spark-gap transmission/ michelle butler hallett

Aether Punch -- Michelle Butler Hallett's Online Study

2011-01-27T17:40:00.000-03:30

Aether Punch? Blog. Doodle pad. Portal for my work -- pdfs for free (CC-BY-NC-ND licensed) or for a small fee. Dart over.

Home Row (click on image to enlarge)

2010-02-12T15:12:00.006-03:30

Scrimshaw

2010-01-18T21:37:00.003-03:30

The irresistible need to create. Wherever. Whenever.

"The canaries in Iran's cages" -- Howard Adelman for The Globe and Mail

2010-01-12T13:48:00.000-03:30

In today's online edition of The Globe and Mail, Howard Adelman explains why the trial of the seven Baha'is in Iran matters to the entire world.

'Highly irregular'

2010-01-12T08:54:00.001-03:30

The long-delayed trial of seven Baha'is in Tehran is underway -- "Initial reports indicate that the trial is marked by numerous violations of legal due process." The accused have been held without charge for nearly two years. Observers are not permitted in the courtroom.

Terry Gilliam interview at cbc.ca

2010-01-08T09:18:00.002-03:30

I love movies. I love getting lost in delicious visuals and solid storytelling. Doesn't happen much anymore. The Empire Strikes Back, that was my first kiss. But the first movie that ever made me think, that ever knocked me silly: Terry Gilliam's Jabberwocky. Then I saw Brazil, many, many times. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen feels like an overdose of candy, grief, and dancing, and every time I watch it, I learn something. Every time. I find Gilliam's animations are the highlight of any Python episode. His struggles to tell those stories keep me going in my own dark nights. And frankly, I trust him so much as a storyteller that I'd watch him move toothpicks across a tablecloth.

Here's the text of a recent interview with Gilliam at cbc.ca, with some visuals.

Featured at SaltyInk.com

2009-12-23T20:43:00.000-03:30

Novelist Chad Pelley keeps a cool new blog on Atlantic Canadian writing called Salty Ink. He's introducd a new feature on individual writers, 'Shedding Some Ink,' and he starts with me.

Clarification -- Sutter Cain, 'Doesn't Really Matter'

2009-12-11T19:19:00.003-03:30

Okay, to clarify: the music is by Sutter Caine. The animation comes from a completely different project, from a short called The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello, directed by Anthony Lucas. I completely missed -- and still can't find -- acknowlegement of Lucas' work at this entry on Youtube. Apologies to Lucas and the Morello team.

Sutter Cain, 'Doesn't Really Matter.'

2009-12-11T10:58:00.000-03:30

Found this treasure on YouTube. Trust me.

"I'm madder than a hatter, and it fires my might" -- Elemental, "Cup of Brown Joy."

2009-12-04T11:45:00.001-03:30

Tea rocks. Enough said.

Defiance

2009-12-04T10:36:00.003-03:30

I am spice, I am stutter, I am crutches, I am pain; I will eat; I will listen; I will struggle; I will sing.

Ankylosing spondylitis

2009-12-04T10:36:00.000-03:30

... a form of arthritis primarily affecting the sacroiliac joints and spine. Can cause ossification and joint fusion. Hurts. Affects mobility. Hurts. Did I mention it hurts?

I use forearm crutches to get around. Passers-by generally glance at the crutches with fear and loathing. I did not see the same reactions when I used the more common underarm crutches -- which are bloody useless, I might add. Underarm crutches require much more energy to use, and the uppermost part likes to get tangled in the side of your bra, should you be wearing one. But back to the forearm crutches, the ones you lean forward on slightly ... why the fear and loathing? Do they seem more medicinal somehow? Do they make me look contagious? Do they remind people of polio? Maybe I'll start asking ...

Time to change the sheets, b'ys: The Bad Sex in Fiction Prize

2009-12-04T10:29:00.002-03:30

Q: Michelle, why do you never write sex scenes?
A: Because I'm afraid I might win this prize.

Saltyink -- new Atlantic Canadian writing blog

2009-11-16T11:36:00.000-03:30

Novelist Chad Pelley has just launched a new blog about and for Atlantic Canadian writing: saltyink.com.

And speaking of human rights ...

2009-09-04T11:17:00.003-02:30

The Baha'i International Community issues a statement on the deplorable situation of the Baha'is in Iran.

"CIA Doctors Face Human Experimentation Claims" -- The Guardian

2009-09-04T10:28:00.004-02:30

Do no harm / Just following orders: doublethink ...

I wrote about this sort of moral dirt in Double-blind. I wanted Dr. Bozeman's psychiatric experiments and research for a Cold War agenda to come off utterly plausible but safely historical. As in, left behind. In the past. Never again, ya know?

Silly me.

More here from Physicians for Human Rights.

Underwood No 5 -- yes, I think this is extremely cool

2009-09-04T09:48:00.006-02:30

This photo from Richard Polt's The Classic Typewriter Page is not of my Underwood No 5 -- my digital camera is toast -- but it's very similar to mine, except mine has black keys. These gorgeous machines would survive Armageddon and ask for more. Cleaned and oiled, they can work just fine. My Underwood No 5 -- affectionately, The Sook -- stutters and jams on spacing, which fits.

You want truly delicious? View this Thesteampunkhome blog.

Possibilities, possibilities ..

Yes, I think this is cool

2009-09-04T09:26:00.003-02:30

The feature article today at Wikipedia: Star Trek character Khan Noonien Singh.

--Where do you get your ideas?

2009-09-01T09:07:00.004-02:30

I dislike that question, because I can never respond intelligently. It's right up there with --Why are there so many good writers coming out of Newfoundland? To that one I can at least throw a saucy and sincere answer: --Why are you so surprised?

But this morning, I got an idea the old-fashioned way. I looked around. Saw a guy on the bus. Felt afraid of him as he stared right through me with glazed blue eyes, as his jaw twitched and his hands flopped on his open notebook, but no way would he drop his pen. Demons, I thought. Something gnaws at him, and gnaws violently this morning. Rips flesh from his back, spits it out, digs for more. Sudden pleading - blink - agitation, fear, and that hot, hot glaze, almost a glisten now: no, not tears. I look out the window at dried-up trees, leaves brittle from desperate sucking wasps. Count to twenty-mississippi before glancing his way again; he's still staring, like he knows something terrible about me, like he's desperate not to tell me. Another woman gets off the bus -- she's much younger than me, a kholed sylph in size two jeans; he stares at her bust and butt, starved, stares back at me, writes something down.

I miss my stop.

Story title, theme, protag and antag arcs spark. Yay for me, woohoo, ain't that grand.

But something gnaws at him.

New grab bag stuff

2009-07-21T22:00:00.004-02:30

Hey. Been working hard on the next book, a novel called Dead Reckoning -- oral traditions. I've tried to write this book many times and had given up; I buried it in the basement while digging the Suez Canal. Worked its way back up through the floor. Seems I had to write Sky Waves first -- who knew? I didn't.

Draft. In progress. Subject to wild change. Or none at all.

Wish I could cook like SuperMom

2009-05-14T12:01:00.002-02:30

The smart, wicked, beautiful and amazing Andreae Prozesky's got a new blog. Food. Motherhood. Writing. Food. Did I mention food?

"Bottle Pit" -- interview with Joel Thomas Hynes in The Antigonish Review

2009-05-13T18:24:00.002-02:30

Litmag The Antigonish Review #157, just out, includes my in-depth interview of writer and actor Joel Thomas Hynes. The interview focuses on craft, personality, fusions and history.

"Does Big Brother exist?"

2009-05-12T21:19:00.002-02:30

Trailer for the 1984 film of Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. This movie is a brilliant and extremely loyal adaptation of the novel ... and very hard to watch.

I admire Orwell's work greatly, and, while I acknowledge his fame, I still think he's grossly underrated as a writer and a thinker.

I wish Orwell and Nineteen Eighty-Four were no longer relevant. I wish we all could look at this in complete dumbfounded shock and recognize none of it.

Cold War angst

2009-05-12T21:09:00.004-02:30

Duran Duran's video for "New Moon on Monday." A bit silly in places, sure, but if you're too young to remember how the world felt before the Berlin Wall came down, this might give you a taste. Not that anyone behind the Iron Curtain had clothes or hair like that. Or glowy-sticks.

New Romantic sensiblities

2009-05-12T20:52:00.001-02:30

Duran Duran, "Union of the Snake." Just plain theatrical fun. Fun, imagine that in the coldest Siberia winter of the Cold War.

Audioslave -- "Doesn't Remind Me"

2009-05-12T20:42:00.003-02:30

Yes, more Cornell ... with the band Audioslave this time. Video for "Doesn't Remind Me." The song's already brilliant. The video: it's a short film.

More on Cornell

2009-05-12T11:46:00.002-02:30

He writes honestly and powerfully about clinical depression, how it numbs you, alienates you from others -- and he does it with some comedy and much skill. He expands his own suffering into empathy for others and then creates art out of it. I admire this.

Chris Cornell's "Scream"

2009-05-12T11:43:00.003-02:30

Love this record. Cornell's brave -- tries new stuff. The video for "Scream" rocks.

Why I post rough drafts in the Grab Bag

2009-05-12T07:13:00.003-02:30

Because my rough drafts suck. Because I need to keep giving myself permission to write shite. Because I love the creative process. Because writing is like walking naked in front of the world. Because I need to wrestle with the black dog of depression, and posting rough drafts is a weapon.

New Grab Bag content at michellebutlerhallett.com

2009-05-11T19:33:00.002-02:30

Cleaned out the Grab Bag at my site and put up the opening of a short screenplay and the first two scenes of a stageplay -- rough as rocks.

The Bookshelf -- new blog by Kerri Cull

2009-05-06T20:24:00.003-02:30

So the smart and saucy Kerri Cull has started a books blog: The Bookshelf. Ms Cull's a diverse reader and hilariously blunt. Find her here.

Review of Sky Waves, by Amanda Tripp in Maple Tree Literary Supplement

2009-04-30T12:43:00.004-02:30

Transmission received.

Skeletal birdsong

2009-04-29T09:30:00.004-02:30

Anxiety, me? I don't think of myself as an anxious person. Keep busy during the day and keep pushing the anxiety away 'til it wakes me up in a sweat, yeah okay, that makes sense, but if I let the anxiety out -- screaming, scratching at the cage which is my own body -- if I let the anxiety out -- dark stabs of fear, like being grabbed from behind -- if I let the anxiety out -- lift weights, walk hard, harder harder harder back bent head low -- damned dull light today, clouds pulpy black and grey, trees skeletal -- birdsong, no, not the defiance I take it for, but simply birdsong, existing long before and long after me, birdsong for no other reason than birds sing -- comforting -- walk hard but head up -- grace?

Twit

2009-04-29T09:27:00.002-02:30

Yes, I'm on Twitter. First signed up to keep in touch with an old friend and his rancid gut; now I really like reading little bits of info and perspective. Jann Arden, Chris Cornell and Doonesbury character Roland Hedley are truly funny. You can find me there as MButlerHallett.

Desperate for connection, all of us.

Reading: Wednesday April 15

2009-04-14T18:45:00.003-02:30

I'll be reading Wednesday evening with Mike Heffernan as part of the Writers' Alliance of Newfoundland and Labrador Monthly Reading Series. We'll be at the Railway Coastal Museum, downtown St. John's. Free admission, books for sale -- mine are all a flat $20 each -- and it starts at 7. But wait! There's more! The Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council will also announce this year's winner of the Lawrence Jackson Award. Heffernan will be reading from Rig: An Oral History of the Ocean Ranger Disaster. I'll be heaving some of Sky Waves out of me, and some new stuff that quivers under that useful label "work in progress." (All this, and I can still slice a tomato paper thin.)

Asking myself tonight as I rehearse: go for funny? sad? manic? or all at once and utterly fucked up?

Simple, hard

2009-03-16T19:37:00.006-02:30

I'm working on a scene in a new novel, scene with a World War Two Royal Navy veteran flashing back to battle at sea while a thunderstorm crashes. The character, Dick Harnum, is based on my maternal grandfather, Harold Francis, a Newfoundlander who served with the Newfoundland Overseas Forestry Unit and then the Royal Navy in WW2. My grandfather hated thunderstorms; I never knew why until about a few weeks ago.

Thunder dragged him back to the guns.

My father found him one day, hunched in his chair, gripping his head, pale and terrified when he finally looked up: -- Oh God, b'y, the thunder.

The low storm that day made everyone's ears vibrate.

Being at sea makes my ears hum and slush, and occasionally vibrate.

My grandfather's head, reinforced by a metal plate after injuries in a blitz -- did that also vibrate with each bang of thunder?

Bent at the waist, gripping his head ...

Try sitting in a chair, bent forward at the waist, holding your head. Either bit of flesh on your belly, and your breathing's cut. So, head pain, ear pain, fear, memory, shallow breathing, ears sloshing -- body memory of being at sea -- ship up, down, port, starboard BOOM up, down, port, starboard, smoke and screams and alarms and BANG dark mystery Where the fuck are we silence silence silence mouths just dark holes ears unblock BOOM ...

A half hour listening to RN footage on Youtube, bang of the naval guns. Five minutes hunched in a chair, elbows stabbing my knees, hands caging my head and those cut short breaths --

Trivial bit of method acting. Pathetic, really. And the comic-book diction of "boom?" Failure of words. And imagination.

Imagination here not just a gift but a duty.

So. Head pain, ear pain, fear, memory ...

Video: Persecution of the Baha'is in Iran

2009-03-06T10:59:00.000-03:30

Link to a video on the status of the Baha'is in Iran

Mic

2009-01-23T10:26:00.002-03:30

The Order of the Dusty Owl's mic. Loved reading into this one -- not invasive, like those phallic ones.

Photo (c) Copyright 2009 Michelle Butler Hallett.

Bytown -- Joy, by Bruce Garner

2009-01-23T10:17:00.003-03:30

Sky Waves -- errata

2009-01-22T15:58:00.002-03:30

Chapter 37, "On the package" should have the dateline "February 17, 1999" and not "February 17, 1979."

I fucked up a bit on the Sputnik program in chaper 65, "Ohm 2," implying that Laika the dog has gone up Sputnik 1. Laika blasted into orbit in Sputnik 2 and died shortly after leaving Earth.

The Baha'i Question -- Cultural Cleansing in Iran

2009-01-21T15:46:00.005-03:30

A site that explores the outrages committed against the Baha'is in Iran.

http://www.question.bahai.org/

Dusty Owl notes

2009-01-21T10:28:00.006-03:30

Best time I've ever had at a reading, guaranteed.Also the best mic I've ever used -- pic to come later. The Order of the Dusty Owl is packed with sweet and generous people.

I met two photographers, Charles Earl and John W. Macdonald. They each took shots of me -- me, who normally coagulates into mud before a camera -- and put me at ease. I;m flattered to be part of their work.

Charles Earl:

http://www.brokenviewfinder.com/index.php?id=996

John W. Macdonald:

http://blog.johnwmacdonald.com

Reasons I am proud of my daughter

2009-01-21T10:18:00.003-03:30

My older daughter turns eleven today. Here's a short list of why I'm proud of her.

1) She's eager to take the Red Cross Babysitting course so she can help others.

2) She wanted very badly to watch Barack Obama's inaguration speech because she sensed the historical importance.

3) After watching the speech, she asked intelligent questions about segregation, "expediency" and Guantanamo Bay.

4) She informs her class at school of the continuing abuses and harassment of the Baha'is in Iran. Not only is she aware of issues -- she cares.

She cares. The start-point for change.

Dusty Owl Reading venue -- correction

2009-01-15T09:24:00.002-03:30

Swizzles is NOT in the Byward Market. Yep, I'm embarrassed.

Swizzles Bar and Grill, 246B Queen: http://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&tab=wl

Upcoming Dusty Owl Reading -- thoughts

2009-01-14T09:43:00.007-03:30

Bytown or Ottawa? Michelle or Nichole?

I never wanted an alter ego, a character who might be identified with me, who had enough in common with me for a reader to think Look! Autobiographical stuff. But Nichole Wright in my novel Sky Waves kinda came out that way ... Nichole worked in radio, studied at Carleton University in 1989 and the early 1990s – majored in English, too, the copycat – even took a job in a downtown Ottawa mall, just like me. Okay, I get silly at that point, having Nichole work at an office supply store called Bigge and Wiggles, whereas I worked for Grand and Toy, but still, Nichole's course arcs close to mine. Until we get to her destructive coke habit and unplanned pregnancy and connected breakdown – fiction, right? So beyond asking the question of why we tend to privilege art that we think we know it autobiographical, I feel almost queasy about travelling to Ottawa to give a reading as part of the Dusty Owl Series. Excited, too -- Ottawa's a second home, a city where I lived for nearly ten years and put down taproots. My first daughter was born in Ottawa. A puntload of friends live in Ottawa. And that winter cold, that dry smack upside the face with microscopic ice – I'll be striding off that plane with arms open wide ... well, metaphorically ... craving the familiar and strange, old and new, and not minding how Nichole hovers along for the ride.

Insomnia

2009-01-13T09:40:00.002-03:30

Sleep a fog that settles and dissipates on unseen whims. Dreams elusive and troubling -- two nights ago, an enormous brown crow attacked my head -- talons -- and then my back where the neuralgia registers, tearing out chunks. My jaw: trap-tight. Someone watches.

NLAC Featured Project

2009-01-13T09:38:00.002-03:30

The Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council now aims extra spotlight on "Featured Projects" they have funded.

The Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council recently awarded me a travel grant of $630.00 for my upcoming trip to Ottawa to read at the Dusty Owl Reading Series.

http://www.nlac.nf.ca/index.htm

"Be sure and make note of your sensations."

2009-01-08T20:11:00.003-03:30

Post-herpetic neuralgia continues.

Today, despite increased doses of Lyrica, my sides burn ... char ... blister ... the skin looks normal. Barbed wire crammed against scalds. Tears.

Upcoming reading -- Dusty Owl series, Ottawa

2009-01-08T19:13:00.002-03:30

Sunday, January 18th at 2pm, Swizzles Bar and Grill in the Byward Market ... the Order of the Dusty Owl honours Michelle Butler Hallett by shoving her -- she'll stumble -- towards the mic to read from her latest novel, Sky Waves, plus some older stuff and some in-progress stuff. Yeah, stuff, yeah.

Official dirt follows:

Butler Hallett's work, at once striking, memorable and difficult to categorize, has been praised by Books in Canada for "economy and power," while The Globe and Mail notes that "demons are at work - the kind that lurk in the subconscious and surface, depending on the individual, as either despairing visions or acts of outright brutality. ... Butler Hallett seems often to be creating from a subliminal place, riding on intuition, unencumbered by the counsel of editors." Speaking of Butler Hallett's first novel, Double-blind, the 2008 Sunburst Award Jury said: "Sanity, madness, torture in the name of science -- Double-blind is wonderfully original while chillingly based in history. ... The writing is incredibly layered, with metaphor and symbol perfectly balanced against the hard neutrality of scientific language."

With Sky Waves, her latest novel, Butler Hallett draws on her radio background and her troubled relationship with history to create her most ambitious work yet. Described by the author as "a demented 'aural' culture novel," Sky Waves is told as a drew, that is, as the ninety-eight meshes in a row of a fishing net. Throughout ninety-eight non-linear but interconnected chapters and several different narrators, characters and storylines are networked together, almost as a mural against a timeline of 1901 to 2008. Sky Waves explores the often funny and often sad human need for - and fear of - meaningful communication.

Asked recently to describe her work, Butler Hallett replied: "a blistering fusion of history, New Romantic sensibilities, stubborn Cold War angst, steampunk and hope. Categorize that."

Grab bag at michellebutlerhallett.com

2009-01-02T15:20:00.010-03:30

From time to time I'll be adding (and taking away) draft bits, new stuff and God knows what to the Grab Bag section of my site. Drop by for a gawk.

Support Wikipedia

2009-01-01T11:29:00.001-03:30

A cool site -- incredibly useful -- and free of advertisements. Also free. As in, you don't pay to use it. As in, access ... and with that, freedom.

Scotty: It's ... uh, green.

2008-12-31T15:53:00.002-03:30

My site has just emerged from refit. New design by Kurt Moyst. New content to be added soon to the "Grab Bag" page -- some polished stuff, some rough drafts.

And yes, it's green.

http://www.michellebutlerhallett.com/

(Post title taken from Star Trek: "By Any Other Name.")

Basics. Duh.

2008-12-30T09:17:00.002-03:30

So I'm drafting a play. Three characters -- a nice change after the ensemble cast of Sky Waves -- and man, I know two of them better than I know myself. They've opened up to me, told me who they are, shared it all ... and off I go, two-thirds cocked.

Forgetting the third, perhaps most pivotal character.

Sure, he's meant to be mysterious -- but I can't write him effectively -- or make him properly and usefully mysterious -- if I don't know him.

I never did well with character sketch exercises in school. I can't design puppets. I might be able to give you brown hair, blue eyes, five foot seven, thin and likes to cut wood, but beyond that, my characters need to show me who they are. Must talk to me. And I must be ready to listen.

Time to go listen.

Things not to be at while alone in the house

2008-12-29T14:30:00.004-03:30

Dark night, by myself, savouring solitude. Catch up on The X-Files, season two on DVD, yeah, something I never got to watch regularly when it was broadcast. Take neuralgia meds and a tiny Ativan to aid sleep despite pain ... hmm, not falling asleep, just feeling, well, held ... mildly unpleasant ... the screen rattles against the big door, tap-tap-tapping -- but the damn raven's already tattooed onto my chest, so I control the visitation of memory, right? Right? Watch Duane Barry and get deliciously scared. Watch Ascension and get quite unsettled -- stakes and motives and what's held dear. Tap-tap-tap. Must doze -- come to, mouth dry and tasting bitter, as though my throat's just been numbed with that bitter, bitter spray that suppresses the gag reflex just before endoscopy or, even more interestingly, ERCP ... tap-tap-tap ... drugged to the hilt once for an ERCP, including Valium, Versed, the throat spray and perhaps something else to concot "milk of amnesia" so that the patient forgets the procedure; this particular exam hits a snag when the doctor in charge of shoving endoscopic cameras into my stomach, bile and pancreatic ducts observes: --I'm stuck. Just need to push ... I heard that. I remember that. I remember sitting upright, choking on that damn hose and some fluid to see only professional backs as they all studied the X-ray image of the endoscope and my ducts ... immense sympathy for alien abductees at that moment, for the terror they suffer, whatever its explanation ... a nurse notices I'm up and choking, someone hauls out the hose -- but I remember it all -- tap-tap-tap ...

One Breath, with comatose Scully voyaging back after mysterious visits from her dead father and a non-existent nurse -- soothing. (And comical from another point of view, as Gillian Anderson had just given birth; in some takes her breasts are enormous with milk.) But I'm still awake.

Tap-tap-tap.

Gab stutter lisp -- WAM

2008-12-18T15:14:00.002-03:30

Angela Antle interviewed me this morning about Sky Waves for broadcast on Weekend Arts Magazine this weekend.

Sometimes, for my own good, I wish I were more afraid of a microphone. Gab gab gab ...

Under discussion: questions of the muddy boundaries between history and fiction.

Dream scraps

2008-12-13T10:11:00.003-03:30

Teeth falling out, sockets black and deep .... cramming teeth back in ... teeth crumbling in my hands ...

Demented in public. Screaming. Water Street in the freezing rain; wearing only a thin black dress. Desperate for coherence. Cop on either arm. Struggling. Screaming. Thoughts clear, mouth possessed. Dragged to the lockup. Dark.

Locked in a corset -- that one's neuralgia.

Kneeling down to admire a wildflower -- becoming the wildflower -- pinched finger and thumb blocking the sun --

Finding a friend waiting for me in a diner booth -- packets of jam on the table in little piles -- long since fallen alseep because I'm hours late -- delighted he's still there -- reach out to wake him but am dragged away --

Bettie Page

2008-12-12T20:45:00.002-03:30

The former 1950s pinup queen and bondage model -- the Dark Angel -- died earlier today at age 85.

What fascinates me most about Page: at what point in her photos is she being exploited, and at what point is she in control?

She had a rough go. Unhappy marriages, divorce stigma that kept her from working as a missionary, something she really wanted to do -- yes, missionary, not missionary position -- diagnosis of schizophrenia and subsequent hospitalizations, cheated out of royalties ... but there's strength in those photos. And beauty. More than just a bad girl. More than just a prop.

Post what?

2008-12-12T20:42:00.003-03:30

Imagine this:

your skin has just been scalded ... and someone is slashing that skin with the metal edge of an old wooden ruler.

Shingles complication -- post herpetic neuralgia.

Like something out of Poe. Remember the pedulum?

Chanting: it's all material, I can use this; it's all material, I can use this ...

Sweet, hot, pungent: thespicerack.ca

2008-12-12T20:38:00.002-03:30

I dare you to visit www.thespicerack.ca. Full disclosure: it's owned by a friend of mine from high school, great guy named Cyril Butler, so yeah, I'm biased -- but I'm also impressed. Thespicerack.ca stocks an almost evil range of hot sauces, mustards, spices, rubs, flavoured salts and Cowgirl Chocolate ... that is, good chocolate with cayenne and other delicious stuff in it. Lots of salt-free spice mixes, too. Come on, ya know ya want to ...

Heard it on the radio

2008-12-12T20:34:00.003-03:30

Earlier this evening, while I was signing copies of Sky Waves at Coles in the Avalon Mall -- much of Sky Waves being set at the fictional VOIC Radio in St. John's -- VOCM's Claudette Barnes mentioned the book during one of her Happy Tree remote cut-ins -- and mentioned how how the novel draws on my time at VOCM.

Not sure if you can call that irony. I do call it wicked. Big toothy grin wicked.

Demobilized

2008-11-25T10:20:00.002-03:30

Demobilized

St. John’s, 1946

Sure it was all gyroscopes, guns and salt.

Never expected to get out intact and dry.

Even a Royal Navy seaman likes to be dry.

Burnt my legs the second wreck.

Oil, flames and water.

Talk about something else.

Married? Yes, little tiny thing from North Shields,

Up past Newcastle. Thought I lost her twice.

First time was a blitz.

Visiting her and her mother,

Two of them just after giving me two boiled eggs,

Me frigging half starved and dying for something

That tasted like home and not a tin bowl.

Found out later, ration cards and that, they

Missed two meals each so I could have eggs and toast.

And didn’t I ask for more?
Can’t forgive that one.

The shelter was under a lemonade factory,

Machines, glass, fizzy gas.

All that fell on top of us.

Daylight before they dug me out,

Shattered glass, dust and sugar in my eyes and throat.

Navy took me, arm broken, deaf in one ear,

Funny in the head for a while.

Months before she found me on a list.

Then she got news my ship went down.

Another two years before I saw her.

Engaged to another fellow. Can’t blame her.

Twice now I was after dying on her.

She all big-eyed and slack-jawed when she saw me,

Even thinner, God, there was nothing to her.

And I said, “You sill love me?”

She dropped the hand of buddy she was with.

I said, “Because by the Jesus, I still love you.”

She’s crossing now with the other brides,

Halifax first, Cunard White Star SS Scythia.

Got the postcard.

But here’s what galls me.

Navy promised us all full time work

When we got home. Even the Newfoundlanders.

Full time work.

And I promised her a house.

Cutting wood, clearing rocks.

When I came back through the Narrows,

All St. John’s was dun black in coalsmoke,

And I could have cried. Me, dry as a rock in the sun

The whole frigging war. Could have cried,

Bringing her to this Newfoundland,

Nothing to shelter her but my tattooed arms.

Originally published in CV2 vol 29 issue no. 4.
(C) Copyright 2007 Michelle Butler Hallett

Sky Waves released

2008-11-04T13:45:00.002-03:30

After a few delays, Sky Waves is out there. Not everyone's got it shelved yet, as some places have it on backorder, but that demented "aural" culture novel is out there. Tune in and read like you mean it. On the air in three, two, one ...

Polyglot in bed

2008-11-04T10:11:00.003-03:30

--Hey, you listening?
-- William Gaddis, JR.

Every leaf -- even the way a sodden bare tree seems to scrape at the wind -- contains a message. I just don't have the language yet. Or I don't have the ears.

A friend, struggling with sudden health issues, asked me yesterday: --How do people with chronic illness just, you know, get on?

I sighed a bit, as if I'm some weary expert, and muttered. --We learn patience. We have no choice. It's hard.

Various religions teach, or at least suggest, some purpose in pain, that physical suffering is an inescapable facet of being human. Ideas continue here, reaching like branches for a hidden sun: suffering strengthens one's compassion and capacity for empathy, draws one closer to what matters -- God, if you will, or better love --

I hear this. But do I understand it?

No.

So, last night and this morning: gut pain hard enough to make me cry out, make me cry; futile nausea; low fever and chills --

Do I understand it?

Not yet.

Puncture wounds

2008-11-02T09:09:00.002-03:30

Hospitalized briefly about a year ago -- gut pain, what a surprise.

Getting an IV hurts a bit -- that first poke through the skin. I don't have skin so much as hide: thick as leather, I'm told. Audible "pop" when the needle penetrates.

Dreamt last night of IVs. Lots of them. While I was trying to catch up on a neglected university course load. IVs not just syringe and tubing but eyeless snakes, biting biting biting, each pierce enough to make me cry out, each shot of venom firey ...

Healing venom. Blind snakes burrowing into my limbs.

Puzzled dread before sunrise. Trust the snakes? Trust pain?

Sweat some more

2008-10-30T12:35:00.002-02:30

Old gut pain smolders ... tendrils of smoke, glimmers of flame? Ash or fog obscures. Sweat, roll over, dream some more -- rabid dog. A mutt, terrier-size: suffering ruins its face and saliva hangs. I am the water. I am what it most desires and most hates. Head down -- growling, demented with pain -- foam spatters --

Roll over. Sweat. Dream some more.

Wisdom from my younger daughter

2008-10-19T08:22:00.002-02:30

CBC-Kids plays in the background, running a PSA from musician Kim Stockwood about a program called Positive Parenting. Kim goes on to say the first five years of a child's life are the miracle years, when so much of foundation is laid. I'm agreeing quietly when my seven-year-old turns around in the big comfy chair and sets her brilliant blue eyes on me:

--Mom, you don't need to worry about that.

I'm thinking, Cool, does she feel like she had a good first five years? Is this turning into a You're a good Mom moment?

My daughter continues.

--Unless you get pregnant in the next five minutes. Which you won't.

Pleased, she turns back to CBC-Kids.

True original (ha!)

2008-10-13T12:34:00.004-02:30

So I'm sketching characters and setting for a new play, and I recognize that I'm playing with ideas Virginia Woolf's already batted about quite tidily in Orlando. No worries, I figure. The whole inhabiting another sex's body thing is at least as old as Teirisias, and in my play it's a vehicle, not the main idea. Archetypal, yeah, that's my excuse and I'm sticking with it. Then a snatch of a Leonard Cohen song floats in, as sung by Tim Baker on the last Feast of Cohen CD -- "You who wish to conquer pain, you must learn, learn to serve me well." Anchor -- hang onto that, scratch it on a file card, memorize it -- search the lyrics. It's from "Avalanche," also known on paper as "Parasites of Heaven." The song describes what my play is trying to do. Fabulous, now I can plagiarize Cohen. Fuck! Might as well cut the play's throat and abandon it balls-up in the fog. But ... Cohen, Woolf and Homer don't have my particular characters, my setting, my fucked-up world view ... and in my deepest dreams I'll never be half the writers they are ...

Cocky, yes. Crazy -- goes without saying.

Three conflicts, when you get down to it. And every story's a quest.

Shred of something original, one feather's worth?

Only way to find out is to write the thing.

Conversation with my older daughter, who is learning the bass

2008-10-07T11:07:00.002-02:30

SFX: Eurythmics live playing in background as I dance around half-dressed -- tank top and panties -- getting ready for work.

CHILD: Cool bass line.

ME: 80s music is very bass-driven. The good stuff was, at least.

Beat.

CHILD: Gee, Mom, you dance pretty good. For a grownup.

Conversation with my younger daughter

2008-10-05T10:12:00.001-02:30

CHILD: Mom, do you know where my DS might be?

MOM: No, darling. I don't keep track of it. Toys and games are your responsibility.

CHILD: Oh.

MOM: Have you looked in your room?

CHILD: (exasperated) Mo-om, I checked there two weeks ago.

MOM: Do you think you might check again?

CHILD: No. I checked it two weeks ago.
_________________________________

How do ya argue with logic like that?

Cover for Sky Waves

2008-09-29T14:37:00.003-02:30

Sky Waves -- due for release on Octover 24, 2008.

Cover design by that genius, Paddy Moore. Cover photography by Missus with Three Names.

Sunburst Award update

2008-09-29T14:33:00.001-02:30

Congrats to Nalo Hopkinson and Joanne Proulx!

http://www.sunburstaward.org/2008_Winners.html

"How's the proofreading going, Michelle?"

2008-09-23T20:49:00.002-02:30

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH
rotten stinkin why the hell did I ever think I could do this of course you can
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHH
do this just a matter of getting your arse in gear and where the hell did that
AAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
comma splice go line 4 or 14 oh for the love of all that's good and pure
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH

Hot water

2008-09-21T12:33:00.003-02:30

Think a hot bath is a good idea when you're getting over shingles?

It's not.

Seems I woke up some angry nerve endings. Seems I'm painfucked as well as storyfucked today.

Getting a bit frustrated here -- hammer through a wall kind of frustrated.

Like my muse cares. Like any of this actually matters when there's a book to finish.

"Fixing a hole where the rain gets in..."

2008-09-21T10:52:00.002-02:30

Despite all my oh-so-intricate and precious work on Sky Waves, my husband, reading through, discovers this problem, days before I'm supposed to return the proofs:

--Uh, honey, if Robert crashes around noon, but Thomas doesn't get out there 'til dusk on a July day, and the lost girl doesn't come out of the woods 'til after dusk, then what the hell is everyone doing in those six or seven hours?

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

I woke up to that question this morning, groggy with meds for shingles and a long, wickedly dreamy sleep -- including dreaming I was struggling to wake up.

It's only the central event of the novel, ya know, the inciting incident, that rock in the water of every character's life ... only a plot-hole you could drive an eighteen-wheeler through ...

Beat head off wall. Rinse. Repeat.

A few sentences will fix this. Five, tops. But that's not the point. The point is I never should have missed such a sloppy lapse. Outlines, charts, timelines, several readings, several readers ... and still, I missed the phantom six hours.

Perhaps this post will feed a bad review later, some clever critic who loathes Sky Waves will Google me and find this and say: -- Yes, her worst fears are true: Butler Hallett's a fraud. Pity she thinks she can write. So much time ...

Time.

Time. Time to fix it.

Should have thought of this before (conversation with da muse)

2008-09-18T20:38:00.003-02:30

Proofing Sky Waves ...
--------------------------------

Holy fuck, I can't publish this.

Got to now, girl.

Incompent, meandering, meaningless --

No, not meaningless. Plan at work.

A mess! I have fucked it up, totally fucked it up, and everyone's waiting on me to deliver the corrected proofs --

Fucked it up? Probably. Definition of novel: a prose narrative of some length that has something wrong with it.

What are people going to think?

Got no control over that, girl.

I'm a fraud. Total fucking fraud. I read from it last night, and I lost every scrap of confidence I had in this book.

You felt the same way about Double-blind.

This is worse. Way worse. Questions this time of history, autobiography, blurry lines of fiction --

You're tired. Go lie down.

I can't do this.

Already did. "Kick at the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight" and all the rest of it. Just go lie down. Can't stifle a story about the importance of communication now, can you?

I'm scared.

Might keep you honest.

Really scared.

Good.

Devil's whip

2008-09-18T20:38:00.002-02:30

The nerve starts in the spine, slopes down a bit over the ribs, wraps around the front. The nerve sizzles with dull fire -- herpes zoster virus, awake after a long nap -- then it snaps, almost knocks me to one side -- gasp -- a whispered knotted string of profanity -- tears -- that scowl again, that bitter scowl, spine throbbing, pain meds so damn slow ... reason, still reason here? Beyond random infection? Old name for shingles: the devil's whip. More accurate. I'm tired now, tired out with pain ... one's night sleep, pray, literally, for one night's good sleep ... reason ...

Burnt, steel wool

2008-09-13T11:59:00.003-02:30

Shingles: wouldn't mind learning how to put them on a roof. Dermatome: name of a nudist new wave band, surely, perhaps expiring in the shadow of Duran Duran. Sensation: first-degree burn over a bruise, the touch of clothing like steel wool. Thank God the Sky Waves galleys came in, so I've got some serious distraction.

So it's stoned topless proofreading today at Michelle's house. Sounds like some act as a secret strip joint hidden in the bowels of a university. For added academic exitement, I'll put on my hornrims and call out "Derrida, Foucault, Marx -- you're all pathetic self-blinded wanking losers!" in wails of ecstasy as I smack the air with Beckett in one hand and Marlowe in the other. Yeah. That's it.

Pustulent symmetry (viral dreaming)

2008-09-08T20:03:00.003-02:30

I caught chickenpox when I was seven or eight. Nothing unusual there, except the fever dreams just before the rash broke: semi-transparent demons drifting down from a black and red sky ripped out of the background washes for those Rocket Robin Hood and SpiderMan episodes NTV inflicted on us over lunch hour in the 1970s. (You can still catch both on Teletoon Retro.) Years later, reading HP Lovecraft and his Cthulhu demons floating down from the sky, I thought: Cool. Just like those fever dreams when I got chickenpox.

I've dreamt about Cthulhu the odd time since, including a particularly wretched dream where I watched a Cthulhu rape me. (I wove this into Sky Waves.)

I ran fevers over the weekend -- or they ran me. That semi-conscious languish that mocks sleep -- no real rest, just lost time, minutes evaporating like sweat. And yeah, Cthulhu dreams. Maggotty with Cthulhu, worse than any other time since I had chickenpox.

Found a rash on my trunk today. Saw a doctor. Shingles -- Return of Chickenpox, in a bent way.

The same virus caused the same dreams?

Cured in one easy step

2008-09-06T15:57:00.002-02:30

So this chronic pain crap, this heap of saltstinking rancid guts too corrupted for seagulls to nibble, dainty little songbirds of delicate taste that they are -- I've got it. I've got the cure. Years of pain and a stoned head could have been avoided, yep, if only, if only I knew this before:

Don't eat. And the pain lessens.

Pass the jaysus Kafka now, 'til we flips open to "The Hunger Artist."

Tunnel

2008-09-01T18:55:00.004-02:30

Some years ago, I miscarried. Statistically normal. Lots of us do. Early enough, and you mightn't even notice it.

Early. But I noticed. I got pregnant with almost wicked ease.

My Mom smiled. --Hang your drawers on the bedpost, and you're knocked up.

And I knew -- morning-after knew. Not sick -- yet -- but different: second soul tethered to my body.

I conceived that lost child a few months before starting my second daughter. Hung my drawers up, and next morning those suddenly fat veins in my chest pumped indigo. Went up a cup size in a week, just like the first time. Felt a funny almost-tickle on my mind, like a feather -- queasy within a few weeks -- period date passed -- faintest blue line on the preg stick --

Faint?

Woke up alone.

Alone in my body, I mean.

Checked with my doctor. He ordered bloodwork.

That night, bleeding ... heavier than the late period should be ... futile trip to the Grace ... very young doctor left to stand in the doorway and watch while nurses kept taking away little blue pans from under me to "analyze tissue" ... so many clots ... the doctor's face made me cry harder as he faced his helplessness. No shiny stethoscope, no young doc's stamina for night rounds, no amount of care and gentle manner could stop this.

Tidal.

Missed.

Could we have the translation, please?

2008-08-31T06:15:00.004-02:30

Sneaking back, like gulls and fog near sunrise, the pain polluted my dreams.

Suddenly unemployed, because I was too busy writing to go to a job interview. Well done. Only the family breadwinner, only got two youngsters depending on me as my husband struggles with crumb-contract work. Find myself back in radio, but I'm politely escorted out of there, old boss telling me in his deep voice I'm better suited to bureacracy. Heading to the long-delayed interview for the bureacracy job, I end up at a competing radio station, trying to get the GM's attention for just a moment -- except I haven't got a CV with me. And the recent double mastectomy causes trouble as I take my breast forms out and lay the wobbly things on the table for all to see. Meantime the GM reminds me so much of a departed friend that I just want to hug him, welcome him back to the land of the living, but something's wrong, gnawing-spitting-cussing wrong ... another friend wears a knife and details just how and why he's so pissed off with me, all these comments taken out of context, only the worst possible meanings understood. He's quiet, calm, cold as that Jesus knife -- can I possibly get it from him, no he can't want to use that ... recognition that part of me is glad I hurt him -- shame, shame -- and the dead friend laughs in the background, much too far down the hall now to catch ... gnaw spit cuss ... gasp and wake up ... time for a painkiller.

Faith (petty believer)

2008-08-30T06:43:00.003-02:30

I pray: --Purify me.

Blunt pain cleaves out my back. Double over - no thought but escape. Teeth grind. Scowl petrifies.

I pray: --Heal me.

Brick? Slate. One of those crumbling rocks, ancient layers, pathetic broken edges comical 'til bloody.

I pray: --Purify me.

Pain steals my knees.

Little lights

2008-08-29T11:58:00.001-02:30

CT scan last month – mercifully clear results. Mysteriously clear, too, as my doctor could palpate some strange little alien in my belly a few months before, but I’ll grab the mercy. I sneezed when injected for a CT scan in 2006 – radioactive contrast dye shoots into your veins, floods your body, cooks you slightly with a piss-warmth in the groin – just a sneeze.

I smile at the needle-nurse. --Now, is this the stuff that makes me warm all over and sneeze?

Timing, right? I ask this while lying on the table.

Concerned faces. Syringe suddenly held away.

We go ahead with the test, with nurse and attendants cautioning me to speak up if I feel the slightest bit strange.

These people worry too much, I figure, watching the nurse pierce my elephant –hide skin and lose the vein. Always a tedious process. Stab hard, dig, dig, pull out. Stab, dig, dig ...

Prick. Shoot. Flood. Heat. Humming wheel of lasers, instructions: --Don’t breathe. Breathe.

Nausea. Guts wants to explode out my nose. Sweat. Sneezing. Lots of sneezing.

Scan’s finished. Sit up, sneeze some more, wheeze a bit, start to explain I think I’m okay – sudden lisp. Tongue wider than it should be. Lips numb? Surely not. Got to be imagining this. Now I’ve got to hang around this little anteroom, sit right in front of a camera ... lips numb. Definitely. Tongue thick. Head foggy. See a doctor – she’s a lovely woman I went to school with. We chat, I wheeze slightly, she listens to my chest, then she goes away, says she’ll check on me shortly. Meantime I should call out or wave at the camera if anything else goes –

Shots of light. Gold and blue. About nine feet in the air. Drawing me towards them. Perhaps I should wave at the camera now, but those lights, don’t want to lose the lights ...

Whack. Sudden shove back into the hard plastic chair. Lips tingle, sensation returning. Tongue shrinks from jamming my teeth. Twenty minutes later, I’m allowed to leave, with a warning: --You shouldn’t have any more CT scans.

I see different lights when stoned on painkillers. Little flames of blue or pink, usually. No desire to follow them.

Swollen brick

2008-08-29T03:07:00.003-02:30

That squatter of shrivelled brick -- pain infestation -- bladder squealing -- brick swells to hot acid balloon -- cold draught -- roll onto my side, try to reason with the pain: Okay, I've gotten up and pissed, I've moved around, so why don't you settle down the once? Reason with pain -- bargain with some demented card dealer, or claw the mattress with short-bitten nails. Reason. Philosophy and detachment -- reaching -- a wee bit more difficult around three in the morning. I know others suffer far worse -- seen some of it. I know this. No one's torturing me for the sake skin colour, faith or moral dementia. No one's stolen my children. Just me and this brick ... swallow the pill, keep quiet, don't wake up the family ... Brick and keyboard. Hunched, scowling, typing this -- kicking.

Tar Paper Shack -- Joel Thomas Hynes

2008-08-27T20:49:00.001-02:30

Dare ya.

www.joelthomashynes.com

Galley slave

2008-08-27T20:12:00.003-02:30

The copy-edited manuscript for my next novel, Sky Waves, is with my publisher, getting paginated, typefaced and then spit back at me in proofs. I do not enjoy reading proofs. By the time you get the proofs, you're not supposed to make any changes, any further revisions -- just spot typos.

It's a bit like looking in the mirror after a shower -- wet hair, saggy tits, stretch marks ... I dunno, hips and waist are all right, not hopeless, tattoos interesting... yeah but that flabby belly, those beady eyes -- workaday nakedness a fleshy equivalent of my sense of exposure. Sky Waves, never really in my control to start with -- the craft, perhaps, but not the guts and scream of it -- feels like a a scabby wound. But I can't wait for you to see it.

Sweat

2008-08-27T20:03:00.002-02:30

Behind my stomach lies a shrivelled brick of pain. Sometimes my body tries to sweat the brick out. Sometimes my biliary tree tries to push it out. Sometimes, in a spasm of independence, the brick tries to slice its own way through my back. Of course then it would have to haul the rest of my guts with it. Chronic. Argues with me when I eat -- anything. Tires me out. Wakes me up. Doubles me over. Stop me in mid-sentence. Draws my face into this scowl so sour you'd think murder rotted out my mind. And makes me sweat. Until I'm waxy. Smothered. Face and forehead moist. Little rivers in the cleavage, damp bra. Not sexy. Not easy. Seeded with purpose?

Watching the Road, by Lee Stringer

2008-08-27T20:00:00.002-02:30

New writer: Lee Stringer has just released his short-story collection Watching the Road with Killick Press. Stringer is one of those lucky guys who's from Newfoundland but gets to take that little commute to Fort McMurray. Recommend you pick this up.

How to go grey in one day, brought to you by Windows Vista

2008-07-23T09:35:00.002-02:30

So I've been working a little hard to finish Sky Waves, having lost so much time to illness over the spring. I've promised delivery of the ms July 26th. I revised 59 (short-short) chapters over last Saturday and Sunday. Now, I haven't slept well since June, and I'm getting just a teensy bit edgy. Monday night I taped open my eyelids and fired up my new Windows Vista-powered laptop to sketch in a new chapter ... but Windows Vista can't find the latest Sky Waves document. Check again -- nope. "Search" can't find it. Restart. Search. Nothing. Restart. Search -- got it ... registering at 32 pages.

When last I looked it was at 168 pages.

Now it registered just 32 pages.

I almost puked. Yes, I'd backed the file up, but not correctly, as I discovered, using my portable drive earlier in the day. For a few moments I thought I'd replaced the version with the 59 of 98 chapters with an older version of just 16 of 98 chapters.

Sweating now, I hit Ctrl End to see where this document ended.

Okay, all my work was there. But Windows Vista still told me the file measured 32 pages, despite me being on page 168. Finally, Windows read the file length correctly.

At least, I'm quite content to blame Windows Vista for this little bit of confusion. Yeah, that's it, evil Windows Vista, out to get me, out to get us all ...

Not sure what I need first: chocolate, Valium, or a new colour job at the salon.

Salt (through my Water Street office window)

2008-07-22T14:51:00.002-02:30

Downtown smells like salt. Not that rancid-scallop smell Halifax gets, but hard-biting salt water, the stuff that'd scrape the features off your face as soon as freeze you to death. Fog's coming in, so it's too chilly for short sleeves and skirts. That lady with white hair who often wears high platform boots and asks you for change in a very professional voice (was she once a receptionist?) stands across the street, breasts down to her navel in a thin old exercise bra. People ignore her. She shakes all over for a moment, picks a few times at her crotch, then moves on, dragging a wheeled suitcase and a cooler behind her.

Cursing and swearing

2008-07-22T14:36:00.004-02:30

I love profanity. I love the rhythm and flavour it can add to a sentence. I want to poke the hornet's nest of profanity and blogging -- should I maintain a corporate tone here? Will the occasional expletive make someone decide not to buy my books? make them decide to buy my books? Is this also a gender and cultural issue, whereby I act like "one of da b'ys" by using profanity? Whoever said cussing was solely the province and privilege of da b'ys? Am I still a good mother if I don't use profanity around my kids? But then can I use it at a reading they're attending? Is it okay for my characters to use it, but not my narrators? Who's in charge here?

Fuck this.

OnePlusYou Quizzes and Widgets

(I found this at http://missingtherock.blogspot.com/. Nadine also has a few words to say on the subject.)

Reading Saturday, July 26th

2008-07-22T14:31:00.001-02:30

As part of the NL Publishers event on Saturday, July 26^th at Chapters on Kenmount Road, St. John’s, I’ll be reading from my upcoming novel, Sky Waves. The whole event runs 1-5 Saturday the 26^th and Sunday the 27^th.

Un-site-ly

2008-07-22T14:30:00.001-02:30

My site, michellebutlerhallett.com, is down. I’ve paid all the fees, but I remain site-less. I want to change it up anyway. Stay tuned.

Steamin'

2008-06-07T10:38:00.002-02:30

Webcomic Girl Genius has been around for years, but it's new to me. Maybe to you? Treat youself:

www.girlgenius.com

While you're at it, serial web-movie Wormtooth Nation. I'm holding back from describing it, because the discoveries are too much fun and should not be spoiled.

www.theskyisfree.com

Sunburst Award 2008 Shortlist

2008-05-30T09:43:00.001-02:30

***FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE***

Contact person: Rebecca Simkin

rebecca@sunburstaward.org

FINALISTS FOR EIGHTH ANNUAL SUNBURST AWARD ANNOUNCED

TORONTO, ONTARIO (May 26, 2008) - The short-listed works in the adult category for the 2008 Sunburst Award are:

Double-blind
- Michelle Butler Hallett
Darkness of the God - Amber Hayward
The New Moon's Arms - Nalo Hopkinson
Wonderfull - William Neil Scott
Axis - Robert Charles Wilson

The short-listed works in the young adult category for the 2008 Sunburst Award are:

Choices
- Deborah Lynn Jacobs
Retribution - Carrie Mac
Darkwing - Kenneth Oppel
Anthem of a Reluctant Prophet - Joanne Proulx
The Night Wanderer - Drew Hayden Taylor

The Sunburst Award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic is a prized and juried award that is presented annually. Named after the debut novel by Phyllis Gotlieb, one of the first published authors of contemporary Canadian speculative fiction, the award consists of a cash prize of $1,000 and a hand-crafted medallion, which incorporates the "Sunburst" logo, designed by Marcel Gagné. It is based on excellence of writing; the jury selects five short-listed works and one winner, representing the finest of Canadian fantastic literature published during the 2007 calendar year. The requirements of the young adult award are the same as for the adult award except for the age of the audience to which the work is addressed. The winner of the annual young adult award will also receive a medallion and prize of $1,000.

The jurors for the 2008 award are: Timothy Anderson, Kelley Armstrong, Barbara Haworth-Attard, Dena Bain Taylor, and Robert J. Wiersema.

The Sunburst jury says about:

Double-blind
- Michelle Butler Hallett

"Sanity, madness, torture in the name of science--Double-blind is wonderfully original while chillingly based in history. It really shook us up. Through the chronically self-deceived mind of the narrator, the novel delves into profound questions of ethics in a morally ambiguous world, and comes up with tragically ironic answers. The writing is incredibly layered, with metaphor and symbol perfectly balanced against the hard neutrality of scientific language."

Darkness of the God
- Amber Hayward

"With Darkness of the God, the second book in the Children of the Panther series, Hayward really finds her footing. Melding old mythology with contemporary society, she creates a different kind of urban fantasy for readers tired of the old supernatural tropes."

The New Moon's Arms
- Nalo Hopkinson

"Nalo Hopkinson crafts an engrossing story featuring an unforgettable character. With generous doses of mystery, humour, magical fantasy and insight, The New Moon's Arms is a entrancing read."

Wonderfull
- William Neil Scott

"Scott follows the tradition of Canadian magic realism in a first novel brimming with quirky writing that would seem forced in less capable hands. The novel has huge scope--bigger on the inside than it appears on the outside and covering the entire lifecycle of a magical town--without ever sacrificing intimacy or detail. Scott has said he was inspired by Gabriel Garcia Marquez and the ghosts conjured by his own family's stories."

Axis
- Robert Charles Wilson

"Original and creative, with strikingly lyrical prose, Wilson shows insight into the human need to dominate every landscape he or she sets foot upon, be it the West in 'olden' times or a new planet in the future--and the mistakes and pitfalls that occur while rushing to do so. He also shows the determination and fortitude our ancestors possessed and passed on, and the ability to learn from our errors and go forward."

Choices
- Deborah Lynn Jacobs

"Jacobs' second novel is original and fast-paced, with characters we'd love to know. Kathleen, Kay, Kate, Kathy--Jacobs juggles realities with dazzling confidence. The resolution satisfies but keeps you thinking--about love and loss, and the choices we make."

Retribution
- Carrie Mac

"A timely novel, given the current rise of child armies in parts of the world. Strong writing pulls the reader through this sequel to The Droughtlanders. The sibling characters Eli, Sabine and Seth continue to grow as an exciting, action-packed yet thoughtful story unwinds."

Darkwing
- Kenneth Oppel

"Kenneth Oppel always spins wonderful fantasies about worlds hidden within our own, and in Darkwing he imagines one of those sub-worlds before our own. Darkwing takes the reader back to the earliest evolutionary form of bats and gives them a well-crafted, fast-paced adventure sure to please both grade schoolers and young teens."
Anthem of a Reluctant Prophet - Joanne Proulx

"Proulx doesn't shy away from showing the tumultuous mix of beauty and ugliness at work in the mind of a teen stoner. Her debut novel tackles ESP, drug use, teen sexuality and the mores of small town conservative Michigan all foregrounded against the soundscape of Luke Hunter's life. There is no doubt teens will recognize many of the characters in this uncomfortable novel. The book, like the protagonist, is not without flaws; Proulx's huge accomplishment here is writing a character whose rage, frustration and love are palpable through the disaffected teen voice."

The Night Wanderer
- Drew Hayden Taylor

"Taylor crafts a fast-paced tale of old magic meeting the modern world in this coming-of-age novel set in an Ontario reserve. With a spare, effective narrative style, he draws compelling portraits of teenage Tiffany, her struggling father, and a grandmother who carries the old world and the old Anishinabe language in her head. The mysterious Pierre brings a darkly gothic element to the prosaic setting, settling in the Hunters' basement room while he looks for a cure for his cravings. Taylor is an accomplished storyteller tackling themes of alienation and compromise with an accessible and engaging voice."

For further information about the Sunburst Award, including information about past nominees, winners, and jurors, please visit:

www.sunburstaward.org

"Jagged Glass and Feathers," by Susan Rendell

2008-05-07T11:53:00.003-02:30

Short story writer andjournalist Susan Rendell recently interviwed me for an aticle in The Independent. Here's a link: http://www.theindependent.ca/life.asp

Emerging Artisits

2008-04-30T10:05:00.002-02:30

I've got the honour to be shortlisted for the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council Emerging Artist of the Year Award -- and the added honour to be on the same list with visual artisits Mary Ann Penashue and Michael Pittman.

I caught some of Michael Pittman's work at the Leyton Gallery in St. John's last November. You must see it. Here's a link to his site:

www.newfoundartist.com

And to see some of Mary Ann Penashue's vital and striking work, and read an artist's statement, go here:

http://www.tipatshimuna.ca/info_people_e.php?page=1440&info=11

Tuning -- can you hear the sky waves?

2008-04-20T10:24:00.002-02:30

Sky Waves will soon bounce back to Earth ... the novel is due out in September.

"Critically acclaimed novelist Michelle Butler Hallett rolls out her raucous brand of satire in this tender exploration of the human need for communication, communion, and love. Sky Waves is set against the development of radio in Newfoundland and Labrador, and told in 98 non-linear but interconnected chapters. It crackles with comedy, modulates through history, and toys with a new signal-to-noise ratio. Sky Waves is definitely a lively and sometimes demented aural culture novel. Butler Hallett worked in radio for several years and has long been haunted by the story of a cousin who crashed his plane while looking for a lost child."

CBC Poetry Face Off, St. John's

2008-02-21T11:26:00.000-03:30

Maybe I’m not competitive enough, but I can’t be sure that poetry is a blood sport. Perhaps it should be. Still, I asked to be considered for this year’s CBC Poetry Face Off in St. John’s. Made the roster, as did Anthony Brenton, Andreae Prozesky, Gerard Van Hirk and Lesley Vryenhoek. Forgot the little detail that the poem has to be three minutes long. Also forgot I’d be up there with, you know, real poets.

So nervous now I’m sweating on the inside.

Three minutes, sure, but can I do three good minutes?

Face-Off details are here:
http://www.cbc.ca/poetryfaceoff/index.html?copy-locations-stjohns-sub

Riddle Fence

2008-02-21T11:12:00.001-03:30

Call for submissions to Riddle Fence

Deadline: March 31, 2008.

Riddle Fence, a St. John's-based journal of arts and culture, is looking to fill its second issue with nothing short of literary genius – though we'll settle for the merely exemplary. Payment? How mercenary of you to ask. We pay $30 a page for prose and poetry.

We are currently considering submissions of poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction. Send us your best and keep the rest for yourselves. Please send no more than 3-4 poems or one piece of prose, maximum 5,000 words in length.

What are we looking for? What is anyone looking for: brilliance, innovation, that certain je ne sais quoi de sage-like insight that will blow away the doldrums and give our lives greater meaning.

We accept submissions by snail mail (please include a self-addressed stamped envelope): Riddle Fence, P.O. Box 7092, St. John's, NL, A1E 3Y3. Or, send your submission by e-mail (as an attachment in MS Word or Rich Text Format) to riddlefence@gmail.com.