Every year, Toronto hosts the massive, and massively popular, International Festival of Authors. It’s a gathering of contemporary writers spanning over a week and is as full of breathless gushing and long line-ups as you can imagine. I’ve been a few times, having had the pleasure of seeing how well David Mitchell and William Gibson…
Month: October 2012
What marriage meant to the Victorians–and by “the Victorians,” I mean three novels by Gissing and Trollope
Oh, I am remiss. I know this. I keep breezing through delightful books and then not blogging about them. This must change, if only because I don’t want all my book posts to be jerk-faced complaint-fests. A couple of years ago, over at Bookphilia, I began a very serious Victorian Literature Project; I was to…
Brand new day
This morning, I ran my first ever race–5km as part of the Scotiabank Waterfront Marathon series. I was so nervous, I barely slept last night. I didn’t know what to expect and I worried a lot about not leaving the house in time and missing it altogether, or not arriving early enough to take a…
A visual representation of the state of our home renovations
In the form of a music video. The only differences are that Big Boi and Andre 3000 aren’t here, and the sun ain’t shining. Ms Jackson. Sigh.
The comforts of Fall
Most of my friends feel most like themselves in deepest, steamiest summertime. Fellow Torontonian Drake comes alive in the nighttime–as does my giant bunny, Sophie, who was busted in the middle of the night last night, jumping up and down in pure joy on the sofa, in the dark. I, however, feel most entirely present…
Teenaged white boy saves the world! Yes, again.
Everyone loves Cory Doctorow’s YA novel of teenage rebellion, Little Brother. And it makes sense that they do because the book is topical: it’s about surveillance, and technology, and what internet freedom means in post-911 America. It’s full of characters who are simultaneously cool and nerdy, so it has broad social appeal. It features minorities…
Jam and Idleness 