Monday, April 27, 2009

Oonagh reviewed at The Globe and Mail

Jim Bartley over at The Globe seems to have enjoyed Mary Tilberg's risky and rewarding Oonagh:

"It's apparent we're dealing with sorrow, but in Tilberg's pictures from a mind reeling we see also the world's gifts. Oonagh Corcoran is the mad sister in the guest room, bleeding hallucinatory joy and pain, a damaged vessel that her family can't fix. It's an uncommonly adept and affecting first chapter. The writing is chock full of quiet wonders."
Yes Jim, yes it is. You can read the rest of the review here.


Friday, April 24, 2009

The 2009 Canadian Booksellers Association Libris Award Shortlist

We're proud to announce that Cormorant Publisher, Marc Côté, has been shortlisted for a CBA Libris Award in the category of Editor of the Year, and Cormorant Books has once again been nominated for Small Press Publisher of the Year.

Congratulations also go out to Cormorant author Charles Pachter, who has been nominated for Children's Illustrator of the Year.

The winners will be announced June 20th.

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Beverly Stone: Vulgar

Meet Beverley Stone, all-around awesome person. For the next few weeks, she'll be blogging about life as an author, with the same warm and honest humanity that defines her novel No Beautiful Shore. Settle in and enjoy a peek into the mind of a very talented writer.


Narcissism and the Single Novelist
IV. Provocative

Honestly and truly, send her an email.

At the end of the day I check the email address for my website. Most of the time there is nothing but spam, but sometimes someone writes me a nice note, or has a question, and I get to discuss No Beautiful Shore with a reader. A lovely thing, feedback.

Except sometimes, it’s not so lovely. A reader who shall remain nameless, but who we will call for the purposes of this blog, Mrs. Pickle-Up-Posterior (“PUP”), wrote me to tell me that she would not keep my book in her home, as it was a piece of vulgar trash.

Ouch. Gratuitous criticism goes right to your guts and settles down there, burning and making you feel vulnerable. It hurt for days, weeks. I wrote PUP back to say that I was sorry that I had disappointed her.

No Beautiful Shore is kind of like The Shipping News meets Last Exit to Brooklyn. I meant it to be that way, in all of its raw, uncomfortable, vulgar glory, but I still feel bad that I enraged PUP.

Oh well, at least she will remember my name. She will have to since she will never, ever buy another thing I write as long as she has breath in her body, or something like that.



Want more on Bev? Visit her website at www.beverleystone.com

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Mis for Moose shortlisted for a Ruth & Sylvia Schwartz Children's Book Award

We've been mentioning Charles Pachter in the same breath as Melanie Watt and Robert Munsch for months.

Now we can do so in an official capacity, with the announcement that M is for Moose has been shortlisted for a Ruth & Sylvia Schwartz Children's Book Award in the children's picture book category.

The winners will be announced on May 20.

Monday, April 20, 2009

The Heart Specialist reviewed at the Montreal Gazette




Click here to brighten your grey and soggy Monday with the Gazette's glowing review of Claire Holden Rothman's engrossing new novel The Heart Specialist. Here's an excerpt:

“I can pay a book no higher compliment than to say I didn’t want it to end. With The Heart Specialist, I rationed my reading, permitting myself only a few chapters at a sitting so as to savour the writing and the story.”

Continue reading...

Friday, April 17, 2009

Underground reviewed at The Globe and Mail




A fantastic review of June Hutton's debut novel Underground, courtesy of Globe Books:

"Hutton's prose is taut and lean, elegant and poetic ... Some seven years in the making, Underground is well plotted … Its exploration of a man's creative defiance and ability to embrace his own imperfect life plumbs the intrinsic qualities of art, poetry, human geography, chance and love."

Read the rest...

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Beverly Stone: Scattered

Meet Beverley Stone, all-around awesome person. For the next few weeks, she'll be blogging about life as an author, with the same warm and honest humanity that defines her novel No Beautiful Shore. Settle in and enjoy a peek into the mind of a very talented writer.


Narcissism and the Single Novelist
III. Provocative

The intrepid Beverley Stone.

I have the attention span of a small rodent. Focusing on one thing for any length of time makes me fidgety. I am sure that, back in the day when I would have had 18 children to protect from wolves or to keep from falling over wharves, this would have been a benefit. But as a writer, not so much.

I have trouble staying in one character’s head for a very long time. It gets claustrophobic in there, with all the little fragment of thoughts, so I have to jump out and into another head. Because of this, I can’t write in chapters, but little fragments of single point-of-view that strung together make a whole (or will make a whole, when I am done).

Take for example, the New Story, still very much in draft. The first crack at it was written from alternating first person points-of view between the two narrators. In draft two, I have stuck the stories together into two chucks – same story told from two different perspectives.

I may take it all apart again at some point, if I can only get myself focused enough to concentrate on the story.


Want more on Bev? Visit her website at www.beverleystone.com

Monday, April 6, 2009

Oonagh at Muse Book Reviews



A great review for Mary Tilberg's novel Oonagh was posted over at Muse Book Reviews. Here's a snippet:

"The book has left me feeling sad; I wasn't prepared to be done with Chauncey and Oonagh, yet. I wanted to know Oonagh's family better; I wanted to know more about her sisters and brother who didn't come to Canada. Mostly, though, I wanted there to be more to Oonagh and Chauncey's story."

Leave 'em wanting more - can't say much fairer than that.

Have a review of one of our books? Email me at b.ibeas(at)cormorantbooks.com and I'll post it on the blog!

Friday, April 3, 2009

Underground launch photos

June Hutton (right) and Deb McVittie of 32 Books (left)


Check out all the photos from the event!

On March 30, the launch for June Hutton's debut novel Underground was held at Zocalo restaurant in Vancouver. Fabulous food was served, many books were sold, and a great time was had by all. There may have even been some Spanish spoken.

Special thanks to the SPiN writing group and 32Books.