It’s Friday and for some reason there’s a lot of news out of France. The calendar creeps towards the final battle of the American Civil War and a pandemic sweeps across the land, fires and record number hurricanes rage, there are murder hornets coming and now there are sinkholes full of rats appearing. It’s like Doctor Venkman said: cats and dogs living together…. Mass hysteria! So, breathe through that for a moment, then let it go, because you have two days to do something different. My suggestion is reading poems. Much less stressful. Unless they’re by Frederick Seidel. They upset me when I like them.
- Always surprised to see established authors entering prizes like the CBC Poetry Prize… I haven’t submitted to this sort of thing in 20 years, mostly because I always assumed these prizes were for emerging writers and I wouldn’t want to muddy those waters… But here you go: 32 poems longlisted for the prize;
- 2021 Journey Prize gets all-star jury;
- Hachette launches BIPOC imprint;
- NYT covers efforts to make diversity efforts worth the effort;
- All things Frawnch:
- Don’t worry, everyone: Gaelic has added pandemic words;
- Amazon wipes crumbs from swollen belly, belches, calls it charity;
- Halloween picture book recs;
- Speaking of Horror: Stephen Beattie’s blog is rolling along with its month of chills, including this piece from James Grainger on Canadian “Folk Horror”;
- Stephen King on how to adapt Stephen King;
- Author sues ADIDAS over use of the term “Inner Game” (maybe I should go after Nike for “Just Do It” since that’s what I say to the sound tech at every open mic reading right after I say the words “For the love of god, mute the mic!”);
- Choose Your Own Adventure comic books? 10-year-old me is a-quiver;
- Bookstore pr0n from China;
- Carnegie Medals longlist is the long longlist you’ve been longing for;
Bookninja 