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    November 17, 2008

    Contest - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

    Benjamin_button For Toronto peeps only I'm afraid, but we've got 5 tickets to a special screening of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Based on the short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the film's DEFINITELY going to be nominated for multiple Academy Awards, so five lucky people will get see what the magic is all about before the rest of Canada. In addition to the passes, we've got one copy of the gorgeous The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (illustrated by Calef Brown) and one movie poster for each of the winners.

    Here are your skill testing questions:

    1. Who stars in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button?

    2. What's the first line of the F. Scott Fitzgerald story the film is based upon?

    Email us the answers [deanna (dot) mcfadden (at) harpercollins (dot) com) and you'll be entered in the draw to take place next Wednesday, November 26th at 5 PM. Winners will be chosen and prizes shipped on Thursday, so be sure to include your full name, email and mailing addresses.

    November 14, 2008

    HarperCollins.ca

    Hi everyone,

    Welcome to The Savvy Reader, the corporate blog for HarperCollins Canada. But for those of you keen on reading and chatting with like-minded book people, note that our Facebook group will have its monthly book theme and giveaways posted up the second Tuesday of every month. Also, we've just announced the Fabulous Fall Reading Challenge so get those spines cracking so you can be eligible to win the prizes!

    Lastly, please email me, Deanna McFadden (deanna [dot] mcfadden [at] harpercollins [dot] com), with any questions, queries or concerns about HarperCollins.ca or any of our programs.

    Book Excerpt - Survive!

    Survive From the sun-scorched sands of the Kalahari to the snake-infested jungles of the Amazon, Les Stroud has survived it all -- and he’s lived to tell, too. In his new book, the creator, and host of the hit TV show Survivorman shares his expertise and shares a no-nonsense look at the real world of survival. In this excerpt from his new book, Survive!, Les shares a very sage piece of advice if you do get caught in a survival-type situation: relieve your fear through knowledge.

    Relieve Your Fear Through Knowledge

    Begin by assessing your body for any injuries and deal with those as soon as possible. Once you have taken care of yourself, assess your environment and the specifics of your emergency.

    • Who knows where you were going?
    • Is anyone expecting you? If so, when?
    • Is it possible to walk out of your current location on your own, or will you need to be rescued to get out?
    • Are you certain of the way out?
    • What do you have to keep you alive?

    To answer the last question, figure out what you have at hand that will help you survive. This could be equipment that you have carried with you- such as a tent, a knife, and food- or aspects of your environment, such as a cave or a lake. If it’s physically possible, lay out all your immediate resources on a tarp or blanket or even the ground to get a good mental picture of what you have available. Seeing it spread out may spark ideas as to how items could work together or what you can make out of your supplies. In making these assessments, you’re providing yourself with one of the most important tools in your survival kit: knowledge.

    Continue reading "Book Excerpt - Survive!" »

    Book Excerpt - Dave Eggers on Illinois

    State_state State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America brings together some of the most interesting voices in the United States in one unique volume meant to broadly describe the landscape. Dave Eggers takes on his home state of Illinois in this excerpt, and goes on to list a number of interesting tidbits about the it: Chicago is home to the world’s largest public library system; Oprah contributes large amounts to the state’s tax revenue; Cracker Jack was introduced at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893; and the state has produced, for decades, the most pumpkins.

    Other writers in the collection include: William T. Vollmann on California; Heidi Julavits on Maine; Myla Goldberg on Maryland; Anthony Bordain on New Jersey; and Edward P. Jones in conversation about Washington, D.C. Is there a better way to get to know our neighbours to the south? 

    Illinois by Dave Eggers

    The slogan on all license plates in Illinois, for as long as anyone can remember, has been Land of Lincoln. Everyone in Illinois and all sensible people elsewhere believe it to be the best license-plate slogan of all the states in our union. The closest runner-up would be New Hampshire’s fiery Live Free or Die, but that slogan scares children. A license plate shouldn’t scare children and shouldn’t include the world “or die.” A license-plate slogan shouldn’t encourage death in the face of curtailed personal liberties. A license-plate slogan should, without threats or hysterics, evoke the moral essence and scenic grandeur of a state, and if possible it should be alliterative and should mention everyone’s favorite president. The slogan on the 9.6 million registered vehicles in the state of Illinois does all those things, and sets the one for all conduct, personal and public, in the state, and guides and inspires all of our plans and pursuits. It is the best of all license-plate slogans. Is Illinois, therefore, the best of all states? This has been often argued and often proved. Through the course of this essay, many examples of the first-ness of Illinois will be offered into evidence -- that state is first in everything from snack s to bombs -- but perhaps no endorsement is more important than Lincoln’s own: He himself believed Illinois best.

    Continue reading "Book Excerpt - Dave Eggers on Illinois" »

    Tweeting Books on a Friday

    My Sony eReader died this morning (it ran out of juice) on the way to work and, of course, I didn't put a book in my bag (gasp!) because I had planned on reading up some of our upcoming Summer 09 titles for our upcoming Sales Conference. What did I do instead? Tweeted. We've been using Twitter in an "official" capacity here for a while, thanks to a suggestion from Jen Evans, who thought it would be cool to send out a daily quote. This morning, however, I've been finding some great links that I thought I'd share with other bookish-minded people:

    It was enough to keep me occupied on my commute, as you can probably guess.

    November 13, 2008

    A Wally Lamb Playlist

    Hour_believed Wally Lamb's first novel in 10 years, The Hour I First Believed, went on sale this week. It's already climbing the bestseller lists and has got people talking about many of the themes Lamb explores within the pages (watch out for an upcoming Prosecast with the author tk). There's a great extra on his author page, "The Hour I First Believed CD Playlist," that shows what songs Lamb was listening to as he wrote the book. They are in chronological order, and I've put the first 10 here -- you'll have to click through to read the rest!

    "I’m often asked what novels by other authors I reading when I’m writing one of my own. The better question is: What and who am I listening to? With this two-CD set, Butterfly and Mantis, I’m pleased to share many of the tunes, recognizable and obscure, that helped me write The Hour I First Believed. The tracks are arranged more or less along the lines of the narrative. I hope you enjoy them."

    THE HOUR I FIRST BELIEVEDBUTTERFLY

    1. "Gloria" -- Van Morrison from The Sopranos: Peppers & Eggs (Morrison)
    Caelum saves a slot for Van the Man in his list of“Greatest Songs of the RockEra.” Morrison had this hit with the band Them in 1964, the year Caelum was 13.

    2. "The Meaning of Loneliess"-- Van Morrison from What’s Wrong With This Picture? (Morrison)
    In a bluesy mood, now-middle-aged Morrison explores the “existential dread” of life’s second half. Middle-aged Caelum’s pondering life’s meaning, too.

    3. "Asshole" -- James Luther Dickinson from Free Beer Tomorrow (Unobsky)
    “Ask any of us cynical bastards to lift up our shirt, and we’ll show you where we got shot in the heart,” says Caelum, as he angrily grieves two failed marriages and a third failing one.

    4. "Black Books" -- Nils Lofgren from Nils Lofgren: Favorites 1990–2005 (Lofgren)
    Lofgren’s mournful vocal, matched to his stunning guitar work, mirrors Caelum struggles to accept the jolting reality of Maureen’s infidelity.

    5. "Useless Desires"-- Patty Griffin from Impossible Dream (Griffin)
    Dr. Patel advises Caelum that if he cannot forgive his wife, he should move on. Instead, the Quirks move—away from Three Rivers and toward tragedy in Littleton. Griffin’s bittersweet road song captures both the desire for and the futility of escape.

    6. "At the Bottom of Everything"-- Bright Eyes from I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning (C. Oberst)
    Conor Oberst (aka Bright Eyes) imagines an airplane ride every bit as strange as the one Caelum takes beside chaos theorist Mickey Schmidt.

    7. "House Where Nobody Lives" -- Tom Waits from Mule Variations (Waits)
    In response to his aunt’s stroke, and later, her death, Caelum returns to a now-empty farmhouse.

    8. "When God Made Me" -- Neil Young from Prairie Wind (Young)
    Caelum, back in Three Rivers and now in his late 40s, contemplates an earlier, more innocent youth -- and its loss.

    9. "Mbube" ("The Lion Sleeps Tonight") -- Ladysmith Black Mambazo with Taj Mahal from Long Walk to Freedom (traditional)
    Mr. Mpipi performs a dance of hunger that turns into a dance of love, and a praying mantis egg case explodes with life on young Caelum’s windowsill.

    10. "Believe" -- Cher from The Very Best of Cher (B. Higgins/S. McClennan/P. Barry/S. Torch/M. Gray/T. Powell)
    “Believe” was inescapable in 1999, the year I toured Europe with my previous novel and began this one. The pop star’s durability causes Caelum to speculate that only two life forms would survive a nuclear holocaust: cockroaches and Cher.


    More Wally Lamb?

    Buy the book
    Explore the rest of his "Butterfly" songlist, tracks 11-18 & then explore "Mantis," songs 1-23
    Browse Inside The Hour I First Believed
    Wally Lamb talks Braided Cords
    A conversation with the author about The Hour I First Believed

    November 11, 2008

    Guest Blogger - Jonathan Vance

    UnlikelySoldiers Lest we forget the sacrifices of those whose voices were bound by duty and silence. Jonathan Vance discusses the reluctance of some veterans to break a decades-old silence about their experiences.

    Recognizing the Silence of Sacrifice

    Remembrance Day is all about recognizing the sacrifices of those men and women who served their country in time of war, but what about those people whose work demanded that they not be recognized? Anyone who took part in underground or clandestine work during the Second World War was required to sign some version of the Official Secrets Act (as it was called in Britain), which bound them to silence and prohibited them from discussing their work with anyone who hadn’t signed the same document. The pledge was to take effect as soon as you added your signature, but there was no indication of when it would expire.

    Over the years I’ve talked to a good number of veterans who, for whatever reason, were required to sign a document like this during the war. Some assumed that once the war was over, the need for secrecy had passed and they were free to discuss their work. Others, however, still regard their signature as a solemn pledge –- they will categorically refuse to talk about their experiences, even if the details have been available in books for decades.

    I sometimes wonder how Ken Macalister and Frank Pickersgill would have dealt with this dilemma had they survived the war. In the 1950s and 1960s, books by and about secret agents became very hot commodities. Many of them became best-sellers, and at least one, Carve Her Name With Pride, about the agent Violette Szabo, was made into a successful motion picture. Had they lived out their mission and worked with Physician, one of the most famous resistance networks in France, Ken and Frank could probably have picked any publisher and named their price.

    But would they have wanted to? Ken probably would have regarded his military service as a closed book –- a good experience, but not something to be relived through memoir. He was naturally shy and self-effacing, and might well have resisted anything that put him in the spotlight. Frank would have been a little more interested -– because he dreamed of being a journalist and had an obvious talent for the profession, he could easily have used a memoir as a way to kick-start a career as a writer.

    But somehow I think both men would have declined to tell their stories. They might well have joined a Remembrance Day parade, but I imagine them being like the vast majority of veterans I have met over decades of research and writing –- modest to a fault.

    How They Became Unlikely Soldiers

    When we were casting around for possible titles for the book, Unlikely Soldiers struck me as particularly appropriate. On the one hand, it really suited what I wanted to say about Ken Macalister and Frank Pickersgill. It would have been difficult to find two men who were less suited for military service, both physically and temperamentally. Both of their fathers had served in the First World War, but the sons never showed the slightest inclination to involve themselves in anything military. Frank even wrote, after the Second World War had begun, that he had no intention of enlisting for anything. Nevertheless, both men found their way into uniform and took on one of the riskiest jobs imaginable, one that involved direct, personal contact with the enemy.

    On the other hand, Unlikely Soldiers gave the story a broader relevance. Ken and Frank were unusual guys in their background and educational attainments, but their experience in enlisting wasn’t unusual. In fact, most Canadians who served in the military were "unlikely soldiers." Canada has always had a very small professional army, and choosing the military as a career is less common here than it is in many other countries.

    So, there aren’t too many people who would be considered likely soldiers. The story of Ken and Frank, then, is really the story of the citizen-soldier that Canada has come to rely on -– people for whom military service is merely an interruption in civilian life. They enlist, they do their bit, and then they come home and get on with their lives.

    The real tragedy is those who don’t get to come home. We have no way of knowing what Ken and Frank would have achieved had they survived the war; they showed sufficient potential that they could have accomplished just about anything. But we also have no way of knowing what the other 100,000 men and women who died in service could have achieved. How much poorer has the country been for the loss of these unlikely soldiers?

    More Jonathan Vance?

    Buy Unlikely Soldiers online from Amazon.ca or Chapters.Indigo.ca
    Remembering Remembrance Day
    The Least We Can Do to Remember

    Guest Blogger - Jonathan Vance

    UnlikelySoldiers Today on The Savvy Reader, Unlikely Soldiers author Jonathan Vance will be guest blogging both this morning and today at exactly 11:11 AM to commemorate Remembrance Day. Both my great-grandfather and grandfather fought in the First and Second World Wars respectively, and my grandmother was a war bride, so today has always been especially poignant for my family.

    The Least We Can Do to Remember

    There’s something about November weather that makes it an appropriate time to honour those who served and died in the wars. It’s usually cold and often rainy, and the gloom and discomfort, although temporary, reminds us of the suffering that the soldiers experienced in the battlefields, where they had no protection from the elements for weeks on end. But it's hardly the sort of weather in which our elderly veterans should be standing outside, and that’s probably kept a lot of them from attending Remembrance Day parades in the past.

    After the Second World War, there was a move across the British Commonwealth to find another date for Remembrance Day. The weather was only a small part of it –- the big reason was that, with a new war to be commemorated, it was thought that the 11th of November was tied too directly to the First World War. So committees were struck and meetings were convened to discuss possible alternatives. Lots of ideas were suggested, but ultimately all were rejected, for a variety of reasons.

    The 6th of June, the date of the Allied invasion of Normandy in 1944, had little relevance to Australia and New Zealand, since their troops didn’t take part in the operations in northwest Europe. The 3rd of September didn’t seem right because it put too much emphasis on the beginning of the war in 1939. VE-Day, the 8th of May, when the war in Europe ended in 1945, was a possibility, but could it be given preference over the 15th of August, VJ-Day, the day the war in the Pacific ended? And Battle of Britain Sunday, commemorating the turning point in the battle on the 15th of September, 1940, was too connected to the Allied air forces and didn’t say anything about the other services.

    Gradually, all of the other possibilities fell by the wayside and the 11th of November remained as the best choice. And, since the name of the day had been changed (from Armistice Day to Remembrance Day) in Canada in 1931, the date had invoked a general spirit of commemoration, rather than a specific event in history. Besides, a cool November day seems to me to emphasize the gravity of the occasion better than a warm day in June. Standing in the rain for a few hours is the least we can do to remember.

    More Jonathan Vance?

    Buy Unlikely Soldiers online from Amazon.ca or Chapters.Indigo.ca
    Remembering Remembrance Day

    November 10, 2008

    Guest Blogger - Jonathan Vance

    UnlikelySoldiers For the next couple days, Jonathan Vance will be guest blogging here on Savvy Reader. The author of Unlikely Soldiers, Vance shares some thoughts about Remembrance Day, his book, and why it's so important not to forget.

    Remembering Remembrance Day

    When I was a kid growing up in small-town Ontario in the 1960s, Remembrance Day didn’t seem to be much of an occasion. We did learn John McCrae’s "In Flanders Fields" in school and I’m sure we must have had a Remembrance Day assembly every year, but I have no recollection of it. Perhaps that’s because the event would have involved singing with the school choir, something that always made me feel nauseous and light headed –- and so I tended to forget about it.

    There were veterans all over the village. But Mickey Rockett was the old guy who lived up Vinegar Hill, not the young buck who had run away to join the Royal Navy in the First World War. Ernie Weeks was the nice fellow who gave you extra candy on Halloween, not the former flying instructor in the RCAF. And Stan Sawell wasn’t the young officer who had fought his way up Vimy Ridge –- he was just my Uncle Stan.

    At some point, for some reason, those mens' various identities started to merge for me. It wasn’t when I stopped playing with toy soldiers and started reading books about real soldiers; even then I had a hard time connecting the experiences I was reading about with the veterans I saw around the village. But little by little, I began to realize that the ordinary people I knew had done some pretty extraordinary things.

    That’s when I started to pay attention to Remembrance Day. I looked at the men and women marching by and wondered what they had been through -– they were no longer just familiar locals, but participants in history. The more I wondered, the more I wanted to learn about them. First I just wanted to figure out whether they were army, navy, or air force, and whether they had served in the First or Second World War. Then I realized you could learn things from the crests on their blazers and the badges on their caps. All of the medals and decorations had different ribbons, and each ribbon had a story. Before long, Remembrance Day became a kind of living history lesson.

    After that, I could never think of Uncle Stan without thinking of Captain Stanley Sawell of the 21st Battalion, Canadian Expeditionary Force.

    More Jonathan Vance?

    Buy Unlikely Soldiers online from Amazon.ca or Chapters.Indigo.ca.

    The Ultimate Comfort Food - Part II

    Home made_145x227 The next recipe I picked out as "ultimate" comfort food comes from Tana Ramsay's Home Made. While I haven't tried this recipe yet, I've earmarked it for next weekend. I'll probably use faux-chicken from the health food store (read: tofu) and use up the beautiful dried morel mushrooms my cousins gave away as thank-you gifts at their wedding this past Thanksgiving.

    Chicken and Mushroom Pie Pots

    Serves 4 Prep time: 50 minutes
    Cooking time: about 50 minutes

    4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, sliced into 1cm/ ½ inch wide strips
    3 tbsp olive oil
    2 red onions, peeled and finely sliced
    2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
    12 button mushrooms, sliced
    2 tsp fresh tarragon leaves
    50 ml/2 fl oz white wine
    200 ml/ 7 fl oz fresh chicken stock
    142 ml carton of double cream
    2 tbsp chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
    375g pack of ready-rolled puff pastry
    1 egg, lightly beaten
    Salt and black pepper

    I really like making individual pies and the kids love having their own –- let’s face it, you don’t get someone stealing all your favourite filling bits! Try making them in large ramekins for children with smaller appetites. If you prefer, you can, of course, just make one big pie.

    1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/GM4.

    2. Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large frying pan and brown the chicken pieces on all sides. Take out and put to one side.

    3. Add the remaining oil to the pan, then add the onions and garlic and cook until softened. Add the mushrooms and tarragon and cook until the mushrooms are tender and lightly coloured. Pour in the wine and simmer until almost evaporated, then add the stock and simmer until reduced by half.

    4. Add the cream and simmer for a couple of minutes, until the sauce is slightly thickened, then add the parsley and season with salt and pepper. Leave to cool.

    5. Stir the chicken into the thickened sauce. Divide the mixture between four ovenproof bowls, each about 300ml/10 fl oz capacity; the mixture should reach about 1 cm/ ½ inch from the top (see Why Not Try…).

    6. Divide the sheet of pastry into four and cut a strip from each piece about 1cm/ ½ inch wide. Brush the rim of each pie dish with the beaten egg, then gently press the pastry strips around each rim. Next, take the pastry squares and lay them over the top of the pie, trimming off any excess pastry. Using your thumb and forefinger, pinch around the rim of each pie at 2cm/ ¾ inch intervals to seal. Make a small hole in the centre of each one.

    7. Lightly brush the tops with beaten egg and add a light sprinkling of salt. If you are feeling artistic, use the pastry trimmings to decorate the tops with cut-out pastry shapes and stick them on with beaten egg.

    8. Place the pies onto an oven tray and bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes until piping hot in the centre and golden brown on the top.

    Why not try…

    You can make the filling in advance and leave in the pie dishes in the fridge. You will need to cook the pies for slightly longer to make sure the filling is thoroughly heated through, and you may need to cover the tops with foil to prevent them getting too brown.

    Serve with a large side dish of steamed broccoli and delicious new potatoes.

    More Tana Ramsay?

    Buy the book online at Amazon or Chapters.Indigo
    The Ultimate Comfort Food, Part I

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