THE
RISE OF THE FALL PREVIEW 2007
Compiled by Nathaniel G. Moore
As the summer dwindled away and the
catalogues poured in from across the country, I realized just how many
books go undetected, over-detected or barely detected in this business
season after season after season after season. It’s like a pattern or
something. I was also reminded of a conversation I had at a book launch
a couple of years ago with a bookseller, and we got to talking about US
book retail interest in the always vilified Chapters-Indigo chain, and
this yearning’s subsequent quenching when they realized just how small
our industry is in comparison to their own…
Yet, in a fit of irony, this preview
will neglect so many new releases this fall, releases that many
individuals have laboured hard to make available to readers who might
never ever even hear about their works. Which leads, to my next point,
and that is the point of taking advantage and making the most of buzz
and brand new opportunity. It’s the job of the publicist, publisher
and editors of any press (or even the author in some cases) to make all
of us care, whether we are reader, reviewer, fan, fellow author or all
of the above.
While glow-trend social programs of the
tech-tool-boom persuasion such as MYSPACE, YOUTUBE and FACEBOOK
have assisted in the online promotional process, and the sometimes
well-attended live events are hit and miss in this industry, one key
factor remains important: a sense of excitement oozing from those who
are working to promote these authors. And I must say, I have, for the
most part while putting this hit-list together, felt this positive
ooze.
With that, we welcome you to the first
instalment of TDR’s comprehensive guide to book buying, launch
attending, review pitching, and general literary hob-knobbing
nationwide, as we reveal an uneven but earnest portrait of the
publishing landscape that is the fall season. We’ve got debut and
sophomore releases, first-time poets, hostage-taking debuts, legendary
poetry retrospectives and contemporary criticisms.
TDR proudly presents the fall preview
in all its formats: we’ve got Hart-breaking biographies, insightful
anthologies, concrete works of urbanized non-fiction, long-awaited
spin-offs and more ISBN’s than an Indigo category manager could shake
a scented candle at: enjoy the fall.
FICTION / DRAMA
"Looming apocalypse aisles four
Douglas." Okay, so no one else heard that loudspeaker announcement
but you and I, however, The Gum Thief (Random House, Sept.)
Douglas Coupland’s new novel, is described as "Clerks meets
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf—starring Roger, a divorced,
middle-aged "aisles associate" at a Staples outlet, who begins
an obsession with a fellow employee at the end of her Goth cycle named
Bethany." The catalogue promises the novel is, among other things,
a story of love and looming apocalypse. Toronto artist and author Brian
Joseph Davis (author of 2005’s tabloid tableau Portable
Altamont) is up to his new tricks again with his debut novel
I,Tania (ECW, Sept.) a book that uses the memoir format and gets
bawdy while recounting the highly fictionalize true story of the rise
and fall of the far-leftist group the Symbianese Liberation Army, and
its heiress hostage turned helper. The novel also answers some plaguing
questions and proves some debate-worthy points including: Why John
McEnroe is scarier than Ian Curtis and How Don DeLillo can kill…with
his mind, and finally, do violent debutantes have a place in political
struggle? Joseph has the answers, I,Tania is your hook-up. ‘Yeah,
don’t do us any favours, Ass Eyes!’ Former women’s hockey
player-turn-novelist Cara Hedley is hoping to score in regulation
time with Twenty Miles (Coach House, Oct.) a novel about
The Scarlets, a hard-hitting women’s hockey team. (Dare I remind
readers the women’s Olympic hockey squad did what the men’s failed
to repeat last year?) Lead by players named Toad, Hal, French Pelly and
Heezer (who moonlights as a waitress at Hooters) Hedley’s book
refreshes the male-dominated world of Canadian Puck-Lit with a serious
hereditary backdrop and plenty of questionable officiating. Gail
Anderson-Dargatz releases Turtle Valley (Knopf, Sept.) No
stranger to a Giller win, M.J. Vassanji releases the much
anticipated The Assasin’s Song (Doubleday, Sept.) While the
Giller-nominated Elizabeth Hay is following up her bestselling Garbo
Laughs with Late Night On Air, a novel set in the mid-1970s
that centres around the romantic and rivalry-ready lives of the workers
at a Yukon radio station. Wings of a Bee is Julie Roorda’s
first novel for young adults, the story of quirky oddball named Bronwyn
DeGroot. (Sumach,Oct.) Montreal’s favourite novelist/barmaid Maya
Merrick brings us another refreshing round with her sophomore novel
The Hole Show (Conundrum, Oct.) full of colourful dreamers and
lovers like Billy, the cross-dressing butcher boy, who leaves the farm
and changes his name to Beau. The novel follows Billy and his gang of
thespians who form a controversial theatre troupe set in the politically
vulnerable Montreal of the 1970s. Merrick’s first novel,
Sextant, (Conundrum, 2005) was recently translated and published
into French by Les Editions du Boreal. On the other side of the country,
Teresa McWhirter follows up Some Girls Do with Dirtbags (Anvil,
Oct.) a novel about reckoning with one’s past, one’s choices, and
one’s expectations for the future. Spider is a scrappy kid growing up
in rural B.C., and when a tragic event causes her world to implode she
heads to Vancouver for solace, distraction, and experience. Peter
Robinson brings Inspector Alan Banks back with Friend of the
Devil (M&S, Sept.) Ottawa poet, editor, artist rob
mclennan debuts in novel form with the ever-topical uncertainty of
urban romance in White (Mercury, Oct.) Brendan Mcleod,
winner of the 29th annual 3-day novel contest, is releassing
his new novel, The Convictions of Leonard McKinley , a a comedic
coming-of-age novel about a teenager who must suppress his dark side in
an attempt to become a better human being. (Arsenal, Sept.) Pulpy and
Midge (Coach House, Oct.) will take the day-job world of faxing and
water cooler gossip by storm when Jessica Westhead’s unleashes
her debut novel which Lynn Coady calls "a hilariously deadpan,
wincingly funny take on one office innocent’s workplace coming of
age." Join Jessica and the House September 25th
at an office party book launch through Pages This is Not a Reading
Series. Richard B. Wright is back with October (Penguin
Sept.) the story of a Toronto professor who travels to London to see his
dying daughter and stumbles into his past. Elyse Friedman
releases the much anticipated Long Story Short (Anansi, Oct.) Stephen
Henighan is back with A Grave In The Air is a sequence of
stories (though the catalogue says novel) dominated by Central and
Eastern European themes. (Thistledown, Avail). Roddy Doyle fans
will be pleased when The Deportees is released (Knopf, Sept.)
collecting stories Doyle previously wrote for Metro Eireann, a magazine
by and for immigrants to Ireland. Massachusetts novelist and academy
award-nominated screenwriter Tom Perrotta brings the always
topical issues of child-rearing and sexuality to the forefront in his
latest novel The Abstinence Teacher (Random House, Oct.) Kuroshio
by Terry Watada (Arsenal, Oct.) centres around an Issei woman who
arrives on the west coast from Japan as a picture bride crushed in the
loveless throes of a disappointing marriage. Toronto literary fixture Stan
Rogal’s third novel As Good As Dead (Pedlar, Oct.) let’s
us tag along with suddenly fame-struck writer Vic who confronts
celebrity living with a press circuit including a stop on Oprah and at
the erotic island that is The Playboy Mansion. The Stone Face by
Sherry Macdonald (Anvil, Oct.) is set in the year is 1964
where first-time film director Alan Schneider is about to embark on a
project combining the talents of Buster Keaton and Samuel Beckett. Tacones:
high heels (Anvil, Aug.) by Todd Klinck is a reprint of the
1997 winner of the 3-Day Novel Contest. Tacones is a hangout for a
subculture of outlaws and rejects—crackhead murderers, transvestite
prostitutes, biastogerontophiles, hustler boys, and addicts—all
blatantly searching for connection. Ray Robertson releases What
Happened Later (Thomas Allen, Sept.) David Chariandy’s
debut Soucouyant (Arsenal, Sept.) takes its name from an evil
spirit in Caribbean lore, and a symbol of the legacies that haunt the
Americas. The novel is the story of a mixed-race family living in
suburban Ontario affected by the mother’s worsening dementia, while
the Rock’s favourite son Michael Winter releases The
Architects Are Here (Penguin, Sept.). The Anansi Reader:
Forty Years of Very Good Books, edited by Lynn Coady (Anansi,
Oct.).
NON-FICTION
Naomi Klein,
author of No Logo is back with The Shock Doctrine (Knopf,
September) examines how the free market came to dominate the world based
on four years of on-the-ground reporting in disaster zones. Chris Turner
opens up possibilities for all in The Geography of Hope (Random
House Oct.) is one writer’s exploration of a the world’s many
beacons of possibility using front-line reporting, analyiis Turner
argues for optimism amid the gloom and already in place solutions around
the world including Canada’s largest wind farm and Europe’s most
environmentally friendly communites. Turner touches on economic, social
and spiritual futures. From The Geography of Hope: "There
are, I’m sure, any number of images called to mind by talk of
ecological revolution and renewable energy and sustainable living, but I’m
pretty certain they don’t generally include a hearty fiftysomething
Dane in rubber boots spotted with mud and cow shit."
"To me there is something
bordering on beautiful about a brotherhood of big tough men who
pretended to hurt one another for a living instead of actually doing it.
Any idiot can hurt someone." Widely considered one of the greatest
technical wrestlers of all time, Calgary’s favourite son and
Canadian sports hero, Bret "The Hitman" Hart continues
his healing process from personal tragedy with Hitman: My Real Life
In The Cartoon World of Wrestling. (Random House, Oct.) The
autobiography traces the legendary career of Bret Hart who reveals how
the industry works, pays and betrays, including how he coped with the
death of his younger brother and once rival Owen Hart in 1999, or how he
helped put over the industry’s biggest draw of all time in "Stone
Cold" Steve Austin. Hart was passionate about his legacy, and the
legacy of those around him.
John A.
by Richard Gwyn (Random House, Sept.) will bring us closer to the
"man who made us" in John A. Macdonald. In this first volume,
spanning 1815-1867, Gwyn follows Macdonald’s life from his birth in
Scotland to his emigration with his family to Kingston, Ontario, his
early political ambitions, conceiviing Confederation and presiding over
the first Canada Day. Rob Stewart’s Sharkwater (Key
Porter,Oct.) is based on the Award-winning documentary of the same name,
(Winner Canada’s Top Ten—Toronto International Film Festival, Winner
People’s Choice Award and Winner Best Documentary—Fort Lauderdale
International Film Festival) with over 200 photographs, the book reveals
the reality of sharks as pillars in the evolution of the seas. As a
result of human greed, the ocean’s king predators are a vulnerable
minority, facing mass extinction. Technically not a fall title, but
nonetheless, Secret Carnival Workers: The Paul Haines Reader,
edited by Stuart Broomer (H. Pal, Jul.) collects the work of Paul
Haines (who died in early 2003) in short fiction and music journalism
forms that he wrote from 1955 to 2002. Paul Haines is the father of
Toronto musician/poet Emily Haines. Veteran photographer Pat
Graham releases Silent Pictures, (Akashic, Sept.) featuring
photographs of Modest Mouse, Ted Leo, Bikini Kill, Fugazi, and The
Shins are just some of the subjects that helped define ‘90s
underground rock.The Dictionary of Homophobia by Louis-Georges
Tin (translated by Marek Redburn) (Arsenal, Nov.) is the
result of seventy researches in fifteen countries, at 448 pages it’s
described as "a mammoth encyclopaedia book that documents the
history of homosexuality, and various cultural responses to it."
Includes Canadian contributors and issues. Imagination in Action
(Mercury, Oct.) edited by Carol Malyon, collects the essays and
articles by Canadian painters and sculptors, musicians and composers,
poets and novelists and journalists including: Adam Dickinson, bill
bissett, Joe Blades, Penn Kemp, Phlip Arima, Stan Rogal, Steve McCabe,
and Susan Helwig. Vancouver’s homelessness is the subject of Street
Stories: 100 Years of Homelessness in Vancouver (Anvil, Sept.).
Photographs by Lindsay Mearns, authored by Michael Barnholden
and Nancy Newman. Tracing the homeless problem since 1907 in
Vancouver, the book delves into new programs and initiatives that have
been tried and have seemingly failed. Concrete Toronto: A
Guide to Concrete Architecture from the fifties to the seventies edited
by Michael McClelland and Graeme Stewart (Coach House,
Oct.) is a guide through Toronto’s extensive concrete heritage, and a
re-examination of the uniqueness and value of these historic buildings.
Included in the book are remarks from some of the original concrete
architects, local practitioners, journalists and industry experts.
Includes archival photos, drawings and interviews. rob mclennan
explores Ottawa: The Unknown City (Arsenal, Oct.) with tons of
interesting facts, including one surrounding an Oscar Wilde visit that
may very well have changed the genius’ life forever. Have you ever
wondered what living in a world where porn had no fake breasts or big
budget trailers? Black and White and Blue by Mojo magazine
approved rock writer Dave Thompson (ECW Sept.) traces the
development of adult cinema since 1889 to around 1980 when the advent of
the home VCR changed the landscape of adult film forever. If the
apocalypse and science fiction are your guilty pleasure, if you need to
brush up on your history of the Cylons, and if you can’t decide if you
like the new series better than the old one, better pick up a copy of Frak
You! (ECW, Oct.) the Ultimate Unauthorized Guide to Battlestar
Galactica by Jo Storm. High Hat, Trumpet, and Rhythm: The
Life and Music of Valaida Snow by Mark Miller (The Mercury
Press, Oct.) Traces the hyperbolic story of this singer, trumpeter and
dancer, child star, jazz pioneer and world traveller. Loath him or rely
on him, Subverting The Lyric (ECW, Oct.) showcases the Wayne
Gretzky of Canadian Poetry rob mclennan in his most honest form:
the tireless and passionate reflector of this country’s literary
providers. With essays on the works of such diverse Canadian writers as
Bowering, Fiorentino and Christakos, it is easily a work that the
academia and literati sects should own, study and debate over with great
interest
POETRY
Poetry goes through a shake up and an
always welcome identity crisis this fall when Ottawa poet Stephen
Brockwell releases the real made up, (ECW, Oct.) an
intriguing collection that concocts itself around the notion of
imitation, mimicry and "blatant theft" while the wry circuits
of David McGimpsey hopes to temp basic cable subscribers and
lower Neilson numbers at the same time when he unplugs his latest poetry
collection Sitcom (Coach House, Sept) a book that wobbles its
bunny-ears and flips its poetic channels between the serious and the
comedic. Margaret Atwood releases The Door (Anansi, Sept.)
The author of The Dying Poem Rob Budde releases Finding
Ft. George a poetic record of the poet’s growing love of Prince
George and northern British Columbia. Diane Guichon debuts with Birch
Split Bark (Nightwood, Oct.) musing on birch bark canoes and the
private waters of humanity, while Michael Blouin debuts with I’m
Not Going To Lie To You (Pedlar, Oct.) in a collection that shows us
how small details add up to a sense of purpose, while Jacob Scheier’s
More To Keep Us Warm (ECW, Oct.) also a debut collection, mourns
the absence of both religious and cultural identity as the poet deals
with issues of familial loss. Last Water Song by Patrick Lane
(Harbour, August) takes its form with a series of 16 long elegies on
writer acquaintances who are no longer with us, followed by a section of
23 lyrics and narratives. Rita Wong releases Forage (Nightwood,
Oct.) described as "impassionate rants against the abuses of
power" touching on cultural and political angst. Perhaps one of the
most exciting poetry releases this fall will be The Alphabet Game: A
bpNichol Reader by bpNichol (edited by Smaro-Kamboureli
and Darren Wershler-Henry) which amasses key texts from the very
broad spectrum of Nichol’s work, and is the ideal introduction for
brand new readers who wants to catch up to the rest of his fans. (Coach
House, Oct.) |
