Raise a Reader!

Next Wednesday is the Times Colonist Raise a Reader event. Teams will hit the streets on October 3rd to sell the TC for donations to the Raise a Reader Fund, which helps organizations like the Victoria READ Society, Project Literacy, and the Greater Victoria Public Library. Similar Raise a Reader events will take place across Canada.

An Orca team will be out next week raising money for literacy… so if you’re in Victoria, hopefully we’ll see you out there too, volunteering or donating!

Book Events

Hello again. As this is my last day as the guest blogger, I suppose I should end with something profound. Unfortunately, after making half a dozen new dents in the wall with my forehead, and seeking inspiration by leafing through my back issues of Popular Mechanics, rather than profound, I feel prolost. Instead, I’ll send out an open invitation to a couple of upcoming events.

On Sunday, September 30, I’m appearing at The Word on the Street National Book and Magazine Festival in Vancouver’s Library Square. I’ll be in the Canada Writes Tent at 11:20 a.m., talking about and reading from my new novel, Klutzhood.

If you’re in the far reaches of the British Columbia Interior (beyond Hope), on Friday, October 12 at 6:30 p.m. in Armstrong at the Okanagan Regional Library, it’s the official launch of Klutzhood.

For any teachers out there, I’ve just completed the official Klutzhood Teacher’s Guide. It includes mind-bending activities, brain-rattling questions, and everything you need for using Klutzhood as a classroom resource. In addition, I’ll be dropping in on the Orca forums if you’d like to discuss the novel with me.

I’d better go, as my wife just walked in the front door with . . . two boxes of pears.

Until we meet again,
Chris

Notebooks

Chris here again for Day Four of my guest spot on the Orca Blog.

Part of back-to-school preparation is shopping for school supplies. Shopping for school supplies means hitting the stationery or office supply section of the store. I have a confession to make. I love the office supply section. I even love office supply stores more. (I know love is a strong word, but not too strong in this case.) Some people go gaga over power tools, electronics, or clothing. (I won’t mention books, as this is a very healthy form of gaga.) But for me, it’s office supplies—notebooks in particular.

I’ve collected a variety of shapes and sizes of notebooks over the years. It’s always a dilemma between having a notebook small enough to carry comfortably in your pocket or pack and having it large enough for the practical purpose of writing. My current coil bound notebook is 22.8 cm x 15.2 cm and contains 300 pages. I think I’ve finally found the perfect compromise between portability and practicality.

Notebooks may seem like a rather trivial matter to obsess over, but I’ve talked to many a writer who won’t leave home without one. The first writer I met who was near and dear to his notebook was mystery writer Eric Wilson. Attention to detail is critically important in mystery writing, so a notebook is a vital component of his writing process.

A few days ago, I was paddling my kayak on Swan Lake just north of Vernon. Half way around the lake, this great idea thundered into the forefront of my mind. Knowing my Swiss cheese memory, I had to write the idea down or lose it. Out of the drybag I hauled my trusty notebook. There I was, bobbing about in the middle of the lake, madly scribbling the idea down before it vanished forever. Admittedly, I got strange looks from a passing four-man rowing team, but saving the idea was worth it.

This may sound sort of schmaltzy, but getting into the habit of carrying a notebook around has heightened my sense of observation. The more I write, the more I notice the subtlety of details around me in daily life—the phrasing used in a conversation, body language, the idiosyncrasies of clothing, and on and on. And when I see something really good, I’ll jot it down right away in my 22.8 cm x 15.2 cm notebook.

Speaking of back-to-school shopping, I’d also like to talk about how important it is for writers to have matching Barbie lunch kits and pencil cases, but that’ll have to wait for another time.

Until tomorrow,
I remain,
Chris

“What was I thinking?”

I’m really on a roll with this back-to-school stuff. (Not necessarily a good roll, but a roll nevertheless.) Those back-to-school ads we’re bombarded with starting in late July got me thinking of my one and only back-to-school clothing disaster.

I was going into grade two, and as part of my fall wardrobe preparation, my mother bought me a bright yellow rubber raincoat with really great snaps. (The sort of coat Paddington Bear would wear.) Don’t ask me why, but for some reason, I loved this raincoat. Maybe it was the snaps. Who knows?

The first day of school, I was determined to wear my raincoat. Unfortunately, it was a sunny, hot day with not a cloud in the sky. I was undaunted. Regardless of the weather, I would wear my new raincoat to school. There’s not a whole lot more that I remember of that day except for three things:

-It was very hot underneath that rubber raincoat.
-Quite a number of times, I heard myself say, “Well it’s raining at my house!”
-My lunch kit contained two very bruised pears– although not nearly as bruised as my ego.

These “What was I thinking?” moments have a strange way of haunting me decades later. Fortunately, embarrassment can be great fodder for fiction. In Klutzhood, Arlo pulls off plenty of “What was I thinking?” moments. Have you ever accidentally swilled down the paint brush cleaning water during art class? (I hope not, but if you have, you’ll know how good it tastes.)

If you’re looking for an interesting prompt for writing, give “What was I thinking?” a try. Anyone out there care to share their “What was I thinking?” moments?

Until tomorrow,
Chris

Pears

I hate pears. I apologize to all of you out there who happen to like them, but I don’t. I’m sorry if you are a member of the Association for the Advancement of Pear and Pear-related Products of America, but I can’t stand pears, especially when they come in pairs.

Why is my hatred so vehement? How can I get so emotional about an innocent, pale, bland-tasting tree fruit? To explain, I’ll have to go back to a topic I addressed in yesterday’s blog entry. It has everything to do with going back to school.

You see, even if I was going back to my familiar old school with familiar teachers and familiar classmates, I still wasn’t wildly excited about going back for another school year. But add to this the coincidence that Back to School fell at the very same time as the height of the pear season.

My lunch during those first few dreaded days back at school always included a pear or two. And as I remember, pears don’t travel well in paper lunch bags or rattling around inside plastic lunch boxes. By the time I opened up my lunch at noon, the pear had done some serious bouncing around and was covered in dents and bruises.

Worse than dents and bruises was when the skin was punctured, and pear juice covered the inside of my lunch kit. If the pear made it to lunchtime unscathed, I hated the taste because of its association with coming back to school. Again, I apologize to all of you pear lovers out there, but I simply can’t ignore the wave of emotion that overcomes me every time I see a pear.

What brought me to rant about the pear? I suppose yesterday’s entry brought back some other memories of the first days of school, and it got me thinking of how powerful food can be with emotional connections. Although we breathe more often than we eat, air isn’t nearly as interesting to write about as food. Food can be a great focal point in a story (How to Eat Fried Worms, The Worldwide Dessert Contest, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory). You can also tell a lot about a character by what he or she eats, as well as how they eat. Food certainly is something to consider when developing a character or grounding a scene, provided the author avoids writing about PEARS!

Until tomorrow,
Chris