In keeping with the visual inspiration theme, here is a collage I created at the recent “Hello Dali” surrealism collage night at Spadina Museum.  I used some scrapbook paper, Egon Schiele postcards from a set I bought while working on A Terrible Beauty, images provided at the event, and phrases from the incredibly cool card I […]

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I find visual inspirations very helpful when working on a book (see my earlier posts about the “mood boards” for the novels).  I’m just starting on what might be the new novel, but I already have a couple of touchstones. This girl with the wary eyes is part of the painting The Coronation of the […]

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I’ll be in Kingston at the Limestone Genre Expo the weekend of July 23, 2016.  This is the second year of this event and there’s a great line-up of writers and some fascinating panels.  It’s a small, friendly convention in a beautiful town. I’ll be taking part in three panels (Where is Fantasy taking the […]

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I’ve been working full-time since I was twenty-two (that’s 35 years, for anyone who’s counting).  I started doing data entry at a sleazy mail order company whose principals eventually were arrested in the U.S. for mail fraud, moved to the magazine business in the circulation department, worked in magazine consulting,  and then ended up in […]

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I’ll be doing a panel at 10:00 on the ongoing imaginative power of Camelot and then I’ll be around until mid-afternoon.  Say “hi” if you see me looking lost…

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I’ll be at Ad Astra at the end of the month, but only on the Sunday (May 1st).  I’ll post my schedule when it’s available.  

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The key question from The Witch, the movie most of my friends were seeing in February and March. I go along with the unanimous praise. Even the parts I didn’t think quite worked (I understood what they were getting at but the execution didn’t quite hit the mark) were thought-provoking. One of my coworkers and I came […]

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Spurred by reading Mary Beard’s book about Rome, SPQR, and by memories of our tour of the Colosseum, we decided to rewatch Gladiator the other night.  Not withstanding my affection for men in period armor (with wolfskins),  the film still works.  Oh, parts of the plot don’t make any sense, Rome was apparently to be […]

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  I’ve been buying clothes from Annie Thompson for years (probably close to twenty) and in that time I’ve gotten rid of no more than about ten items.   I wore one pair of pants out and have sized myself out of a few other items – though of course I’ve hung on to most of […]

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   Which is not precisely the same as the best books of 2015.  These are the books I read in 2015 that moved me to talk about them, recommend them, think about them, or buy my own copy. H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald I love good nature writing because the best of it is […]

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