compassion and intelligence, and that only by a hair’s breadth. Forster I can sink into as a reader and lose myself in his graceful, impeccable writing, and his depictions of the barricades of class and gender that I find comprise a good part of my own themes.

Who is your favourite hero in fiction? Is there a historical figure that you most identify with? My favourite hero is Valda, who had her own strip in British comics when I was a kid. If Valda ran out of energy, all she had to do was visit her personal source of blue fire. She walked through that fire and emerged re-energized. I have never forgotten her.

If you died and had the chance to come back as anything that you wanted, what would it be and why? It would have to be a bird, a strong bird who can fly great distances over oceans. I would love to be able to fly to India with my own wings, or to crack sea urchins open on the rocks and suck out their pale orange roe with my beak.

GIVEAWAY:  I have ONE copy of Annabel available courtesy of the wonderful people at House of Anansi.

Giveaway will end on JULY 16, 2010 !

Leave a comment as to why this book intrigues you, make sure when posting your comment, you use a valid email address while posting so that I may contact you if you have been chosen.

Canadian and US  entries only please and no post office boxes !

Good Luck !

Q and A with Author Aviva Goldfarb

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Well yesterday, you got to take a peek inside the cookbook, now it is time to welcome Aviva to Serendipitous Readings and have a chat, so, sit down with your coffee and enjoy the questions I got to ask her recently, and thank you so much Aviva for asking them and welcome !

While not making up new and healthy recipes for upcoming books, what is it that you read for pleasure? Are you reading anything now that is just intoxicating, one that has you so intrigued that you cannot put it down?
Thanks for asking! I’m a huge and passionate fiction reader when I’m not cooking and I am always reading something new and interesting. Right now I’m engrossed in “Cutting for Stone” by Abraham Verghese and it’s mesmerizing and so incredibly impressive and beautiful. It’s also the first book I’ve read that takes place primarily in Ethiopia, so I’m also learning about a new place, and I think it’s also the first novel written by a surgeon that I’ve ever read, and many of the characters are doctors working in a missionary hospital in Addis Ababa.

With a busy family, what is it like around your kitchen around dinner time? Is there a consensus of what everyone wants? Do you plan ahead?
I built my online menu planning system around planning ahead for a week of meals, and that’s what I almost always do for my family. I find that when I get off schedule and forget to plan ahead and shop for the week, than dinner time is much more chaotic and I remember why I started The Scramble in the first place! I plan a balanced menu for the week, usually with one or two meat dishes, one pasta, one fish, and one or two vegetarian meals. I’m usually testing new recipes so everyone gets to weigh in on whether they like the new dish, but if the kids get too sick of trying new things every night than I spend a week revisiting some of our old favorite dishes.

What was it that gave you the idea for this wonderful cookbook?
The short answer is that I had developed hundreds of new recipes since the last book came out and my publisher was willing to hire me to write a new one because the last one sold pretty well!  But here’s the slightly longer answer. Since the last book came out in 2006, I have become more and more enchanted with buying, growing and eating fresh, local and seasonal food because it tastes so much better and is so much better for our communities and the environment.

As I’ve thought and written more about food over the years since I started The Scramble, I’ve realized that we can’t really separate the food that we eat from the way it’s produced and I’ve learned about the impact our food choices have on the planet.  As I started letting myself really think about how food makes it from pasture or sea to our plates, I decided to start to implement some changes in my shopping habits and my family’s diet. As it turns out, these changes have made eating even more pleasurable, rather than forcing us to make many sacrifices.  What’s more, these little changes, such as eating seasonally and locally, eating less meat, composting, and bringing our own grocery bags to the store are simple to make and are the pillars of a more environmentally friendly diet!

I wanted to share some of those changes we’ve made in my family along with the easy, healthy and seasonal recipes that have made it so easy and delicious to eat in a more environmentally friendly manner, so I’ve put them all together in this cookbook.

Are there any other tips that you could pass along that aren’t already in the book?
I’m constantly trying to learn new things about easy and healthy family meals! Right now I’m trying to teach myself about grilling fruit and hope to share more about that soon on my online newsletter on Facebook or on Twitter.   I’m also trying to grow a lot more of my own produce this year and am battling pests that are trying to devour my chard and bok choy before we do! I made a natural spray by dissolving a little dishsoap and cayenne pepper in a spray bottle of water that seems to be doing the trick!

Are you working on a new cookbook? When can we expect to see it?
Well, I’m constantly developing new recipes for my online subscribers, but I’m still busy promoting this cookbook. My cookbooks are a lot bigger than most authors’ cookbooks and I do all my own recipe development  (mine have several hundred recipes!) so they take me several years to develop and write. I don’t expect to have another one out for at least a few years! I hope your readers will find plenty of recipes to enjoy in this book and my earlier cookbook, The Six O’Clock Scramble, for quite a while.

What can fans of your book that haven’t already visited your website expect to find?
On my website I help busy people take the “scramble” out of the dinner hour each and every night! Each week I send subscribers an email with a week of easy and healthy dinner recipes and a grocery list, and they can either use the complete plan or go online and easily customize it for their families’ tastes and schedules, and it will automatically generate a new grocery list! Each seasonal recipe also includes the side dishes and all the nutritional information, so I try to make it as easy as possible for people to get healthy and delicious dinners on the table every night, and I do it all for people for about $1 a week.

Do you ever get so busy that even you have to order take-out? What is your favorite take-out?
Yes, of course, I’m a busy working mom just like many of your readers! Sometimes my family goes out to dinner, occasionally we even order pizza. I also keep a few healthy frozen meals in the freezer for those nights when things don’t go as planned, or we sometimes have scrambled eggs or cereal for dinner if it’s one of those nights.
But my feeling is that if I manage to cook for the family for 5 or 6 nights a week, I deserve to be taken out for a night, too!

Which people are influences when it comes to other chefs, creators of cookbooks past or present?
Oh, so many! I was very influenced by Barbara Kingsolver’s book  Animal, Vegetable, Miracle about the author’s quest to try to live off of food from her own land and community for a whole year. As far as cookbook authors I admire, there are tons, but a few that come to mind right away are Mollie Katzen, Mark Bittman, and Ina Garten,

If you had to pick one favorite recipe out of the book which one would it be and why is it your favorite?
Isn’t that like asking a parent to pick her favorite child? But if I had top pick a couple that I’m really proud of I might go with the Pollo a la Brasa (Peruvian Grilled Chicken), which was really fun to create and has the wonderful flavor of the Peruvian chicken restaurants that are becoming so popular, and the Spinach, Basil, and Red Pepper Wraps, which are really fun to make and are great for a light lunch or dinner and even fun to serve as an appetizer if you cut them in little pinwheels. But there are tons of recipes in this cookbook that I want you to try!  In fact, I’m getting hungry just talking about them…

Thanks so much for inviting me to do this Q & A with you today, and I hope your readers get a chance to check out one or both of my cookbooks!

Nick Interviews Chris McNab, Author

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Please Welcome Chris McNab to Serendipitous Readings.  This is the first ever interview that Nick my son has done, and I think he did a wonderful, intelligent job of it!

You have a doctorate.  What was the main focus of your doctorate? – My doctorate was actually in postmodern theories of literature and history, which I know is a long way from anything to do with knives and swords. My first degree was also a combination of history/literature, and I focused a lot of my attention on military history specifically.

What was it that made weapons and fighting techniques so interesting to you that gave you the desire to write about it? – As a father of two children, I have no love of war whatsoever. In fact, the things that happen in war seem to upset me more the older I get. And yet, the reason I find military history so fascinating is that in war you see the absolute best and the absolute worst in human character, and all the shades in between. You also see history literally in the making. From a technological point of view, however, war is often, sadly, a time of great innovation and creativity. I find weaponry interesting for this reason alone, but also for the way that the weapons soldiers use can literally decide the outcomes of battles, or at least individual survival. In the civilian world, objects are typically disposable. For soldiers, weapons can make the difference between life and death.

Do you have any military or weapons experience? What would that include? – I have never been a serving soldier, and have enormous respect for those who do serve in the military. I am very familiar with using firearms (both military and civilian), however, and have written several books on this topic. I  also practised martial arts for many years, which brought me into contact with bladed weapons, in which I have always been interested.

Why was it that you write the Knives and Swords book? - The Knives and Swords book was a cooperative venture between myself and Dorling Kindersley, a publisher for whom I have always enjoyed working. In the modern age we have become used to weapons delivering ‘death from a distance’, so the prospect of fighting at close-range with a blade only both horrifies and fascinates me. An added interest in the topic was the undeniable craftsmanship in many of the blades, which makes them objects of beauty in their own right.

On average, how long does it take you to write a book? – That’s a very good question, and the answer varies wildly. Depending on the type of publisher and project, my writing schedules vary from a few weeks (I recently wrote a 40,000-word book in 10 days, for example) to about a year. Publishing is a tough industry, and deadlines are frequently very short. If I am undistracted (which is a big ‘if’), I typically write about 3000 to 4000 words a day when I’m working on a book.

How long did it take you to write and compile Knives and Swords? – This project took about six months in total. As well as writing, one of the biggest challenges was compiling all the excellent photographic material, working out what to keep in and what to leave out.

What is next in terms of writing?  Have you started on another book, can you give us a tidbit about it? – I am writing a book at present. The publishing industry is a bit sensitive about giving away details in advance of publication, so suffice to say that it is an in-depth study of a major special forces hostage-rescue mission. Other books are also on the horizon soon. I’ll keep you posted.

Nick’s review of Gun: A Visual History and Knives and Swords: A Visual History

Q and A with Mary Sharratt

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Please welcome Mary to Serendipitous Readings, and my sincere apologies for posting this late, Laptop since Sunday has had a mind of its own.

In Daughters of the Witching Hill you tackle a pretty gruesome historical event that actually occurred.  What was it that interested you in the Pendle Witch Trials that made you want to write about it? – In 2002, I moved to the Pendle region of Lancashire, England—the rugged Pennine landscape that borders the West Yorkshire Dales. Pendle Hill is steeped in its legends of the Lancashire Witches. Everywhere you go in the surrounding countryside, you see images of witches: on buses, pubs signs, road signs, bumperstickers. Visiting American friends found this all quite unnerving. “Mary, why are there witches everywhere?” they’d ask me.
In the beginning, I made the mistake of thinking that these witches belonged to the realm of fairy tale and folklore, but no. They were real people.

In 1612, in one of the most meticulously documented trials in English history, seven women and two men from Pendle Forest were hanged as witches, condemned on “evidence” provided by a nine-year-old girl and her brother, who appeared to suffer from learning difficulties.

What really hooked me on this particular witch trial is that two of the accused, Mother Demdike and Mother Chattox, had established reputations as cunning women. During the interrogations they made no attempt to deny their perceived powers. They gave every indication of being proud of their craft.

Was there something about the strong women that you found in your research that made you want to be back in that time to experience what they were going through and how they accomplished what they did? – Yes, most definitely.

Mother Demdike, called Bess in my novel, had the most infamous reputation. According to the primary sources, she was the ringleader, the one who initiated the others into witchcraft. Demdike was so frightening to her foes because she was a woman who embraced her powers wholeheartedly. This is how Court Clerk Thomas Potts describes her in The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster, his account of the 1612 trials: – “She was a very old woman, about the age of Foure-score yeares, and had been a Witch for fiftie yeares. Shee dwelt in the Forrest of Pendle, a vast place, fitte for her profession: What shee committed in her time, no man knowes. . . . Shee was a generall agent for the Devill in all these partes: no man escaped her, or her Furies. ”

Not bad for an eighty-year-old lady! Reading the trial transcripts against the grain, I was amazed at how her strength of character blazed forth in the document written expressly to vilify her.

Mother Demdike freely admitted to being a healer and a cunning woman. Her neighbours called on her to cure their children and their cattle. What fascinated me was not that she was arrested and imprisoned but that the authorities only turned on her near the end of her long, productive life.

So much has been written about her and the other accused witches. In writing this book, I wanted to travel back in time with Mother Demdike and give the story back to her. I wanted to let her tell her story in her own words.

It was certainly a difficult time in the 17th century when all of these witch hunts were going on in Europe and North America as well.  Was there an actual consensus that there actually were witches in the midst or was it just something that got carried away with? – During the times of active, ongoing persecution, the authorities indeed appeared convinced that witches were real agents of evil in their community and that they had to be stopped. Yet even in the times of persecution there were skeptics, such as Reginald Scot, whose book, The Discoverie of Witchcraft (1584), argued that most accused witches were just harmless old women and persecuting them was unchristian.

Scot was pitted against alarmists such as King James VI of Scotland, later James I of England, whose book Daemonologie (1597), argued that a vast conspiracy of satanic witches was threatening to undermine the nation. In 1590 James personally oversaw the trials by torture for around seventy individuals implicated in the North Berwick Witch Trials, the biggest Scotland had known. The witches’ alleged crime? Raising a storm which nearly sank James’ ship when he sailed home from Norway with his new bride, Anne of Denmark. Possibly dozens were executed by burning at the stake, although the precise number is unknown.

When James ascended to the English throne in 1603, he ordered all copies of Reginald Scot’s book to be destroyed.

What is it you most dislike? – There are so many misperceptions about historical witchcraft. For example, there’s the cliché that witchcraft persecutions were a phenomenon of medieval superstition and that is simply not true. The European witch hunts, spanning from around 1450 and tapering off around 1700, were a phenomenon of the Renaissance and the Reformation.

What talent besides writing would you like to do and why? – I’m a passionate horsewoman. I only started taking riding lessons in my late thirties, then I bought my own horse, a beautiful Welsh mare, about two years ago. When I’m not writing, I’m usually riding.

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? – I wish I could be taller and have really long legs like a top equestrian!

What do you consider your greatest achievement? – What I hope to achieve in my writing is to give voice to the voiceless. To give the people in history who were silenced and disempowered their voices back so that they can tell their stories. If readers are as touched by Mother Demdike’s story as I am, I’d consider that a huge achievement.

What is your idea of perfect Happiness? – Riding my horse up Pendle Hill on a beautiful spring day.

Who are your favourite authors? Why? – I love how Louise Erdrich evokes an entire landscape and community of interrelated people, book after book. And I love the way Sarah Dunant pours her considerable research skills into her historical fiction, completely challenging our (mis)perceptions of the time and place she is writing about.

Who are your heroes in real life? – The story-tellers, writers, and historians who keep the old ways alive and who serve the memory of those long silenced.

Q and A with Catherine Gildiner

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Back in February, I had the pleasure to read and review Catherine’s 2nd part of her  memoirs After The Falls.  This is the Q and A I did with her around the same time.  My apologies for posting it so late on the blog.

I see in the author’s note that you have taken care to protect the privacy of the people you have written about though I expect many of them see themselves on the page. Are there incidents where people have objected to the way their loves have been portrayed? - I have changed the names of the people in the book and I have also changed some locations and dates. (BTW you made a Freudian slip in your question and said “loves” instead of “lives”– Freud says there are no accidents in Vienna!) I have no idea how people will react to reading about themselves. I guess I’ll know when the book comes out next fall in America through Penguin. It came out first in Canada.

Has there been any fallout from any of the people that Catherine wrote about? (Thinking of Skip, Jeff and Valerie) Did she have to get releases/permission from everyone? – I didn’t have to get any permission. I have tried to be true to the memory of my life and the people in it. Memory is not infallible. Just think of your own life and how your memory differs from your friends or relatives. I don’t expect everyone to remember things in the same way that I have. We all have a different perspective.

What was it that made you go and do the psychologist route and not follow in your mother’s footsteps and become a teacher? – My mother was only a teacher for a day. She said she had no idea she would “have to teach children.” Hardly a role model for teaching. If you have read my first memoir TOO CLOSE TO THE FALLS you will remember the chapter where I was sent to the psychiatrist, appropriately named Dr. Small. (I stabbed a bully at school with a compass) I liked the look of his job even at the age of seven. I also have always been interested in what makes people tick. When I worked in the drug store and delivered medicine I was fascinated by how we could all be from the same society and behave so differently.

Was what you experienced in the ’60′s moulded on how you feel and conduct your everyday life now, what has changed, what hasn’t? – That is an interesting question. I am pretty much the same person. I still participate in sports (rowing team) but I am no longer active in politics. Just like my mother, I never cook or sew or do much domestic activity. I still read a lot, and am very active. I am probably more ‘well adjusted’ now only because of the feminist movement. It actually ‘normalized’ my behaviour. I can work, not do housework, be assertive and I am much more acceptable to others. As a boy, or man, said to me at my high school reunion last year, “boy Cathy you are lucky that it is fifty years later and you are right in style now”.

When and where you the happiest? – Probably when I was a small child working in my father’s store at Christmas time with Roy the delivery car driver. We all worked together late every night delivering prescriptions and I felt like we were on a team. I didn’t have any of the complications of adult worries about romance and a career.

What is your greatest regret? – I regret being unkind to my father when I was a teenager. Before I had a chance to outgrow my adolescent rebellion he died and I had spent his last years shutting him out of my life.

What talent besides writing would you want to have and why? – I have lots of ‘talents’– more than I need. (Bright, athletic, witty–obviously not modesty) What I would like to have had is patience and more kindness. Those are probably not talents but virtues. Regardless of what they are called I could do with more of each.

Did you ever find out the reason why the FBI questioned you about the death of Splits? – I never found out directly why but I assume it was because he was involved in drugs and more importantly he and Laurie were involved in the Black Power movement– ultimately the black panthers and the FBI was committed to breaking it up. I had been seen with Splits and Laurie, both of whom had been under investigation for a long time.

In your private practice, do you have a specialty? Do you speak to whoever needs help, or are you specific in whom and what you treat? – I am no longer in private practice. I left it four years ago to write full time. I figured 25 years was long enough. I specialized in anxiety; however I saw all kinds of clients — ‘garden variety neurotic.’

Do you think that the ’60′s changed the world we now live in? What was the most prolific moment of your life living in the 60′s? – Yes I think the 60′s changed the world. Look at the civil rights legislation, and the human rights legislation, the pill, and the feminist movement. They all changed how we think about race, women and independence, marriage and role women play in society. I had many great moments in the 60′s. Most of them came from working with others for social change. I remember clapping when Johnson passed the civil Rights legislation in 1968.

Do you keep in touch with some or most of the friends you had made while living in Buffalo? – I keep in close touch with lots of people from high school. I am still friends with the ‘wild girls’ and the ‘goody-two-shoes-girls. Strangely enough I am in close contact with a bunch of boys in my class that I skied with and went to Brunner’s with. We have a reunion every year in some state of the union and some of them have been to Canada to visit. I am in constant contact with the friend Leora in the book. She is still one of my closest friends and we e mail almost daily and talk on the phone at least once a week. It is a rare opportunity to have friends for 50 years– especially when I have lived outside of the country.

Whatever happened to your one friend’s brother that brought that girl down into the basement in the middle of a meeting? Did anything come of that while you and your friend were hiding? – I am not following the question. The chapter describes what happened while we were in the closet. If you are asking did anyone ever find out we were in the closet the answer is no. If you are asking what happened to that boy that brought the girl downstairs — the answer is I have no idea.

I know that in your forward that you mention that you had this uncontrollable desire to write down your memoirs. What was one of the reasons you had it published? – I had it published because I am a writer and that is what writers do. We publish our work. I wrote the book because after I wrote TOO CLOSE TO THE FALLS I had hundreds of people write me and ask, ‘what happened next?’ I figured if people were interested in the story I should probably write it. I wrote another book in between my two volumes of memoirs called SEDUCTION which is a mystery novel about Darwin and Freud. Then I returned to the memoir. I am now writing a third memoir which takes me up to age 25 and it covers my life in England and Toronto.

Q and A with Danielle Trussoni

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As you know, Danielle’s book Angelology has been hitting just about every best-selling list when it published.  I had a chance to talk to her about the book, and herself.  So, a heartfelt thank you to Danielle for taking the time out of her busy schedule to answer my questions.  My review is here.

What was it that you wanted to convey in your latest book Angelology? – I WANTED TO WEAVE TOGETHER AN ENGROSSING STORY WITH A NUMBER OF HIGHLY RESEARCHED HISTORICAL SETTINGS. I WAS HOPING TO FIND A WAY TO MAKE A COMPLETELY NEW AND UNIQUE IMAGINARY WORLD THAT READERS COULD WHOLLY BELIEVE IN AND BECOME LOST IN.

Are you currently writing the sequel to Angelology?  Do you have an idea of when it will be published? – YES, I’M CURRENTLY WRITING ANGELOPOLIS, THE SEQUEL TO ANGELOLOGY THAT FOLLOWS EVANGELINE AND VERLAIN (THE HEROINE AND HERO FROM THE FIRST BOOK). I BELIEVE IT WILL BE OUT IN 2012.

I was curious, what was the reason behind combining the 2 different time periods instead of doing one book about the time in the 1940’s and a separate book in the present?  Was it easier in a sense to plot it out? – I WANTED TO HAVE MANY DIFFERENT LOCATIONS AND TIME PERIODS WOVEN INTO ONE GREAT BIG NOVEL. I WAS GOING FOR A SWEEPING, EPIC EXPERIENCE, WHERE READERS WOULD FIND THEMSELVES TRAVELING ALL OVER THE WORLD AND MEETING CHARACTERS FROM DIFFERENT HISTORICAL PERIODS. ONE PART OF THE BOOK IS IN 1940′s FRANCE, ANOTHER IN 10TH CENTURY BULGARIA ANOTHER IN CONTEMPORARY NEW YORK CITY. THE BOOK ALLOWS READERS TO TAKE A JOURNEY.

Did you have any say about that absolutely gorgeous cover?  Was there any stipulations that you absolutely had to have, or did you leave it in the hands of the professionals? – I LOVE THE COVER! THE PHOTOGRAPHER/ARTIST JEFF BARK TOOK THE PHOTOGRAPH. IT IS AN ACTUAL MALE MODEL POSING WITH WINGS. THE ONLY THING I DID NOT WANT ON THE COVER WAS A SWEET GOLDEN CHERUB FLOATING IN A CERULEAN SKY.

You had previously published memoirs, what was the reason for the change? - I WANTED TO WRITE SOMETHING AS FAR AWAY FROM MY FIRST BOOK FALLING THROUGH THE EARTH AS POSSIBLE, AND SO I DECIDED TO ALLOW MY IMAGINATION TO SIMPLY TRANSPORT ME WHERE IT WOULD. ANGELOLOGY WAS THE RESULT.

Which Historical Figure do you most identify with? – I LOVE THE WRITER COLETTE. ALSO, COCO CHANEL.

What do you consider your greatest achievement? – MAINTAINING MY CAREER AS A WRITER WHILE RAISING TWO BEAUTIFUL KIDS–MY SON, ALEX, AND MY DAUGHTER NICO.

What is your idea of perfect happiness? – IF I COULD CAPTURE PURE HAPPINESS IN A SINGLE MOMENT IT WOULD BE OF SITTING IN A PURE WHITE ROOM, A VASE OF YELLOW TULIPS NEAR A WINDOW, JUST BEFORE SOMEONE I LOVE IS RINGING THE DOORBELL.

What would be the trait you most deplore in others? – IT USED TO BE LAZINESS, ALTHOUGH NOW I’M FINDING SOMETHING WORTHWHILE IN BEING LAZY. NOW I THINK IT IS POSSESSIVENESS.

Which talent besides writing would you most like to have and why? – I’D LIKE TO SING IN A BAND.

Who are your favourite writers? – I LOVE  NABOKOV AND WILKIE COLLINS AND COLETTE.

What do you regard and the lowest depth of misery? – I HAVE A GOOD ENOUGH IMAGINATION TO REALIZE THAT MISERY CAN ALWAYS GO A NOTCH LOWER. I KNOW THAT I HAVEN’T BEEN TO THAT POINT.

BookLounge.ca has a contest going right now where you can win a signed copy of Angelology – ENTER HERE GOOD LUCK!!

Q and A with Author Pam Jenoff

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Please help me welcome Pam to Serendipitous Readings!

What do you consider your greatest achievement? Besides Writing? My one year old son, Benjamin.


What do you most value in your friends? Loyalty.  Sounds cliché but I only have a very small circle of family and close friends.  I call them “The Kidney Club” because those are the people to whom I would donate a kidney or vice versa, and to me the world is divided into them and everyone else.

A close second is non-judgment.  I have a friend, and she knows who she is, who I could call and say “I want to rappel off of the Empire State building.” She would say “What time should I be there and how much rope should I bring?” instead of trying to talk me out of it.  Now that’s a friend.

What is it that you most dislike?

That’s such a broad question; I’m not sure how to answer.  I don’t think I’m terribly fussy (though some who know me would surely disagree) or that there’s much I dislike.  Least favorite chore is vacuuming, if that counts.  I once picked up a fairly new vacuum and it broke into a half-dozen pieces.  I decided then and there I wasn’t meant to vacuum, and I don’t think I have since.

What is your greatest fear? I don’t know; I have so many.  Bad things happening to a loved one tops the list.  But beyond that I’m afraid of flying, fire, lightning, drowning, etc., etc.  Kind of a wimp that way.

What is the trait you most deplore in others? Pretentiousness.  I think it’s a sign of insecurity to have to show off wealth or prestige or accomplishment.  I also dislike narrow-mindedness, and I love thinking there’s more out there in the world than what I know.

What is the conclusion about past events coming to haunt us in present-day, do you think that the people who made those decisions making such choices would have guessed at how they will change the future?

I think very few people except for the greatest of leaders really think in terms of implications for the distant future, and even fewer have the courage to make decisions based on those long-term effects.
Who are your favourite writers living or dead, and who out of all of the would you want to meet and why?

There are so many! But to name a few: Tracy Chevalier (Girl With A Pearl Earring), Anita Shreve (The Pilot’s Wife), Pat Conroy (Beach Music), Anne Tyler (The Amateur Marriage), Laura Lippman (What the Dead Know), Kate Atkinson (Case Histories),and Barbara Kingsolver (The Poisonwood Bible).  Children’s books are still my favorites and I think that children’s authors – Judy Blume, Paula Danziger, Beverly Cleary and the like – are deities! But one series – the Betsy/Tacy series by Maud Hart Lovelace (about a young girl in Minnesota at the turn of the 20th century) stands out. I also read a lot of children’s Holocaust literature – I Am Rosemarie by Marietta Moskin and The Endless Steppe by Esther Hautzig were memorable.

And if I can pick a character instead of an author, I’d like to meet Jo from Little Women.  I want to shake her and ask why she didn’t stay with Laurie when she had the chance!

Who is your favourite hero of fiction? Okay, I’m going to be really obnoxious here and say it’s a tie between two of my own characters:  Emma from The Kommandant’s Girl and Marta, her best friend and heroine of The Diplomat’s Wife.  Emma was so brave when faced with harrowing circumstances during the Holocaust; I know I never could have been so strong in her position.  And Marta, who seemed so immature and judgmental in The Kommandant’s Girl, really came into her own when faced with her own dangerous Cold War circumstances.
Which historical figure do you most identify with? I’m not sure there’s one in particular, but recently I read Girl in Hyacinth Blue and it portrayed how the painter Vermeer felt a tension between doing the work he wanted creatively and pressure to work at a faster speed in order to earn a living.  The theme, at time, has resonated with me.
If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? I’d be taller or maybe able to sing.

Such great answers ! Thank you so much Jen for doing this, I enjoyed it, I hope the readers do as well.

Q and A with Author Elizabeth Noble

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I would like to take this time to welcome Elizabeth to Serendipitous Readings! I hope you enjoy the Q and A I recently got to do with her.

What was it about the premise of the story that you wanted to get across in the book? I moved to New York in the summer of 2006, and was immediately captivated by the idea of all these interesting people from everywhere, living all on top of each other on this tiny island – the idea that behind every single door, there was a story…

With you living in New York, is there a eclectic vibe to the city? I can’t imagine anywhere more eclectic than New York.


What do you value most in your friends? Loyalty, humor, and the fact that they know me well and love me anyway.

What talent would you most want to have besides writing? I wish I could run.  I really can’t.  Not even for the bus.  Sing, play piano…I could be here a while.

What is your greatest extravagance? Shoes and handbags.  They always come in my size.

When and where you the most happiest? When my babies were born.  Happiest, tiredest, messiest.  But mostly happiest.

If you could change one thing about yourself what would it be? A faster metabolism.

Who are your favourite writers and why? Anita Shreve and Armistead Maupin.  For their craftmanship with words and plot, and for their endless ability to move me.

What would be the one quality you would like in either sex? I’d like for men to be less ‘fix it’ orientated.  Sometimes we just want to vent and have you listen.  And for women, to care less, sometimes, about what other women think.

What would be your greatest regret? I only regret the things I wasn’t brave enough to do when I was younger.  I intend to spend middle age doing them all – I just won’t look as good doing them…

You can visit Elizabeth’s Website here

My review of The Girl Next Door

Q and A with Author Catherine McKenzie

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Without further ado, I give you Catherine McKenzie who is the Author of SPIN published by HarperCollins.  Thank you Catherine for doing this and giving such great answers !

Who are your favourite heroes in real life? I don’t really believe in heroes. Not in the large sense. I do think there are everyday acts of heroism all the time, and that people can be heroes in their own lives. But we shouldn’t look to others for examples of what we should be and do; certainly not to celebrities. There are people I admire, but I wouldn’t call them heroes – that seems to imply some kind of perfection or flawlessness, and no one is perfect.

Who are your favourite authors and why? I do believe in favourite authors. Mine include Jane Austen (of course), Nick Hornby, James Frey and my current favourite, Andre Agassi (read Open, it’s awesome). Why? Because they’ve all written books I can’t stop talking about. Books I’ve finished so fast that when I get to the last page I start over again because I don’t want my time with them to be over. If I’m telling you to read a book – this happens about once a year, and I read a lot – then that book has made a lasting impression in my life. The reason is different for each of them, but the effect is the same. Awe.

What is it you most dislike? Peanut butter. Seriously. I hate it.

When writing “Spin” what was your basis for putting it in a recovery standpoint? I started Spin from a premise that required it, or at least part of it, to be set in recovery. When I started writing Spin, I thought I’d spend a lot less time in rehab – there was this whole thing that was supposed to take place in Vegas. But the more time I spent with the characters, Katie especially, the more necessary it seemed to give the recovery part of the book its proper space. I didn’t want to gloss over her changes with a soundtrack – I wanted the reader to see her change.

What was it that made you want to pursue writing when already having a career as a lawyer/profession in law? Insanity. Hubris. My type A, overachiever personality? Probably a combination of all three. I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer and I’ve always written (poetry mostly). Then, there was a long period of time when studying and then practicing law took up all my energy. Starting to write again was part of finding a balance between my very cerebral job and the creative part of me. I didn’t start doing it with any plan to get published, but once I had a couple of books under my belt, the traits described above kicked in and I was just crazy/egotistical enough to think I should get a book deal.

What is your present state of mind? Happy. Apprehensive. Nervous. Hopeful. Depends on what time of day you catch me.

What do you regard as your lowest depth of misery? Can’t answer that one, sorry. Too private.

What qualities do you most admire in people? In yourself? I admire people who don’t just talk, they do. I try not to admire myself, but I don’t always succeed.

Besides having a talent for writing, what other talent would you most like to have and why? I’d love to be a great singer-songwriter. Being able to really fuse my love of writing and music would be great. Alas, alas.

When do you feel most indulgent? When I spend the weekend watching several seasons of a TV show on DVD. Unfortunately, this happens often.

Thanks so much for the great questions, and giving me a chance to “speak” to your readers. Hope you enjoy the book!

I also have ONE copy of SPIN to giveaway to one lucky Canadian

Read my Review of SPIN


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Q and A with Author Becca Fitzpatrick

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You may have read my review of Hush, Hush that I had written a while ago.  During that time I had contacted Becca with doing one of my Q and A’s with her, but since her schedule was so busy this was the only time she was able to do it.  So, a huge thank you to Becca for doing this during such a busy time.  I hope you enjoy her answers, I did.

  • What do you consider the most overrated virtue? Beauty.
  • Which words or phrases do you most overuse? Okay, this is really funny. Just a little while ago, my editor mentioned to me that I use the word “window” a bajillion times in HUSH, HUSH. Who would have thought? Apparently I really like windows. My editor thought there was some deeper meaning to all the windows, but I swear, I’m not that philosophical or deep!
  • What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? I was about to say loneliness, but changed my mind to feeling despised. I’m not sure how my quality of life would be if I felt the world hated me, but I’m guessing pretty darn low.
  • What is it that you most dislike? This is a tough question. My answer is always going to depend on my mood. My biggest pet peeve is when I walk into a large, empty public restroom, say at the library, and the person who walks in behind me takes the stall directly next to mine. GARAH! I mean, there are ten other available stalls, and they have to plunk down right beside me? It’s just…weird.
  • Which talent would you most like to have besides writing? Dancing. I love the show So You Think You Can Dance. Man, it would be awesome to move like that, to express myself that way.
  • When writing your current novel, what was it that you wanted to convey most about the story, characters? In HUSH, HUSH, I really wanted to convey the power of physical attraction, but I wonder if I did a very good job. I say that, because I get a lot of people asking why I never went deeper with Patch and Nora, writing about their “undying love” for each other. Honestly, I don’t think they’re to that point. HUSH, HUSH was more of an “I see you, I like what I see, but I’m not sure I should” type of story. Whether they develop a deeper love is yet to be seen…
  • What was it about writing that made you want to pursue it full time and not work in the health care field as you wrote? Easy. I loved writing! Please don’t tell my mom I said this, but the only reason I graduated in Health was because it was blissfully, wonderfully low in credits. I bounced around a lot in college, trying to decide what to major in, but nothing stuck. By my junior year, I knew I was getting dangerously down to the wire. So I did a search for majors with low credit requirements. Health happened to be one. Probably, English was too, but it never occurred to me to major in English.
  • If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be? A really good book!
  • Who are your favourite writers? Laurie Halse Anderson, Diana Gabaldon, Sandra Brown, L.M. Montgomery, Emily Bronte, Jane Austen, Sue Grafton, Laurie R. King, Richelle Mead.
  • What is your one principle defect? Oh, wow, I have a lot of defects and even more flaws. If I’m being completely honest with myself, my biggest defect is probably my resistance to change. I’m a creature of habit, which would be fine, if my habits were actually good!

Becca’s Website

Hush Hush Website

GUEST POST – Viewing history through a kaleidoscope by Sandra Gulland

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As promised, we have Sandra Gulland as a guest today on the blog, and here is her post… Enjoy !

Viewing history through a kaleidoscope by Sandra Gulland
www.sandragulland.com

I’m now writing my second novel set in the court of Louis XIV, the Sun King. Louise de la Vallière, the heroine of Mistress of the Sun, is only briefly seen. It is the same world — and peopled by many of the same characters — but seen through a different lens.

This is not so much a series (as was the Josephine B. Trilogy) as novels written about the same characters, but from different points of view. This poses some interesting challenges! With each novel, I research deeply, and, as a result, come to understand the history differently. Already I can imagine the readers of Mistress of the Sun puzzling over scenes in my next novel that might be portrayed in quite a different light. Where lies “the truth”?

At lunch today with friends from France, they told me something interesting about Margaret Yourcenar, the author of Memoirs of Hadrian (a novel about ancient Rome) and many other finely-crafted historical novels. In 1980, Yourcenar was the first female to be elected to the Académie Française. A French novelist, she spent most of her life on an isolated island off the coast of Maine. She believed that to recreate history took not only years of research, but a mystical identification. (I echo that.)

She was, without a doubt, not only a great writer, but a brilliant one. An extraordinary academic, she taught herself to read Japanese, German, Spanish, Portuguese, and modern Greek. (Humbling, isn’t it?) But what I found especially interesting is that she apparently revised a novel every time it was reprinted, according to her new findings. For Margaret Yourcenar, clearly, a historical novel was an ever-evolving work.

The thought of makes me shudder, frankly! The events in Mistress of the Sun will never change (and should not) — but the interpretation of those events? Yes, quite possibly, but in my next novel, and in the novels that follow. I like to think of myself as looking at the Court of the Sun King through a kaleidoscope. Turn the focus just slightly, and the entire image changes.

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For more thoughts on history and writing, see Sandra’s blog: Notes on the Writing Life: http://sandragulland.blogspot.com/