experience.

Guess what I just cracked open?!?!

The first chapter of Exit Music the new ( and perhaps last ) Rebus novel by my perennial favourite/celebrity author/Scottish crush Sir ( knighted him myself after I knighted Robert Lindsay) IAN RANKIN


I love that feeling. You know THAT feeling.... when you have waited for eons for a new book and it finally comes in, you stroll with it protectively under your arm to the cash desk, you gladly shove over the money ( heavily discounted, if you work in the profession I do ), and almost skip home anxious to open the first page.

In you favourite reading chair. Cup of cider. Lamp on. Rain soft outside.

This is perfect.

I love this moment.

I usually speed through Rankin once I get my warm up, but I always savour the very first chapter, chew it over and take deep breaths. I hope he writes more.

There is no feeling like the beginning in all of the world.

unlikely.

Just a note to say that I liked the movie version of The Jane Austen Book Club better than the book. This is a rare exception ( except in the case of some ultimate trash like The Da Vinci Code where the movie cannot help but be better than the book because the book is the worst thing in the history of time ) but it just fit better on screen. They altered the character's ages a bit ( which worked ) and the characters on screen seemed better to portray Fowler's ultimate thesis: that each woman was somehow a singular portion of a conjoined Austen universe.

And, I love the What Would Jane Do? thing. And Hugh Dancy. But no scifi convention-attending nerd in my stratasphere ever looked like that.

Anyways, not rocket science here, but definitely enjoyable.

Finished an ARC of a book called The Luxe by Anna Godbersen which will be released in Dec. I will write more about it then... sort of a Gossip Girl for the Edwardian period.

woot!

These kids are having a 24-hour a read-a-thon!

What a splended idea. I know I have come close to doing it WITHOUT a challenge or event before ( stupid school).

Anyways, the only thing they could improve on for next year is having people sponsored for some sort of charity event.... perhaps of their choice: a library, public school or literary council.



I will be reading most of the blogs there.

non-book and book

Dear person who stormed out of Starbucks in shock and appal and dismay when the cashier would not take the 100.00 bill you gave her for your 1.91 tea,

you are my least favourite person ever.

Me and the guy behind me who looked like Adam West

are mocking you

if silently

forever.





In other news a volume of the Selected Letters of Charlotte Bronte is finally being released for sale at a reasonable price. No more petitioning with the Reference Library that they should sell me their copies at less than 50.00 and no more dismal perusals at amazon's marketplace to see nothing under 249.00

Sir Ian: my celebrity author

So, we all know I have a thing for Ian Rankin. Not surprising. Have forever. It's a little bit of the sense of humour, a little bit of the accent, a little bit of the fact that he is one male author who has created an absolutely believable female character in the figure of Siobhan, a little bit of the fact that I got to touch his sleeve.

Authors are my celebrities, so seeing Ian for me is like some squealy girl seeing Johnny Depp.

Ian Rankin IS my author celebrity. I know you all have one. Whether it be Oppel or Patterson ( god help you if it's Patterson) or Neil Gaiman ( in which case I completely understand).

Now, Sir Ian and I have quite a history: he shows up in Toronto every year or so to sign something somewhere and I go to see him.... often with a couple of other people...sometimes by myself. Sometimes, if you are extra lucky, you get two for the price of one.... such as the IFOA reading when Sir Ian AND Peter Robinson were at the same table....

or, don't even GET ME STARTED on the now legendary round of Bouchercon that I didn't make but that I heard lots about.

I knighted him. I go and see him. He plays xs and os in my book and writes Slainte and signs his name and I smile. Broadly.


So, this year I was delighted to hear that our friend has a day named for him. Yes, Torontonians, October 17th is now IAN RANKIN day!

This is a good thing.

RIP Challenge:

a little behind in the posting of this, but well ahead in the reading, so:

Here is my list:

The Hellfire Conspiracy by Will Thomas

My Swordhand is Singing by Marcus Sedgwick

Vendetta by Chris Humphreys

The Meaning of Night by Michael Cox

Blood and Chocolate by Annette Curtis Klause

Thanks, of course, to Carl V. ....he is rather wonderful at organizing these things.

I also mean to pick a classic but will have to get back to you on that.

The end!

unrelated.

Dear American film companies,

I know that you feel you need to film the Hulk movie in my city because it is cheaper or what have you. But that does not mean you should be able to litter our perfectly fine Torontonian streets just to make it look more gritty and authentic. Just because you are a litter-filled grimeland, why must you bring it here and deem it "set pieces"

I have never seen so much junk on Yonge street...erm...I'm sorry, the sign now reads W 25th street.

And just because you are covering our Dundas Square signs with signs that better reflect the American locations in your film, everyone will know ( as they always do ) that nothing is ever filmed in LA or Chicago or New York....it's all done in Toronto and passed off as American.

Take the extra, over-filled trash cans you are authentically placing on my sidewalks, the stacks of cardboard boxes and the extra tissues and coffee cups, your signs and your streetnames and GO HOME! I have to get to school and while I am a full supported of Eric Bana, everyone is ON TO YOU !

we all know everything is Toronto.

Get your own city..... the real one, perhaps. That way you wouldn't have to litter. It'd be right there.


Rant Over.