St. John's-own, Craig Francis Power, unleashed his debut novel last Tuesday, amid the full fury of Hurricane Igor. I confess, although I had checked in earlier with him, I never expected him foolish enough to coax people to risk life and venture down to the Ship Inn. But he did, and I am contrite in having missed it all.
Craig and I share weird parallels that end the moment you meet either of us, or read how we each write. Both of us were trained as artists at NSCAD ('though I preceded him by a century or so), we both write about art, curate exhibitions. This summer, each of us ventured to China on separate junkets, to check out the scene. Power's book, Blood Relatives, was written here in St. John's over roughly the same period that I was working through Firmament. Both manuscripts were shortlisted for the same award (Fresh Fish) and both ended-up with great indie publishers (Gaspereau & Pedlar Press).
CFP just did some readings from the novel in Winnipeg, and there's a short interview in the Manitoban. I was interested to read about the fiction he dislikes: Canadian writing that is: "kind of like ornate, pseudo-poetic kind of precious, dull writing.” Setting aside the 'dull', I have a nagging suspicion that good-ole-CFP might quickly deposit my own writing style and structure in this catch-all. It will be interesting to see if any parallels survive.
I'm off now to pick-up my copy of Blood Relatives to confirm the good things I've heard. Do the same.
Craig and I share weird parallels that end the moment you meet either of us, or read how we each write. Both of us were trained as artists at NSCAD ('though I preceded him by a century or so), we both write about art, curate exhibitions. This summer, each of us ventured to China on separate junkets, to check out the scene. Power's book, Blood Relatives, was written here in St. John's over roughly the same period that I was working through Firmament. Both manuscripts were shortlisted for the same award (Fresh Fish) and both ended-up with great indie publishers (Gaspereau & Pedlar Press).
CFP just did some readings from the novel in Winnipeg, and there's a short interview in the Manitoban. I was interested to read about the fiction he dislikes: Canadian writing that is: "kind of like ornate, pseudo-poetic kind of precious, dull writing.” Setting aside the 'dull', I have a nagging suspicion that good-ole-CFP might quickly deposit my own writing style and structure in this catch-all. It will be interesting to see if any parallels survive.
I'm off now to pick-up my copy of Blood Relatives to confirm the good things I've heard. Do the same.
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