And with the third episode of Canada Reads, the first book is voted off the proverbial island. And what was the first noble title to fall? Well, if you had money on Douglas Coupland's Generation X, I'm very, very sorry...

Tune in to CBC Radio this week for Canada Reads (or pick up the video and podcasts at cbc.ca).

After months of preparation and anticipation (and a number of healthy on-line imitation and/or critical competitions), Canada Reads 2010 kicked off today for a week's worth of literary competitiveness which will leave only one book standing.

What book will it be?

Will it be Good to A Fault, Marina Endicott's Giller-nominated novel? It's the newest of the books listed, and deals with contemporary concerns, but will that be enough to take it over the top?

Then there's Fall On Your Knees, practically a Canadian classic from Ann-Marie MacDonald. It's been part of Oprah's book club, it's sold a kajillion copies... will its popularity work for it, or against it?

In comparison to FOYK, Nikolski by Nicolas Dickner is a bit of a dark-horse, a literary novel in translation. In true contrarian manner, though, Nikolski has been gaining a lot of adherents, and it's one of the most popular of the Canada Reads picks.

Always popular is Wayson Choy's The Jade Peony. For this competition, though, a beloved book like this might be at a disadvantage...

As might a book that changed not only the language, but how we look at ourselves. Douglas Coupland's debut novel Generation X is an icon in more ways than one: will the Canada Reads panelists be looking to knock it off its perch?

So many questions, so much potential for drama. Tune in to CBC all week for daily installments of Canada Reads.

Hot on the heels of Canada's spectacular showing at the 2010 Winter Olympics, we've got news of a headline-making new competition.

Yes folks, you guessed it -- the nominees for the 2010 Prix Aurora were announced this weekend!

The Prix Aurora is the annual award of the Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Association. The full list of nominees is linked below, but here are a couple of major categories:

BEST NOVEL IN ENGLISH :
THE AMULET OF AMON-RA, by Leslie Carmichael, CBAY Books
DRUIDS, by Barbara Galler-Smith & Josh Langston, Edge
WAKE, Robert J. Sawyer, Penguin Canada
STEEL WHISPERS, Hayden Trenholm, Bundoran Press
TERRA INSEGURA, Edward Willett, DAW Books

BEST SHORT-FORM WORK IN ENGLISH:
"PAWNS DREAMING OF ROSES", Eileen Bell, Women of the Apocalypse. Absolute Xpress
"HERE THERE BE MONSTERS" Brad Carson, Ages of Wonder, (DAW)
"LITTLE DEATHS" Ivan Dorin, Tesseracts Thirteen
"RADIO NOWHERE" Douglas Smith, Campus Chills
"THE WORLD MORE FULL OF WEEPING" Robert J. Wiersema, ChiZine Publications

No, your eyes aren't deceiving you: that IS Bolen Books' own Rob Wiersema, nominated for his novella The World More Full of Weeping. I bet he's pretty pleased about that!

For all the nominees, and to find out how to vote for the winners (hint, hint), go to the Prix Aurora homepage.

A Dark Matter by Peter Straub

I've been a Peter Straub fan since his Ghost Story scared the bejeesus out of me as a 13-year-old (and again last year, when I was... older). His work charts a path parallel to, but not quite overlapping, contemporary horror fiction. Yes, his books are scary, but they're also fantastic (ie, they contain significant, often understated, fantasy elements).

His new book, A Dark Matter, is an impressive addition to his canon.

A Dark Matter is set in the present, but focused on events of the past and how they have changed the lives of those involved in them.

Lee Harwell is middle-aged, a semi-successful writer, married to his high-school girlfriend, also named Lee (though she was once nicknamed The Eel). Lee and The Eel have a good relationship, but there is a secret at its core: when they were in high school, The Eel and several of their friends fell under the thrall of Spencer Mallon, a wandering guru. Lee did not become a follower, and as a result, The Eel has refused to discuss their activities with Mallon, especially what happened that night in the meadow, when they performed a ritual that left one of the friends dead, and shattered the lives of everyone concerned.

Harwell, always curious about the events of those bygone days, begins to investigate, tracking down their former friends. One is a convict, just released from prison. One is a smalltime conman. One is a resident of a mental hospital, speaking only in quotations from books he's read.

As Harwell pieces together the story, the reader is treated to a genuinely chilling, heartbreaking and terrifying narrative which comes to a peak when The Eel, finally, shares her secrets.

A Dark Matter is a compelling read, and one which will delight not only horror readers, but anyone who likes a good story well told.

If you spend any time at all on writing or books sites on-line, you've probably noticed that one of the hot topics these days is a pair of articles that appeared in The Guardian newspaper last weekend. The newspaper surveyed a range of writers for their personal top ten tips for writing (inspired by Elmore Leonard's classic Easy on the Hopdoodle), and the results are extraordinary. It's a glimpse into the process of these writers, and the sort of answer you get if you come to one of our author events and pluck up the courage to ask our visiting writer for advice.

My personal favourite advice comes from Margaret Atwood:
1 Take a pencil to write with on aeroplanes. Pens leak. But if the pencil breaks, you can't sharpen it on the plane, because you can't take knives with you. Therefore: take two pencils.
2 If both pencils break, you can do a rough sharpening job with a nail file of the metal or glass type.
3 Take something to write on. Paper is good. In a pinch, pieces of wood or your arm will do.

Which, in addition to being good advice, is a classic example of Atwood's dry wit at work.

And then there's Roddy Doyle:
1 Do not place a photograph of your favourite author on your desk, especially if the author is one of the famous ones who committed suicide.
2 Do be kind to yourself. Fill pages as quickly as possible; double space, or write on every second line. Regard every new page as a small triumph –
3 Until you get to Page 50. Then calm down, and start worrying about the quality. Do feel anxiety – it's the job.

(It just occurred to me: we've actually hosted a number of the writers in this survey. Excellent!)

The articles are great fun, and well worth your time: Part One

And as of this morning, the National Post has gotten into the act as well:

We live in what I think most of us would agree is one of the finest countries in the world. As Canadians, we typically don't pump ourselves up too much, or engage in over-the-top patriotic displays, but we live our lives in a state of freedom, comfort and care that is the envy of many people around the world.

It is important, however, not to take those freedoms for granted.

February 21-28 is Freedom to Read Week, a chance to celebrate that freedom and to bring awareness to the challenges it faces on a daily basis. In the last couple of years, a number of books have come under the harsh lens of censorship, including such "dangerous" titles as Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, Nelson de Mille's Wild Fire, Deborah Ellis' Three Wishes, David Guterson's Snow Falling On Cedars, Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird and Phillip Pullman's The Golden Compass series. Books are routinely challenged in public libraries and school boards, and held at the border.

The freedom to read, to open our eyes to worlds beyond our own experience, is one of the most valuable freedoms in a democracy, and a cornerstone of a wiser populace. Don't let it slip away.

Visit http://www.freedomtoread.ca/ for more information.

Traditionally, the fall is seen as the key literary awards season, but really, rewarding literary excellence is a year-round job. In fact, two major awards have announced their shortlists in the last couple of days, in the depths of winter (or, here in Victoria, in the throes of what seems to be an early spring).

The Regional Shortlists for the Commonwealth Writer's Prize were announced yesterday. The nominees in the Canada/Caribbean section are:

Best Book:
The Winter Vault by Anne Michaels (Canada)
February by Lisa Moore (Canada)
Euphoria by Connie Gault (Canada)
Goya's Dog by Damian Tarnopolsky (Canada)
Galore by Michael Crummey (Canada)
The Golden Mean by Annabel Lyon (Canada)

Best First Book:
Under this Unbroken Sky by Shandi Mitchell (Canada)
Daniel O'Thunder by Ian Weir (Canada)
The Island Quintet: Five Stories by Raymond Ramchartiar (Trinidad)
Diary of Interrupted Days by Dragan Todorovic (Canada)
The Briss by Michael Tregebov (Canada)
Amphibian by Carla Gunn (Canada)

For the complete list of nominees, head over to http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/afterword/archive/2010/02/18/regional-shortlists-for-commonwealth-writers-prize-unveiled.aspx

And the shortlists for the Nebula Awards, presented by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, were also announced yesterday.

The nominees for the Novel category are:
The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi (Nightshade, Sep09)
The Love We Share Without Knowing, Christopher Barzak (Bantam, Nov08)
Flesh and Fire, Laura Anne Gilman (Pocket, Oct09)
The City & The City, China Miéville (Del Rey, May09)
Boneshaker, Cherie Priest (Tor, Sep09)
Finch, Jeff VanderMeer (Underland Press, Oct09)

For a complete list of nominees, head over to http://www.sfwa.org/2010/02/2009-nebula-awards-final-ballot/

(And just a note -- we've got some of the nominated titles for both prizes in stock, and we can special order any of the others if they're available!)

Word on the web this morning is that Stephen King's next book, due sometime this fall, will be a collection of four previously unpublished novellas entitled Full Dark, No Stars.

This is very exciting news, and was posted to King's website, so it looks pretty official. Consider that the last time King collected four novellas, the book was Different Seasons, which included The Body (the basis for the film Stand By Me), Rita Hayworth & the Shawshank Redemption (the bases of the film The Shawshank Redemption), Apt Pupil (also released as a film) and The Breathing Method (which scares the heck out of me just thinking about it).

Did I say "very excited" already?

Over breakfast this morning, I was thrilled to attend the presentation of The 2010 Early Years Awards. Success by 6 and PLAY Greater Victoria sponsor these awards, which "celebrate the businesses and organizations that make a difference in the lives of families with children". Bolen Books was nominated in the Best Retail Store category, and while we didn't win (congratulations to Buddies Toys, who richly deserve the prize), it was a genuine honour to be nominated. At Bolen Books we have long considered ourselves Victoria's Community Bookstore. A nomination like this is a nice way to recognize that the reverse is also true: Victoria's families feel that Bolen Books is a valuable part of their community. We wouldn't have it any other way, and we go to great lengths to fulfill that responsibility everyday.

I spend a lot of time talking with writers and readers, so I wasn't particularly surprised when they singled out Penticton slam poet Shane Koyczan's performance of his poem "We Are More" as a highlight of the Opening Ceremonies of the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver. I was thrilled, though, when I started to hear the same sentiment from a much broader cross-section of people, including some who would run into traffic rather than read a poem.

Let's hear from you: what did you think of Koyczan's performance? And what did you think of the fact that they made time in the multi-million dollar event for a bit of spoken word? Send your replies to promotions@bolen.bc.ca -- one respondent will win an advance copy of The Master of Happy Endings, the forthcoming novel from Jack Hodgins!

Sad news out of the Cayman Islands this weekend, as it was reported that Dick Francis, a former jockey and one of the bestselling novelist of the twentieth century, had died at age 89. A new novel by Francis, co-written with his son Felix, will be published later this year.