A Lemon Hound "most engaging book" of 2010!

I am very pleased that my book made Lemon Hound's "most engaging" list. Here's the link where you can read her comments:

http://lemonhound.blogspot.com/2010/12/most-engaging-books-of-2010.html

Art Bar reading

I'll be reading tonight with Antony Di Nardo at Toronto's Art Bar -- which is actually at Clinton's (Clinton and Bloor). The reading starts at eight.

Sanders Pinault vernissage

Another art exhibit featuring work based on my poems! This show will include sculpture and prints by Sutton artist Sanders Pinault. Previously, Sanders has also created work inspired by Quebec poet Anne Hebert.

I feel tremendously honoured that my poetry has inspired others to create art (I've heard of a songwriter working on something too!) and I'm very excited to see how my work is interpreted, especially by an artist as sensitive and talented as Sanders.

The opening is this Friday, November 5th from 6-8 at Le Cafetier on rue Principale in Sutton, Quebec. The show continues for a month.

I'll be there!

Christine Marlow vernissage

Montreal painter Christine Marlow will be opening an exhibit of new paintings, including a series inspired by my book, tomorrow evening.
The wine & cheese starts at seven, I'll be reading my poems at around 8:30, and the evening continues until eleven. The gallery is located at 870 Notre Dame in Lachine, Quebec. Hope to see you there!
Christine's paintings are beautiful!

Concordia reading

I had such a nice time at the Concordia Alumni Reading yesterday. I was especially delighted to meet Gillian Sze, also a Concordia grad -- not only a lovely poet but a lovely person too, just shimmering with light. And how nice to see Moez again too!

Alumni reading at Concordia

I'm very much looking forward to reconnecting with some former classmates -- including Kate Hall, Moez Surani, Angela Hibbs, and John Goldbach -- from Concordia's MA program. We'll be reading tomorrow at this public event.

http://http//writersread.concordia.ca/alumni_panel.html

Speaking Words at Sutton's Jazz Festival

I'll be participating in the Spoken Word event in Sutton this afternoon as part of the annual Jazz Festival. My musical inspiration for this book was Satie, so reading to a jazz rhythm will be an interesting experiment. This is supposed to be an improv event, but I think just reading with an improvised musical accompaniment is as far as I'm ready to go. Still a little too attached to my written page!
http://www.festival-jazz-sutton.com/calender.html

Another review

I think this is quite a fair review. Here's the link to the Eyewear blog where it's posted.

http://toddswift.blogspot.com/2010/10/guest-review-pryor-on-briscoe.html

Visual Arts Centre Reading

I'll be reading this Wednesday at the McClure Gallery, 350 Victoria Avenue, Westmount, with seven others. The doors open at 7 pm, the reading starts at 7:30. Entry is $5: my first reading that isn't free!

A poet reading poetry

My dear poet friend Antony Di Nardo has kindly mentioned my book in TNQ's Who's Reading What feature. He says, "Finally, I'm enjoying my good friend, Susan Briscoe's book, A Crow's Vow. I heard her reading from it at Knowlton's Wordfest in Quebec's Eastern Townships and she had me swaying on the hammock of her lyrics, images as delicate and sturdy as spider's silk. Written in a series of linked, ghazal-like poems her book assigns those small, barely perceptible changes within the seasons to the dissolution of a marriage. For me, summer going into fall is a good time for concentrating the mind on the broken line."

It's fun to see what other writers are reading. Go see http://www.tnq.ca/magazine/whos_reading_what/ for more.

Knowlton WordFest

I still haven't written here about last weekend's Knowlton WordFest. I'll get to it soon -- but for now I'll just say it was wonderful!

Another book club invitation

I had such a great time at my mom's book club last month that I'm delighted to have been invited to another one. This will again be the first time the group has chosen a book of poetry. They will in fact do two: mine and one of Erin Moure's -- I'm not sure which. I'll let you know how it goes!

Sutton launch a success -- now on to Knowlton's Word Fest!

We had a wonderful reading and launch last night in Sutton. There was a nice, appreciative audience for an impressive and varied line-up of readers. I was especially happy to welcome Antony and Ann Di Nardo back after their absence of a few years -- so nice to have a poet friend to share these experiences with. And this weekend we'll be reading together again at the Knowlton WordFest. I'm really looking forward to it -- the weekend starts with a "VIP" cocktail party, then a couple of days full of workshops and readings and more parties. My reading is at 11:30 am on Saturday -- should be fun!

Sutton launch!

The Sutton launch of my book will be this Wednesday, July 14th, as part of the Tour des Arts. Join me and poet Antony Di Nardo, who will be launching his two new books, Alien, Correspondent (Brick Books) and Soul on Standby (Exile Editions) at Le Cafetier, 9 Principale nord. Be there by 6 pm for cocktail hour; the reading, which will feature several other local writers as well, starts at 7 pm. It will be a lovely evening!

Book club

My mother invited me to read and speak to her book club, and what a lovely time I had! She had given a copy of my book to each of the members of her group for their June meeting, and we all met last week over lunch -- delicious assemble-your-own (to accommodate my vegetarianism) Cobb salad -- at her house. This is the first time they have featured a book of poetry, and most of them have only rarely read verse. And yet they were such an appreciative audience. Several of the women, who now live full time in the country, especially related to the observations of nature through the seasons. A few particularly identified with the poem about stacking firewood!
It really was fun -- so if anybody else wants to try poetry in their book club, I'd be delighted to join you for a short reading and discussion.

Another book design blog mention

The book design getting yet more attention. So nice not to have a frumpy book cover!

http://www.thomasriggs.net/blog/index.php/tag/poetry/

WordFest poster

Here's the poster for Knowlton's WordFest. I'll be reading at 11:30 a.m. on Saturday, July 17th with Griffin Prize winner A. F. Moritz. Pretty exciting!

Gazette link

This link is broken.

CKUT podcast

Here's the link to the podcast of my CKUT In the Motherhood reading and interview with Trixie Dumont and Rona Harun, part of the Hersay program. It was aired last night. (I, of course, forgot to tune in until it was two thirds through.) I read two sections of the book and a short story, Claire's House, previously published in Event.

https://secure.ckut.ca//64/20100616.18.00-19.00.mp3

A mention in The Gazette

I've received word -- from my mother again, who somehow finds out about these things before the rest of the world -- that my book gets a mention in The Gazette's Saturday book section. Check it out tomorrow!

100 % Recycled

Just feeling glad and grateful again that my book was printed on 100% post-consumer recycled paper. Thanks go to Vehicule Press for its commitment to our forests.

Radio interview and reading

Last week I had the great pleasure of recording a reading and interview with host Trixie Dumont and Rona Harun for In the Motherhood, a feature of CKUT's Hersay program. We set up the microphone in Trixie's children's bedroom, Rona taking care of the technical side of things, and recorded about an hour's worth of material. It was lots of fun: listen in to 90.3 FM on Wednesday, June 16th at 6 pm if you're in Montreal. I'll post the link for the podcast once it's aired.

Planning a Sutton launch

I was very happy to finally pick up my friend Antony Di Nardo's two (!) new books, Alien, Correspondent and Soul on Standby yesterday. Several literary presses were at a book fair in Montreal over the weekend, and I stopped by to browse (also to track down my publisher regarding some urgent business). I came away with my backpack full of poetry. Can't wait to get a chance to read the books!
Tony and I will be launching our books together in Sutton in July. We've been emailing between Montreal and Beirut, where he's been teaching for the past few years, trying to decide how to do this. Since he's finally returning to his home in Sutton the very day of the annual Tour des Arts reading, we decided to appropriate that event for our launch. I've been organising and hosting the TDA reading for the past few years, so I'm hoping I can get away with this! I'll post details soon.

An interview!

Here's a link to a blog interview, rob mclennan's very interesting 12 or 20 questions--though I think I was only asked 19. Check out some of the other inteviews with North America's poets and presses while you're there. So far I've only found one editing error (my own, not rob's); finding my mistakes in published work is so irksome.

http://robmclennan.blogspot.com/2010/05/12-or-20-questions-with-susan-briscoe.html

Where to buy my book

Wondering how you can get your own copy of The Crow's Vow? In Montreal, it is stocked by Paragraphe Books on McGill and at Drawn & Quarterly on Bernard. In Knowlton, it should be available at Brome Lake Books, and in Sutton you can get it at Librairie le livre d'or.
If you live somewhere else, ask your favourite independent bookstore to order it for you. For some reason, it's not yet available on Amazon. You can also order it online from the publisher, Vehicule Press (see link below). You can even order it directly from me; just send me an email here (susanjbriscoe@gmail.com) and we'll make the necessary arrangements.

http://www.vehiculepress.com/cgi-bin/dbman2/db.cgi?db=default&uid=default&ID=*&mh=20&sb=8&so=descend&view_records=View%2BRecords&keyword=crow%27s+vow&Genre

Summer readings!

A few notices from Brick Books about a couple of readings I'll be doing with my friend and excellent poet Antony Di Nardo in the Eastern Townships this July. At one we'll be reading with Griffin Poetry Prize winner A. F. Moritz!

http://www.brickbooks.ca/?page_id=113

The catalogue entry

Here is the Vehicule Press catalogue entry with all the pertinent details. You can order the book from here -- if the link works!

http://www.vehiculepress.com/cgi-bin/dbman2/db.cgi?db=default&uid=default&ID=*&mh=20&sb=8&so=descend&view_records=View%2BRecords&keyword=crow%27s+vow&Genre=

Launch at Drawn and Quarterly

Here is a photo from the launch at Drawn & Quarterly. It's a little small and unfocused, but it's the only photo I'm aware of.
Drawn & Quarterly is a great little store. Do check it out if you're in Montreal.

http://211blog.drawnandquarterly.com/

A stunning cover design

This is the wonderful cover of my book, designed by David Drummond. It's getting rave reviews in the world of book design, where pale pink is rarely seen outside of baby books. I have to admit that it took me a little while to warm up to it, since it's far from my favourite colour. But I am so glad now that I didn't complain, because I've come to really love it. The spareness and stark contrast between the black crow and the soft pink beautifully reflects the poetry inside. Even the publisher agreed to leave their logo off the front cover to maintain the integrity of the design. I was so convinced, I even tried to match that pink for this blog. Check out David's own blog to see more of his very impressive work.

http://bookcoverarchive.com/

http://daviddrummond.blogspot.com/2009/12/crows-vow.html

A glowing review

I was absolutely thrilled when my mother called from Florida to leave me a message quoting from a review of my book. "She is a brilliant writer," the quote began. The very words every (female, at least) writer wants to hear, and this was the first response to my book from anybody other than my publisher and my loved ones. Strangely, nobody else knew about the review yet, since it wasn't supposed to be out until the end of the week. But somebody had sent an email to somebody else, who sent it to my parents, who soon sent it to me. I quickly found out where I could get a copy of the whole review (the source of the first email, Atwater Library), which wasn't far away. And there I found a pile of the Montreal Review of Books set out by the front door.
It was a little disappointing to read the review from the beginning; the glowing part was only at the very end. But still, it's a very favorable review by a well respected reviewer --with no personal connection to me at all, which often is not the case in the tiny world of Canadian poetry. And I was grateful to get any review at all. Actually, I was grateful even just to have my work read. There are so few readers of poetry in Canada, so to have somebody give that much attention to my writing is an unexpected honour.

http://www.aelaq.org/mrb/article.php?issue=29&article=853&cat=3

A review of the book

Here is a link to one of the first reviews of the book. It is a short mention, the reviewer not entirely convinced but definitely intrigued.

http://robmclennan.blogspot.com/2010/04/susan-briscoe-crows-vow.html

The spiritual necessity of poetry

I was surprised and pleased to see one of my poems --a pretty spring one-- on this blog in celebration of the spiritual necessity of poetry. The poem describes this precise moment of spring, when the most fragrant flowers are all in bloom, offering us pure sensual delight. I love the connection between this poem, the belief that poetry can protect us and is necessary to our happiness, and handmade bath products, which is what Dot & Lil is all about.

http://dotandlil.blogspot.com/2010/04/poetry.html