Summer started with a lot of good intentions. The Summer of Proust initiative continued with The Captive, while a flurry of activity found me deep into preliminary work on a new writing project, powered by Ritual Coffee’s Teenage Riot Espresso, found here in town at Luke’s Drug Mart, with a mind to have a first […]
Read more "July Happenings"This winter, I spent some time out near Golden, British Columbia, enjoying the quiet. I had a delightful time staying at Il Nido, a bed & breakfast nestled between the Purcell and Rocky Mountains. Apparently, I read a lot of British literature and also drank some wonderful locally roasted coffee. I wish I’d brought another […]
Read more "New Year, New Beans, New Books"Wow, September was a busy month. A piece I wrote back in the spring about my years as a Stampede Park parking lot attendant made the CBC Creative Non-fiction Longlist. I submitted something last year and didn’t make it past the first round, so improvement is always good. Next year, the Short List! This was […]
Read more "September Happenings"The lazy summer days of writing in my backyard have given way to cooler mornings working in my basement, waiting for the sun to rise. It’s been a long time and a lot of words since last I wrote here, largely as a result of a rather unusual summer for me, productivity-wise anyways. Generally, the […]
Read more "End of Summer"January’s goals are a real mixed bag. I’ve been looking forward to reading Madeleine Thien’s Do Not Say We Have Nothing since the fall and have been promising my daughter that I would read The Cursed Child for almost as long. Ken Dryden’s autobiography, The Game, has sat on my shelf for almost six years, […]
Read more "January Goals"With National Novel Writing Month well under way, I’m wishing everyone the best of luck with their endeavors. Having recently finished a piece for the CBC Short Story Competition and still doing a bit of research for my next big project, I am ill-prepared to participate in NaNoWriMo this year. However, I do love the […]
Read more "NaNoWriMo"The arrival of autumn finds Calgary shifting into a different literary gear. Wordfest, which saw over 90 authors and artists this year, wraps up this weekend, and National Novel Writing Month is right around the corner. For me, fall is mostly about digging into short stories. My regular writing routine focuses mainly on manuscripts through […]
Read more "Short Story Season"Sorry for the radio silence. Last fall I simultaneously joined the Ancient and Illustrious Order of the Wayward Writers of Calgary and enrolled in the Humber School of Writers Creative Writing course, and these two things have pretty much sucked up all my writing time ever since. However, there has been lots to catch up […]
Read more "Hail and well met."I was lucky to have spent much of the past month visiting family in and around Venice, steeping myself in the stories that run deep and dark like the murky waters of the Venetian Lagoon. I’m collecting the tales of my extended family for a project I hope to do one day, perhaps […]
Read more "There and Back Again"
Coffee and Blarney 