BC Book Prizes

Tour Schedule 2010

From April 11–23 a selection of finalist authors will hit the road On Tour, with FREE readings at bookstores, libraries and schools throughout BC. We will be visiting communities in Northern BC, Southern BC (Kootenays and Okanagan) and Vancouver Island.

Stay tuned for more information on the confirmed communities. Once the tour is underway, we’ll be posting blog updates, photos and more as the Tour visits a town near you, so make sure to Follow the On Tour Blog

Northern Leg

April 11–18, 2010
Kristin Butcher | Michael Turner | Kari-Lynn Winters | Cathleen With

View the full Northern tour schedule here

• Terrace
• Prince Rupert
• Kitimat
• Prince George
• Quesnel
• Smithers
• Hazelton

Southern Leg

April 18–23, 2010
Sylvia Olsen | Fred Wah

View the full Southern tour schedule here

• Oliver
• Trail
• Rossland
• Nelson
• Cranbrook
• Creston
• Grand Forks
• Osoyoos
• Sidney (special event)

Okanagan / Vancouver Island Leg

April 19–23, 2010
Fiona Bayrock | Ehor Boyanowsky

View the full Okanagan / Vancouver Island tour schedule here

• Kelowna
• Penticton
• Princeton
• Courtenay
• Nanaimo
• Sidney (special event)

Posted by Monica Miller | Filed under: Tour Schedule | 0 Comments | Permalink

Final Photos from the Southern Tour

We had a great last few days in Southern BC and here are some lovely photos. To view all our photos, visit the BC Book Prizes Flickr Photostream. It’s been organized into albums and we’ll soon be posting Gala photos.

Sylvia reads from Counting on Hope at the Oliver Public Library

Myself (Tim), Fred and Sylvia enjoy the Osoyoos view after an excellent dinner at Passa Tempo restaurant, Nk’mip Winery.

Fred signs a copy of is a door for a fan at Cafe West Books in Rossland.

Posted by Tim Carlson | Filed under: Southern Leg 2010 | 0 Comments | Permalink

Cimex lectularius

Bed Bugs!
We stayed at the Coast Osoyoos Beach Hotel on Wednesday night and, after discovering my bed crawling with bed bugs at 1:30 am, I didn’t get any sleep that night. And, because of the itching, not much for the past two nights. What a bummer to an otherwise delightful tour of the south. A bit of a drag since Coast Hotels is a sponsor of the prizes and provides free rooms for parts of the tour.
So I’m in Victoria today, Saturday, after finishing off schools and readings in Osoyoos, Oliver, and Sidney.
I have found a new enthusiasm for talking with 14-yr olds. How out of touch I’ve become from those teen years that, finally, spurred my own poetic investigations and diatribes.
My book, _is a door_, leans much on my interest in hybridity and senses of “betweeness.” Talking about difference, identity, marginalization with the students has been surprising and interesting. Of course many of them are at that crucial turn in life when identity first offers its confusions.
The teachers, those brave educators who work in the trenches (not towers), have been likewise open and caring about the social, and more aware than I about issues of difference and confidence.
Traveling with Sylvia Olsen, whose life on a reserve informs all of her books on the interface between aboriginality and whiteness, has been an incredible pleasure. Tim Carlson and I have listened throughout the long trip to some amazing and informative stories about her life as a “white Indian.” In fact, our conversations have been so central to our trip that Tim didn’t dip into his box of cd’s he so thoughtfully put together.
So, again, the great thing about the BC Book Prizes has been the school visits. Since BC doesn’t have a “writers in the schools” program, this tour has been, I think, the most useful and productive aspect of the Prizes. I hope it grows (without the bed bugs).

Posted by Fred Wah | Filed under: | 0 Comments | Permalink

Final Leg

The week has flown by. We leave shortly on the final leg of our tour. We’re bound for Sydney where we’ll meet up with Sylvia Olsen and Fred Wah (and Tim!) of the Southern Leg.  Fred and Ehor will give presentations at the high school while Sylvia and I visit Sidney Elementary to talk with the younger set. I’m hoping we arrive in time for me to catch some of Sylvia’s presentation, as I particularly enjoyed her book Counting on Hope and would love to hear more about her approach to writing it and how she made her interesting format choices.  It looks like another gorgeous Island weather day today.

Posted by Fiona Bayrock | Filed under: Okanagan / Vancouver Island Leg 2010 | 0 Comments | Permalink

What does it mean?

As I sit in the hotel lobby for a few minutes before heading off to our public readings at the Vancouver Island University Book Store, my mind turns to the whirlwind that makes up the last few days. For me that has included eight presentations to more than 650 students, plus two public book store/library readings, and some lovely downtime along the way—-leisurely meals at funky eateries, ammonite shopping in Courtenay, and feet-up on a piece of driftwood on the Comox spit, soaking up the sunshine and salt air in the company of a happy seagull or two. Man, we live in a beautiful province!

Wherever we go, the teachers, librarians, and book store owners all tell us the same thing, and with a genuineness and intensity that is palpable: they are so very grateful that the BC Book Prizes tour has brought an author to their community to visit with students and patrons. Time and again we’ve heard stories about how valuable an experience it is to have personal contact with a “real live author”,  how meaningful and inspiring it is to hear the stories of our writing processes and writing life, the successes, the challenges, effort and perseverance it takes to create the works we do. As Mari at the Courtenay Library said, “The impact is huge.” And yet, I was the first author many of the kids I talked to had ever seen. Hearing our hosts talk about the importance of these personal connections, I am extremely humbled and grateful to be part of the BC Book Prizes tour this year.

Posted by Fiona Bayrock | Filed under: Okanagan / Vancouver Island Leg 2010 | 1 Comments | Permalink

Jelly Doughnut

120 Grade 8’s in Creston and we’re talking about hybridity and betweeness (the “theme” for both Sylvia Olsen and I on this southern tour) and I ponder about the opposite of “apple” (red on the outside and white on the inside) and a few minutes later a young girl jumps up an yells out “Jelly Doughnut.”
Beautiful warm day driving to Cranbrook. In fact, the whole week has been summer weather. A good high school group of Comm. and English 10, but it was last class in the day and they were tired. The reading at the library in the evening was poorly attended which is disappointing considering the 3-hour drive back to Nelson after the reading. But the half-dozen who came were good listeners.
Another early morning today with a 1 1/2 hr drive to Grand Forks. I had quite a good class of 8’s and 11’s and they were fairly responsive to issues around race and identity.
On to Osoyoos and a bit of a break and a warm afternoon. Tim, Sylvia, and I had a wonderful meal and some BC wine at Nk’mip and then drove a few minutes north to Oliver for a well-attended event at the library. An engaged crowd of several book groups and a solid library support group.
We checked into the Canucks-Kings 3rd period in a local bar (yahoo!) before driving back down the lake to the Coast Osoyoos Beach Hotel.
Tomorrow some schools in Osoyoos and Oliver and then on to Sidney,

Posted by Fred Wah | Filed under: Southern Leg 2010 | 0 Comments | Permalink

Tuesday

Fifteen hours is a long time to spend on the road even if you are with wonderful men like Tim and Fred. Great conversation. The girls at A.R.E.S. (above) were disappointed that Tim was too old and too taken but they thought he looked “very Vancouver” and that was exciting for Creston. The schools have filled the house with two or three classes of grades 5-7. I am having a good time telling stories and talking about books. The kids and teachers at Adam Robertson Elementary in Creston and Steeples Elementary in Cranbrook want to say “thanks” to the Book Prizes for sending an author to the Kootenays. On Monday I was able to visit Sono Nis’, my publisher, awesome location in Winlaw (just out of Nelson) for the first time—no wonder Diane loves the Slocan Valley.

Posted by Sylvia Olsen | Filed under: Southern Leg 2010 | 2 Comments | Permalink

Monday

Started early, ended late and had a great day—the Kootenays are beautiful. Thanks to Tim, the driver, and Fred, the navigator, I got from Nelson to Trail to Rossland and back to Nelson with no effort on my part—it was wonderful. Today was a special day for me because I got to visit my publisher, Sono Nis. Thanks to Diane Morris who picked me up and brought me to her beautiful location in Winlaw. Thanks BC Book Prizes, this tour is a privilege.
Sylvia Olsen

Posted by Sylvia Olsen | Filed under: Southern Leg 2010 | 0 Comments | Permalink

The odyssey begins

After a weekend staining logs of the cabin Cristina Martini and I are building at Nighthawk, our little ranch property at Basque on the Thompson River, C drove me to Kelowna and then, poor thing, had to drive the home leg to Horseshoe Bay herself (well, actually accompanied by our English Setter, Thompson S Hunter). I hooked up with Bryan and Fiona the next morning and had one of the busiest days of my recent life: four presentations beginning with criminal psychology, followed by two presentations on the book during which I tried to explain how a psychologist ended up writing a book about a poet, fishing, the philosophy of creativity, conservation and the wilderness. For me, the highlight was the poem at Pentiction SS I got 15 year old Amayla Black to read on spousal abuse. It was amazingly poignant. She demurely informed me she had already published three.

Fiona and Bryan are such great company that it made the whole first day’s itinerary flow seamlessly. The epicurean highlight was a delicious early meal of perogies with wild boar proscuitto and Nichols pinot gris at the Heritage House in Naramata where a very forthcoming host by name of Quentin Cane regaled us with stories of the halcyon days of the grand old manor in the Edwardian era of garden parties and regattas. Highly recommended if you are in the area.

Today was a challenge as I was presenting to grade eights and nines in Princeton but kept them listening by drawing parallels between Ted Hughes’s cold blooded raptors who “in sleep, rehearse perfect kills and eat” (I pointed out how that poem fragment in seven words can be a complete bio or characterization) and human predators who through sensitive disposition and early trauma and most of all isolation from positive paternal influences become obsessed with killing humans. The little ghouls loved it, many, to my surprise having seen Psycho and the Texas Chain Saw Massacre, etc, inspired by the most horrendous cases. I emphasized how important it was to reach out if someone seemed especially isolated or if they themselves, were. Then we cruised downhill and ferried to Nanaimo with no duties but to track down a pub, The Old Station, and watch Steve Nash and the Suns pummel the Blazers, and to bed to sleep, perchance to dream - not of axe murderers or even hawks who begin to eat their prey without bothering to kill them, but of idyllic rivers teeming with steelhead.   

Posted by Ehor Boyanowsky | Filed under: Okanagan / Vancouver Island Leg 2010 | 0 Comments | Permalink

And we’re off!

Two days into our tour and Ehor, Bryan, and I appear to be bloggers MIA.  But we’re not, really we aren’t. Factor in a travel day and a day of internet access issues and here we are at last!

While Ehor headed off to the high school on Monday, my first official BC Book Prizes tour day began with me visiting 100 K-3 students at Dorothea Walker Elementary School in Kelowna. What a welcome!  The classes arrived at the library with otters and frogs and whales and fish—-artwork from Bubble Homes and Fish Farts! 

Each class had made something different with illustrator Carolyn Conahan’s line drawings. The kids grinned from ear-to-ear as they showed off their masks, medallions, and two styles of animal hats. Too cool.  I grinned right back.

A quick trip along the highway—-and a few heart palpitations on Bryan’s part as we were delayed for 15 minutes at a dead stop due to construction—-found us at Penticton schools for the afternoon. A big shoutout to Wiltse Elementary! 

Since we had plenty of time before our public gig at Hooked on Books, a lovely little book store on Main Street, Penticton right next door to Fibonacci’s, home of the biggest latte cups I’d ever seen, we thought we’d stop en route for a

official visit to the Red Rooster Winery, one of the adopt-a-library sponsors. 

After

.
Kudos to Hooked on Books for hosting our evening event even though they’ve been open for only a few months.  A terrific first touring day.  Can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings.

(Thanks to Bryan for the photos!)

Posted by Fiona Bayrock | Filed under: Okanagan / Vancouver Island Leg 2010 | 2 Comments | Permalink