Discussion Questions and What's Next

THE DEVIL'S VIOLIN: MYLLYSILTA'S HISTORY has been out for a little over six months now. 

August was a big month, with reviews in the Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal and the local arts magazine, The Walleye. 

It made the top ten bestseller list for the local bookstore, Entershine Bookshop. 

And the website for my publisher, Shuniah House Books, was recently updated. It now includes discussion questions--should you want to talk about Antti Myllysilta with a group of your reader friends. Look for the guide here. 

Snow on the porch on the "land side" of the house.

For the past several months, my wife (mostly) and I (on occasion) have been compiling a selection of my poetry, my ten-minute plays, and my short fiction and nonfiction. This project, still in search of its final title, will make an appearance this spring. 

We recently read through the full manuscript, trying to find those annoying errors BEFORE it goes into production and fixing things becomes more difficult. 

Reading through it was... illuminating? Humbling, for sure (but not for long). 

Some of the themes that have appeared in my novels began as ideas that I worked through in fiction and creative nonfiction. Also, I think a lot about poets and poetry, music and science--and the afterlife.

Stay tuned for more about this collection. I hope readers enjoy it.  

Author Panel Details

A week from tomorrow, I'll be participating in that panel discussion I mentioned last week.

Here's a poster for the event, showing the rest of the panel. I'm looking forward hearing their stories.

If you're in the area, check it out.

SILENCES: Questions to Consider

Shuniah House Books asked me to come up with questions for readers to consider after reading SILENCES. The list of questions is linked here and on their website.

It's always interesting to know what a reader sees, as opposed to what the writer sees. In interviews, you often see writers talk about "being immersed" in the books they're writing, or "living with" their characters.

Historical fiction is a little different. I can get in a car and go 20 kilometres to town without much forethought, where the same trip for Jussi, with Viola or Perho pulling his cart, would take far more time and require preparation.

Even the Port Arthur of 1955 is gone--subsumed into Thunder Bay, its streets renamed and re-routed, the bush where Jimmy plays developed into parks.

For those reasons, I don't quite "live with" my characters, though I still think of Jimmy when I make toast.

Nevertheless, characters speak in my ear. I can look out my window in the early 21st century, and while my physical eyes see snow-covered birches, my mind's eye sees again the destruction of Tampere or a box holding shoes and boots.

So I hope the questions help you consider some of the questions I lived with while writing SILENCES. And if you have other questions, please be in touch!