On October 20, 2010 at 8:00PM I attended this wonderful event.

There were four authors who participated:  Emma Donoghue, Pascale Quiviger, Robert Wiersema, and Kathleen Winter.  All four authors share a common theme in their latest works, that of parent and child.

Emma Donoghue’s  most recent work is ‘Room’.  Here is a book description, taken from the book:

To five-year-old Jack, Room is the entire world. It is where he was born and grew up; it’s where he lives with his Ma as they learn and read and eat and sleep and play. At night, his Ma shuts him safely in the wardrobe, where he is meant to be asleep when Old Nick visits.

Room is home to Jack, but to Ma, it is the prison where Old Nick has held her captive for seven years. Through determination, ingenuity, and fierce motherly love, Ma has created a life for Jack. But she knows it’s not enough…not for her or for him. She devises a bold escape plan, one that relies on her young son’s bravery and a lot of luck. What she does not realize is just how unprepared she is for the plan to actually work.

Told entirely in the language of the energetic, pragmatic five-year-old Jack, ROOM is a celebration of resilience and the limitless bond between parent and child, a brilliantly executed novel about what it means to journey from one world to another.

To research for this book, Ms. Donoghue said that she made Room “much less scary than real cases of captivity.  She wanted to show that all parent and child relationships can be tumultuous.

 I asked Ms. Donoghue why hadn’t the characters of Ma or Old Nick thought of birth control.  Ma actually started taking birth control pills after Jack was born.  She thinks that Old Nick thought Ma should be allowed one child.  I also pointed out that in North America, at least, “give me some” refers to sex.  In room Jack said it for wanting to be breast feed.  Ms. Donoghue said that she played around with other sayings for this but “give me some” seemed best to her.  (note: no photo available, it was all blurred).

Pascale Quiviger’s latest work is ‘The Breakwater House’.  Here is the book description, taken from the book:

Two little girls are born five days apart. Lucie lives with her mother, Aurore, who struggles to make ends meet; Claire lives with her wealthy mother, Suzanne, who struggles to make her marriage work. The girls are inseparable.

One night, Lucie begs her mother for a story. And so Aurore begins to recite incredible tales — of Lucie’s grandparents, and of her missing father, and of people who were part of Aurore’s life before Lucie. For 10 years, Aurore weaves a rich skein of tales for Lucie and Claire. Then, when the girls turn 15, Aurore tells the final tale in her tapestry, and disappears forever.

Several years later, Lucie gives birth to a little girl, Odyssee, and she and Claire take turns telling stories to the child. But one day something unspeakable happens. Into the terrible silence, a woman without a name wanders, trying to find the broken pieces of herself.

The Breakwater House is the story of the woman without a name. It is also the story of Lucie and Claire and Aurore and Suzanne — and the complex love between mothers, daughters, and friends. With this thrilling puzzle of a novel, Governor General’s Literary Award winner and Giller Prize nominee Pascale Quiviger shows that she is a writer who is capable of combining stylistic brilliance, philosophical depth, and sheer un-put-downable storytelling.

Ms. Quiviger wanted to use this book to show “overlooked forms of courage.”  Aurore hides her ignorance from Lucie, as she is growing up as mothers do.  Lucie finally catches on and asks her mother for the truth.

from left:  Pascale Quiviger, Teddy, Robert Wiersema
Robert Wiersema’s latest work is ‘Bedtime Story’.  Here is the book description, taken from the book:

Following his bestselling 2006 debut, Before I Wake, Wiersema returns to his exquisitely plotted blend of supernatural thriller and domestic drama.

Novelist Christopher Knox began his writing career with a bang. The echo of that success still rings in his ears as he sets to work every morning on his second novel, ten years later. His wife feels like a single parent, and with Chris living in exile in a studio above their garage, it won’t be long before she is.

Chris discovers a fantasy novel by an obscure author he loved as a child and gives it to his son, David. Father reads to son nightly, and To the Four Directions soon enthralls him. Until one night, when young David is reading alone, an inexplicable seizure leaves him in a mysterious state of unconsciousness. As his seizure recurs every night, his father learns that only one thing will calm it, a bedtime story from his strange new book.
Convinced that the secret of David’s collapse is within its pages, Chris traverses the continent in search of the truth. Meanwhile, David wakes up within the story he has been reading, and as his father struggles to free him David struggles to survive, facing perils unimaginable in a world created to capture the hearts and souls of children like him. Both father and son are headed toward a fateful collision of worlds, and a showdown with ancient evils, both fictional and very real.

Mr.  Wiersema  told the audience that this was the first time talking about this book.  He explained that it is a  father and son story.  The son is dyslexic so the father reads to him.  It is a story within a story, so it felt like Robert was writing two books.  The theme is “power of story, love of reading.”

Kathleen Winter’s debut novel  is ‘Annabel’.  Here is the book description, taken from the book:

Kathleen Winter’s luminous debut novel is a deeply affecting portrait of life in an enchanting seaside town and the trials of growing up unique in a restrictive environment.

In 1968, into the devastating, spare atmosphere of the remote coastal town of Labrador, Canada, a child is born: a baby who appears to be neither fully boy nor fully girl, but both at once. Only three people are privy to the secret: the baby’s parents, Jacinta and Treadway, and a trusted neighbor and midwife, Thomasina. Though Treadway makes the difficult decision to raise the child as a boy named Wayne, the women continue to quietly nurture the boy’s female side. And as Wayne grows into adulthood within the hyper-masculine hunting society of his father, his shadow-self, a girl he thinks of as “Annabel,” is never entirely extinguished.

Kathleen Winter has crafted a literary gem about the urge to unveil mysterious truth in a culture that shuns contradiction, and the body’s insistence on coming home. A daringly unusual debut full of unforgettable beauty, Annabel introduces a remarkable new voice to American readers.

Ms. Winter explained that the novel takes place in Labrador and starts  with the birth of a intersex child.   The parents raise him as a boy, Wayne.  As Wayne grows up, he wants to be a girl, Annabel.  A central theme is caribou breaking from the heard, like Annabel.  Kathleen said that she had to keep the prologue short because the publisher said that many people don’t read the prologue.  The audience laughed.

I don’t always read the forward of a book however, I always read the prologue, it’s part of the story.  Please take the poll to tell me if you read it or not.

I am just 50 pages away from finishing Room by Emma Donoghue, so stay tuned for my review.  Now that I heard more about the other authors works, I want to read them.  The one I want to read most is ‘Annabel’ by Kathleen Winter.  I hadn’t heard of it before this event but I love books that have a real sense of place.  ‘Annabel is said to capture Labrador well.  It also sounds like an excellent story to me.

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