Frye Fest Thursday Night

Thursday night at the Frye Festival: an amazing event at the Capitol Theatre (a former vaudeville theatre in downtown Moncton--beautiful original artwork throughout), packed with 600+ audience members there to hear people read from books. It doesn't get any better than that! Margaret Atwood, Shandi Mitchell, Gilles Leroy, and Dyane Leger gave such excellent readings. A veritable who's who of literary royalty in the lobby.

Northrop Frye Literary Festival

Okay, so July 1st is still a ways away. In the meantime, though, we in Moncton are very lucky to be home to the Northrop Frye Literary Festival, beginning next week. For those of you attending this year's festival--and especially those of you who can't make it to all the events you'd like to see--I'll be blogging about all the events I attend, the writers, and the activities. Stay tuned! (And if you'd like to come with me to any events, just drop me a line and let me know!)

Launching July 1, 2011 (Canada Day)!

The Historical Fiction Book Club will launch on July 1, 2011, featuring one of my favourite historical novels: Joseph Boyden's Three Day Road.

So, between now and Canada Day, read, read, and (if you've already read it) re-read Boyden's groundbreaking novel. In the meantime, feel free to comment on the novel: what do you think of it? Which characters or scenes come to life most effectively/least effectively? One of my colleagues found the battle-scenes repetitive: do you feel the same way? When I taught the book to my CanLit students, many felt it was one of the best novels they'd read in university. What do you think?

Some of you commented on the CanadaReads site during the most recent competition, questioning the fact that Three Day Road did not make it onto the list of finalists for the best Canadian novel of the decade. Should Three Day Road have been a finalist? Here's your opportunity to put yourself in the place of the CanadaReads judges: how would you have defended Boyden's novel?