The Persnickety Reader

I made the trek into Edmonton today to take care of a half-dozen details. The big news is I have a suit now for the wedding. And I picked up a father’s day gift from Sherry, who said I could buy a book of my choosing. My choice: Czeslaw Milosz’s Selected Poems 1931-2004. I’m looking forward to reading it right after I’m done reviewing Jan Conn’s Jaguar Rain: The Margaret Mee Poems for Northern Poetry Review.

In other news, I’m planning on some upcoming changes here at IanLeTourneau.ca. Once a month, look for a featured review, to be published here on the last day of each month. I’m working on a review of Eight Stages of Translation by Robert Bly right now. Nothing too fancy: just an overview and some thoughts. And I want people to come back everyday so one way to lure them is some original content. I’m going to post a picture of the day everyday: that’ll be pretty easy because every day I see something interesting in my back yard–lots of deer, all kinds of birds, and even a wolf one day. The only hitch is that I need a digital camera. We’re going to buy one soon, so I hope that feature comes on-line soon. Look for some changes (and original content) soon!

By the way, please leave a message to let me know your reading.

Not only did the Oilers lose last night, but Leah McLaren has signed a new book deal. AAAARGH!

Not as neat as the Eagle Cam (link to previous post), but a good site for information, nonetheless: the Falcon Cam. An initiative of CBC Manitoba and some people from the corporate world with a lot of neat facts, stuff, and even a “Falcon Chick” blog, but a web cam that unfortunately only refreshes every 30 seconds.

The Peregrine Falcon Recovery Project (Manitoba), Shaw and CBC in Manitoba are proud to share with you a very special journey in the life of the peregrine.

Follow the only known pair of nesting peregrine falcons in Winnipeg as they make their home on a downtown high rise.

Also check out: The Peregrine Falcon Recovery Project.

I always really liked Don McKay’s poem, “Identification,” from Birding, or Desire (1983):

Yesterday a hawkish speck
above the cornfield moving
far too fast its where are those
binoculars sharp wings row row row the air above
the Campbell’s bush it

stooped and

vanished

Peregrine

I write it down because

I write it down because of too much sky
because I might have gone on digging the potatoes
never looking up because
I mean to bang this loneliness to speech you
jesus falcon
fix me to my feet and lock me in this
slow sad pocket of awe…

My latest review–Robin Robertson’s Swithering–is on-line at PoetryReviews.ca.

Parliamentary Poet re-launches Poems of the Week feature.

Fitzhenry & Whiteside, owners of Red Deer Press, have finally forked over my $75 permission fee. It was unacceptable that it took so long (see previous post where I vented) and I will never even consider sending a manuscript to any press owned by F&W. I didn’t even get a “sorry, it took so long” or anything even resembling an apology. Even though they have the invoice date of January 5! Six months: any business that pays their invoices that late is not operating with good business sense. Actually, forget about business sense and replace it with common sense.

Should I expect an apology? I guess not, but if these guys, as publishers, are in the business of building relationships with writers, then they’re going to end up single and lonely, to stretch the metaphor. But what this all boils down to–at least from my perception–is the value attributed to the contributors of Alberta Anthology. I hope they are all as outraged as me. At least now I can buy that bottle of Scotch and sooth the literary snub I have endured for six long months.

Impac Award Announced. The winner is Colm Toibin’s The Master, a book I read quite a while ago now and thought was pretty good.

Announced. The Libris Awards are given out by the Canadian Booksellers Association.

Small publisher of the year goes to my publisher (can’t believe I can actually say that!), Gaspereau Press. Second year in a row, I believe.

Had my interview for Managing Editor of Fiddlehead / SCL today. It went really well, I think. I’ll find out on Monday or Tuesday if I was successful.

In other news, I received my galley proofs from Gaspereau today. All I have to do is go through the proofreader’s suggestions, which amount mostly to my use of compound words. I didn’t realize I used so many. It’s pretty exciting to see the proofs; they give me a pretty good idea of what the finished book is going to look like.

Lastly, we picked up the copy of this week’s local paper and there is a little story in there about Sherry winning the Richards’ Prize. They used my photo from the reception.

Up until now, my publishing experience has been frought with frustration. Red Deer Press, for instance, are very tight-lipped (ie: they don’t respond to e-mails) and I’ve been waiting for a cheque from them since the end of November for the contributor’s fee to The Alberta Anthology. A couple of weeks ago, when I called them, they got me to phone Toronto to hound the head office. And they said they were cutting cheques one by one for the contributors. One at a time! Obviously I’m far down in that list. Alphabetical? By page number in anthology? Who knows? I’ve got no straight answers, really.

Thankfully, Gaspereau Press is nothing like this at all. They have been an absolute pleasure to deal with so far. They e-mail with every update: today, just to tell me the proofed galleys were in the mail. And to ask if I had any strong preferences for a cover colour. (I told them I liked their blue covers with the silver print and the purple covers.) I can’t say enough about how great these people are. I get the sense that books are not just a business or a product. And I noticed they just upgraded their site. Check it out.