Canadian Authors Association - West Coast

What a thoroughly bizarre evening! At 7 pm, Laura and I walked into the monthly meeting of the Canadian Authors Association at the Howe Street Alliance for Art and Culture building. Suddenly the room was a blaze and someone was shouting Flashpoint! Little had we turned to run when we were tripping over dead bodies that were not only being investigated by the Da Vinci code team but the Cold Squad as well. All the while the Edgemont High kids were popping bubblegum and trying to mate without moving out of their one location.
Thankfully, Ben Nuttall Smith, dripping blood and dressed like an Aztec warrior explained that Ian Weir was reading tonight. Ian had written screenplays for all those great tv shows. Meanwhile Ben's historic novel, Blood, Feathers and Holy Men had just been released. Spannish Conquistadores were slashing about behind him. When Ben began his reading natives and monks began interacting with colourful parrots flying about the room.
"It happens when you're a writer. Your characters and stories go every where with you," some writer whispered
Robert Mackie, the CAA president rode in on a horse wearing a WWI soldier uniform, his book Horse Soldiers to come out in March. He said Canwrite 2011 retreat was coming up in May and that next month at the CAA meeting here there'd be an open mike.
Publisher Perry Wilson wearing medieval garbs from her own other worldly ebooks then proceded to introduce Ian Weir. He'd actually been sitting behind me with Jane Hall, author of Red Wall which certainly explained why her RCMP characters were chasing the the Devil, the prostitutes and pugilists of the novel Daniel O' Thunder.
Ian Weir stood up and he didn't look at all like a writer. He was a rangy long drink of a fellow looking almost like Sam Elliott. He should be in front of the camera not scribbling at the back of some smelly stage.
Perry told us Weir's novel, Daniel O Thunder was already short listed for 4 major awards including the CAA Award for Fiction and Amazon's First Fiction award.
Despite his 30 years of self supporting writing and utterly obvious genius he was humble and gracious as well.
He read from his novel Daniel O'Thunder and it grabbed you. Later he'd describe how writing for television forced one to really get a hold of the audience because they had 250 channels to change to if you didn't. He had 4 narrative voices in this 1850's novel set mostly in London where Weir got his MA in English at King's College. Daniel, a retired boxer who preached the gospel, had challenged the devil to a fight anywhere in England. John a fallen preacher who just may have slept with the daughter of a wealthy parishioner had seen it wise to leave his church, change his name and come to Covent Gardens. The Devil was indeed a frightening character who trailed a faint whiff of sulfur. As Ian read a chill went through the room before the thunderous applause that followed his conclusion of such a heart warming piece of quite spectacular writing.
The question and answer period followed. The parrots alighted, the dead bodies sat up and the RCMP band quieted so you couldn't even here the Edgmonth High kids bubble gum as Weir shared the secrets of politic, business and craft.
Story, Protagonist, Obstacles and Goals, character monologues when stuck, the diference between American and Canadian agents, the budget for an episode of Da Vinci Code versus the budget for CSI, why camera positions, takes and shows decided by budget can make a faster Canadian tv show appear slow, while locations can take half a budget. Who is the protgagonist. What is he wanting to achieve. What is ongoing Story Arc? What's holding the centre? Has the character transformed? What to do when a show has 4 producers. How to write a peice for CBC and CBS when they really want the one peice to be two different stories. What is the story fundamentally about. Can you tell me what War and Peace or Lord of the Rings was about in 25 words or less?
Ian Weir could and did. We were all so astonished by what and how he told us that Bernice Lever simply apologised to him and all that we couldn't go on all night. Our parking meters were up.
But that's what happens with great story tellers. Ian Weir is one of the best. Even among his own, he enthralled. He could keep a room of story tellers entertained all night.
I left with an autographed copy of Daniel O'Thunder from Douglas & McIntyre publishers in one hand and a copy of Blood, Feathers and Holy men from Libros Libertad publishers in my other. I'll just have to put off writing the 'great canadian novel' myself since I simply must now read both these books.
When I got home I found I was bruised all over my body by some pugilist called Daniel O'Thunder and had parrot shit in my hair. What a bizarre night!

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More on books I loved

When I think of the periods of reading, there's that great gulf of time in Medical School. Gray's Anatomy and Harrison's Internal Medicine, now there were two books I married, definitely an erstwhile love affair. The intimacy with which we lived together is something that still daunts me. Then I'd become an apostle of the Saddock's Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry and DSMIII and DSMIV. New England Journal of Medicine and Scientific American were literally bed time favorites for decades. I never did get hooked on the American Journal of Psychiatry which excites so many of us. What I loved instead were the Hospital and Community journals. Yes, I was writing for the Medical Post but I was also reading it religiously because it was guaranteed to tell what was fresh off the presses, give the Canadian doctor political scene and let me know what colleagues were doing across the country. Today I'm more interested in the professional Merck Manual. It's on my pda and where once I 'd read it as general interest today I use it as reference and only read a chapter when I've come across something in the office. I get the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry but it's predominantly written by psychologists and so often fails to have any clinical relevance to front line psychiatry. In contrast I still find things of great relevance in the Canadian Medical Association Journal but rarely have time to read the stack that grows in the office. I'm more likely to pick up a MOJO Motorcycle mag or HOG and read stories of what fellow bikers are doing. I still read Currents the Blue Water Cruising Associations journal. I've written for it and been the advertising executive but just love to read, especially in winter, about some fellow cruiser in some hot place sailing his boat with fair winds and following seas.

Work and the demands of reading for work have really dominated the type and kind of reading I do. For years in family medicine and then in psychiatry I'd have a patient show up with some sign or symptom and I'd spend the night reading all I could find in pathology or clinical journals about this particular patient's problems. With computers I'd do PubMed searches and be hours on the computer reading all the latest research, looking for some medication or treatment that had yet not been tried on these so often chronic and forlorn. In later years I'd read an Ian Rankin novel to off set these clinical searches with detective searches.

I started to write a detective novel in Saipan and never did get it finished despite the wonderful help of being in a Canadian Author's Association writers' circle. What I did get was permission to myself to read all the great detective writers. And these I've enjoyed, Evanovich, Sue Grafton, and Harlan Coban certainly have been fun.

Sailing I've loved to read but because I'm on watch the kind of reading has had to be light but interesting. Tom Clancy really is a great boat read. I like how writers' of intrigue tell stories that are captivating but not so entwined that you can't put them down at a moment's notice grab the wheel and miss an oncoming tanker in the open seas. Off shore I had a radar detector device that would notify of the boat's need for attention but coastal sailing reading has had it's rather exciting moments. A bit like reading cell phone text messages on the freeway but in slower motion.

Paramahansa Yogananda, Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis were spiritual writers who changed my life. Thanks to Yogananda I was involved in reading Eastern literature for years as well as in the practice of Yoga for life. The mystical path of C.S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy, and Evelyn Underwood would get me into Regent College studying Christian Spirituality and loving St. John of the Cross and St. Theresa of Avila. Oswald Chambers and Brother Lawrence were bedtime favorites. The Spirituality of Imperfection was a thorough delight. More often now I'm studying the MDiv textbooks that probably began sometimes years back when I read Paul Johnson's various texts starting with the History of Christianity. Another spiritual historical series that delighted me was How the Irish Saved Civilization which eventually made the BBC.

Historically, I loved reading Churchill's books but I began my historical foray with Modern Times and H.G. Wells History of the World. I loved approaching a subject through history as a way of getting a grasp on it. So Jared Diamond's writing recently has captured me because it works within the historical framework like Michener would write all his immensely delightful novels.

I'd so often find an author like Michener whose novel about the Middle East would captivate me then I'd run the gamut of all his books and get the latest, like his Mexico and Alaska ones when they came out. I liked historical fiction. I liked fiction where I'd learn facts as well. I loved the thoroughly incorrigible Flashman series not just for the sex and characters but for the actual clear facts that MacDonald incorporated in his bawdy tales. Asimov had this same capacity of coupling fine science with a good story. Which made me love the writings of the doctors so many times especially Jurassic Park.

Recently I've loved Gibson's writing starting from Neuromancer to Pattern Recogntion and beyond. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy books were all favorites and the detective series that followed. Thanks to the local Canadian Author's Association I've been reading the books of friends like Ben Nuttall Smith, Anthony Dalton and Bob Mackay. I've just finished the English block buster Birdcage about tunneling in WWI and am looking forward to Bob Mackay's book, Horse Soldiers, about his father's regiment. I loved Farley Mowatt's war book but then I loved all of Farley Mowatt's writing. What can I say I read authors and read all the early Margaret Atwood until her bitterness turned me off her and it was years before I returned to find she'd gotten over herself or maybe I'd matured enough to appreciate her genius once again. I read all of Margaret Lawrence and just never stopped loving her writing only angry that she didn't write more. Robertson Davies sure did capture me and have me reading all night long with a bed light. Canadian authors, like the poet, Leonard Cohen have made me very proud to be Canadian.

But I've got to get to work where I have to read reports and write them so I can't do nostalgia anymore despite how pleasing it is to the soul. Remembering favorite writers is like looking at old photo albums of the family and remembering parents, grandparents and cousins and nephews with a deep and loving fondness. I have truly been blessed by the people who have shared their lives and thoughts with me through writing all these years of my life. But it's like seeing old family photos I forget so many of the names even though the faces are imprinted on my soul.

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Location:W 12th Ave,Vancouver,Canada

Books that have changed me

A friend asked what books had changed me.  The word 'change' is the key word.  I've loved books all my life. This began for me as a child, both my parents being readers and me encouraged to read at an early age by their behaviour and desire.  I was also blessed with a highly intelligent brother who read as well. Being the younger brother I looked up to these 'role model's' and read.  The first "Book" in our family was the Bible though and reading for the sake of reading the Bible was encouraged in our community.  Dad read mostly scientific and technical books whereas Mom read the occasional novel.  My closest Aunt, Aunt Sally, was a constant reader of most anything she could get her hands on.  I grew up in Winnipeg and the Winnipeg Free Press which was delivered to our door daily was read by all.  It was a source of all the finest reading. Newspapers were especially appreciated in our home and magazines like the Upper Room were present as well.
As a child I remember the weekly visits with my mother, brother and myself to the Fort Gary Public Library.  Much later I'd have a library that filled a room.  At that time in my life, my late 20's, I took it as such a compliment that my friends considered me an "intellectual".  I had studied Milton at university and learned that he was considered the last of the renaissance men who could know 'all' the world's knowledge having the most extant library of his day. I couldn't know all the works of the world like Milton but I do remember as a child I made a point of reading all the science fiction books in the Fort Gary Library.
So the first book probably 'changed' me would be the Bible.  After that it was no doubt the "Hardy Boys".  And somewhere around then Poul Anderson caught a hold of me.  Then I specifically remember Ian Flemming's 007 series being read as they came off the presses.
I remember Shakespeare from school but don't know that studying Shakespeare in high school had much influence on me though years later King Lear would have a profound impact. I studied Shakespeare in Honors English and was immensely moved by the depth of learning that I'd simply not known about as a high school student.
But Cervantes really impressed me. I was bicycling across Europe and kept meeting Europeans my age who were simply more learned than me. Their educations had encouraged a breadth and depth of reading that was so foreign to me.  I was college age and kept meeting Europeans that spoke several languages and had read English classics in the original.  So I set about 'improving' myself.
I remember reading Don Quiote because it was a 'big book' and by that time in my life, early 20, I'd not read anything more than a hundred pages.  So here was this huge book that I read ploddingly through. I actually enjoyed it and learned to love it.  What a brilliant book.  Now having read this massive tomb I concluded that no book was too big for me. And yes I'm still charging windmills and still see Dulcinea everywhere.
Somerset Maugham is the next great in my development.  His short stories and his classic novels some made into plays impacted powerfully on me. I loved his tales of travel.  I related to him telling stories of his love life and his school days.  It was like having an uncle who talked to me and told me the truth about life on the big stage.
I had this Everyday Library book with a list of classics and made a point to read one of each of the famous authors listed. It was as a result of that that I read the Russians, fell in love with Tolstoy and Doysteyefsky.  Later I'd study Brothers Karamasov at university and love it even more than that first time I read it.
Herman Hesse captured me with his mystical interests, Demian, Journey to the East.
Then came that whole collection of existentialisms, the Castle and the Trial.  Of course, Franny and Zoey.
Meanwhile I'd read dozens or a hundred books to everyone I remember 'changing' me.  I was always reading a book a week at least with textbook reading taking longer but there was invariably some books that kept me up all night and others that just haunted me, their ideas lasting long after the last page had been read.

Personal Safety and the Internet

I woke up one day and realized that my own government had released information on all of it's citizens to nefarious characters around the world. Investigations into the most private of information, our income tax returns, indicates that some 200 people at least and many agencies have access to that data.

In two major hospitals in two major cities in two provinces I have ensured that doctors had to show identification to get patient files. Prior to that a white lab coat and a stethoscope got any information. Most of the 'support' staff in most institutions are minimally paid.

When I caught my staff distributing confidential information and let her go notifying the police, the police told me that "It probably happens all the time but you're the only doctor I know of who has come forward."

My accountant in a moment of psychosis or a drunken rage or just plain stupidity dumped all the files of all his clients in the dumpster only to be found by astute Province reporters who made that a front page story.

Private investigators have told me what the television says that anyone's garbage is the best source of information about the individual. Garbage men aren't bonded.

If I ever want to hunt someone down I knew I could without the internet. I was stalked before the internet. I was also held hostage before the internet. I was physically attacked in a public place one early evening walking home. I almost died in a crowd when I rescued a woman being raped from a gang of 8 or so guys who subsequently attacked me and pushed in front of an oncoming subway train pulling me back at the last moment and demonstrating how 'no one does anything'. Not one of the hundreds of people and dozens or more at least had helped the girl and none helped me. I've phoned 911 three times and on each occasion there were no cars. One time some sports fans were wrecking the city. Other times the police have been at an emergency faster than I could have imagined.

Our governments in the west and east dueled and played girlish macho with enough nuclear missiles to kill everyone a dozen times over and now they've lost some. Our governments sell the weapons to the terrorists which the terrorists use on others. The western nations are the principal arms dealers.

The legal system protects and supports criminals, their principal clients. It's a first come first serve justice system and when a person pulled the trigger of a gun he thought was loaded in my face he got off because he claimed that I'd threatened him. The system now is indeed to claim that you are a victim even though you're the actual victimizer today. Just as common criminals get off with murder in the courts claiming their parents abused them, Israel recently claimed that they were victims so it was okay for them to attack innocent sailors on the high seas shooting them from helicopters and then stealing their cameras and films. This stuff goes on all days and the legal system and government don't seem to think it's their job to ensure 'protection'.

Mr. Dugald Christie, an amazing lawyer who'd demonstrated that the Canadian legal system did not serve the poor was killed by a hit and run driver while riding to Ottawa to say the legal system had disenfranchised the middle classes as well. Like the health care system which was once 'universal' but is now mostly for the priviledged the legal system serves only the rich. We are at greatest risk for saying things like this. Mostly I personally am most likely to cause my own death or bring harm on myself and not just politically.

When I did home visits I found half the elderly were stoned or drunk and falling down breaking things. Others who weren't were climbing on roofs adjusting antennas in their seventies and falling down breaking things. There's a very brief window when your hormones no longer rule and you have some maturity and physical capability. Unfortunately you're usually working for an old fart who has you doing dangerous things. Workplace injuries and work stress account for so much damage in society still.

When individual yacht owners were being told they had to purify their waste the city was dumping pollution in tons without purification. "Alternative" "medicine's" have caused countless deaths and no one hears of them because news is only news when it's against the major professions. The government fast ferry multi million dollar loss was due to technicians and bureaucrats not listening to engineers. We don't hear about this. We don't hear the names of those individuals who denounced the doctors who said the Red Cross blood was tainted and for political reasons the government and agencies did nothing till countless people were infected and dying.

Once I've had a certified electrician leave my house at the most unsafe it's been and we're alive today because an electrician friend came by and investigated the high voltage arcing which I'd asked him about because the intermittent flashes of light seemed dangerous. I was given a gun back by a gunsmith that fired when I put the safety on.

But when I smoked and dranked I commonly poured gas into the outboard like so many 'macho men' do. I also stood up in canoes and all those other things that aren't safe.

The government has cut back on so many of the people who were responsible for testing foods and water. Even when the water inspectors were present for the sake of profit the water supply of cities the size of Toronto depended for it's safety on individuals like Carey Shinn who served as a watchdog on city councilmen. VAncouver almost had a casino, hotel, cabin complex on it's principal lake's watersupply if it weren't for someone thinking that might not be 'safe' despite the promises. The promises are the kind of thing that resulted in Chernobyl.

9-11 wasn't supposed to happen if dozens of 'fail safe's were acted on. Indeed 9-11 is probably one of the best examples of gross incompetence and stupidity since Pearl Harbour. But then the British had the Titannic.

When I was a very minor 'hacker' I found that there were no firewalls for most of the governments data bases. Indeed all you had to do is dial up the access number and people had put all personnel files of those who are now in power on their data bases. There weren't even laws about online 'confidentiality' then. Most recently a real hacker notified the Seatle hospitals that their systems were wholly penetrable and advised them of the measures that they should take to cough up security (note that hospital records in the US are also financial records). The hospitals ignored this but rather got the FBI to label this Robin Hood an evil criminal. Hackers for years have been telling the authorities where their weaknesses are but the authorities consistently ignore them and 'save face' by paying off a consultant to do a 'report' and appearing to address the problem. Each new generation of computer is more powerful and generally can breach easily the security systems of the previous computers.

Fear is ubiquitous. Identity theft is a reality. The greatest 'identity' 'scam' here was the tens of thousands of people whose credit card information was taken by the credit card machine scandal.

My patient who was a professional military assassin by any other name said it was easiest to get a guy in the washroom especially if they had a routine. Changing routines is apparently what one has to do to be safe. Changing passwords and codes and credit cards and addresses is clearly a great idea but I lose my codes and credit card companies won't give you credit cards if you move too often. I've moved alot.

I've had my life threatened several times. My family's life has been threatened. I've been knifed and shot at. I've been at times a touch 'paranoid' when people were phoning me up threatening me and the police literally told me all they could do was act on the physical presence, record a conversation etc, but not actually 'protect' me.

One of my patients who was being hunted by gangs after he fingered a mobster was offered 'protection' by the police but the police told me this wasn't 'television'. There's no money for that kind of protection. They could cover his case for a few weeks or months but not a life time. Fortunately criminals more often than not have more recent enemies and as time goes on if you avoid them they can't risk settling an 'old score' as it could interfere with them settling 'new scores'.

So the big question is "are you worth it?" My friend doesn't put her children on the internet and gets outraged at the lack of security that the schools have regarding children's information. One of my patients who was a convicted pedophile lived across from a school yard. So many of the ex cons break the conditions of parole and yet there are rarely consequences. The patient wasn't an actual threat but his taking a place at risk was an indication that he himself was no longer facing the life long nature of his risk. He wasn't intentionally irresponsible just didn't really accept that he was the threat he really was.

A few judges locally refused to imprison gay prostitute drug addicts who knowingly had unprotected sex and spread HIV in the early years. I naturally thought this was the judges way of expressing their homophobia but there was no consequence for their irresponsible behaviour. The medical community was trying desperately to treat an infectious disease and these priviledged highly protected rich old boys were condemning countless men to death and cost the health care system millions before they got off their high horse and listened to their colleagues who had more sense than they did.

My friend's children are worth probably a hundred thousand each. Kids sell and yet it's really quite rare. Young women drug addicts end up in pig farms. If I was rich, young, attractive or had children I would worry more about 'broadcasting' personal data but information about every professional is available to everyone. We're easily followed home from offices. I've been. I've had an unlisted number and have taken the time to make my whereabouts unknown but neighbors will tell strangers where the 'doctor' lives.

I had Jimmy Patterson's house pointed out to me. If anyone was going to break into my home I think they'd find more in his and yet it's fairly common knowledge where he lives. When I lived in Shaughnassey it really did seem that that was the shopping district for the East Vancouver criminal crowds. Yet when my jeweler friend was broken into it was a gang operating all across Canada.

Mostly the media inflates the fears. It's a fear mongering society we live in.

At the end of the day I'd like to remember all the people who over the years have returned my wallet or camera or computer when I've left them somewhere. Countless times as a kid strangers took care of me and didn't do mean or nasty things. Church leaders, boy scouts and teachers collectively were just great. The opportunities that were available for others to take advantage of most of us were myriad but in the end people are collectively basically good. That's the way it was growing up in Winnipeg. I know that things aren't as good everywhere as they once were but that's what old people always say. So far we haven't had a world war in my lifetime and while more people are being jailed by our governments and more people are at risk in these environs than ever before overall we're living longer and healthier than ever before.

For all the billions on the internet and all of us with blogs and most of who are relatively nobodies the risk is very small of someone using this means to suddenly enter your life and become a Chainsaw Murderer. Internet dating with all the risk that would appear to be there is probably no more risky than talking to a stranger at a bar.

I had an employee who had falsified her resume and lied about her past and presented herself as a highly believable and caring person. Psychopaths are notorious chameleons. I loved Robert Hare's book, Snakes in Suits because it's main warning is that they're not different per se than the next guy but are identifiable by patterns. I've been fooled and supposedly I should know better but then I've almost been killed by an ex wife and ex wives have almost killed us both and maybe they'd say that of me.

For the longest time I didn't trust the internet with any credit card number. It's still a source of major concern for me and I have a credit card with a limit for that use. I wouldn't give out my home address and yet my emails and phone numbers are commonly getting accessed because my government and the law won't protect me from their 'friends' because clearly these agencies consider 'telemarketers' and such more their 'friend' than me or they'd not allow them to infringe on my privacy. I hate the curbside suedgie windshield washers because I don't believe strangers should have the right to touch me or my vehicle and yet it's obvious that my government would rather protect the rights of vagrants than protect my safety.

I am concerned that when I'm away and blog then someone could use this information to access my home. The fact is that my secretary tells people when I'm away and I have to arrange call at times so that even though countless people are in fact giving their comings and goings away this doesn't lead to more break and entry. At times I've lived in the country only to realize that police aren't available and I'm at greatest risk for defending myself and going to jail for hurting a criminal breaking into my house. It's probably not safe to possess anything of value. When my car was broken into the government insurance refused to cover the cost of what was stolen. My friends house was broken into three times and he can no longer get insurance.

I have all these concerns. Most criminals aren't reading blogs. Fortunately most criminals are just drug addicts and opportunistic. I feel sorry for the police because they have very few resources for most of the crimes and are expected to hunt down ghosts and goblins ad infinitum at times.

Over the years I've had state of the art security systems and had problems with them going off because of cleaning ladies. I recently had a firewall system probably better than the police but the cleaning lady kept unplugging it with her vacuum cleaner and I couldn't afford the thousands of dollars 'security'. I once established a series of 'traps' that would hurt burglars only to learn that I'd be culpable if the burglars got hurt. Indeed I was told that I had to put up a higher more expensive fence to keep a child from breaking into my already locked and secured yard because I'd be responsible if they drowned in the pool yet I wasn't allowed to use glass and razor wire along the top of the fence and the neighbour objected to the higher fence that would make my yard safe from the lack of parenting of kids in the neighbourhood. I moved. I won't have a swimming pool. I'm worried because one day I would like a hot tub.

More and more I pray. The only security seems really to be with the Lord. I'm glad that I'm a very dangerous person who has martial arts, silent kill and knows every object as a weapon but I'm an old man and more often than not I hurt. I have a dog that I have to protect more than he protects me. Yet if a person pokes a dog and he bites that person I can be sued but I can't sue a person for inciting my dog. Canada is a very insane country to live in with the most insane laws and legal system with all it's technicalities and goobly gook. Every computer has a book of legal agreements that I'm required to sign to use any program and I gave up reading the fine print years ago so I could learn how to save lives. I have to trust. I trust the legal system generally. I mostly trust the police. I trust my government sometimes and the media sometimes. I never really trust criminals and am increasingly not trusting businessmen. I tend to avoid listening to the fear mongering. I worry far more than enough already.

Indeed I worry too much already.

God is good all of the time. If I live in fear then really I don't trust God and yet I don't like to waste God's time.

The closest I came to death was in hospital at the hands of my caregivers on one occasion. Another time it was from a bacterial infection that no one could protect any of us from. As I child I almost died so many times but didn't. Half of those times I was doing things boys do which boys shouldn't.

Today I still think I'm my own greatest threat and being of Scottish descent I know the next fear is the government because those dastardly English are always trying to steal your very blood and now one wonders if it's not just the bleeding southerners and us northern folk all over again.

There's no way out but by death and life isn't safe. If you feel far from God, it's not hard to figure out who moved.








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Location:Park Dr,Capital F,Canada

CAA - Open Mike and Silent Auction

Our president Margaret Hume was away and our Vice President, Bob, author of Soldiers of the Horse, did the honours of leading the literary rabble. Before long Jane, author of the Red Wall, was slamming books to restore order. Give a group of authors an open mike and sheer bedlam follows. Needless to say, everyone had a say. In the silent auction Bob stole my chocolates but I won out big time with a Ben Nuttall Smith painting of Cambie Bridge. Patrick Taylor will be at the June CanWrite Conference in Victoria. He now has 4 Irish books on the best seller list. Anthony Dalton signed his latest book Rver Rough, River Smooth, the ink hardly dry from publication last month. It was highly entertaining evening of wordsmiths plying their trade and hawking their wares. It seemed everyone left with a book door prize of their choice. Next month a major newspaper literary critic will present on what they look for in a book. Meanwhile the rest of us will be taking a page from Michelangelo and searching for the book in ourselves.