An update of the interviews and features on Open Book: Toronto this week.
On Thursday November 24, The Writers' Trust of Canada hosted their annual fundraising gala. The evening was a huge success, raising more than $180,000 for various programs that support Canadian writers and literature. Founding member Graeme Gibson called the Writers' Trust "a great big friend to writers." Click here to find out more about the gala and to see some photos of the star-studded event.
Open Book: Toronto spoke to many of the writers who participated in this year's Writer's Trust Awards Gala as part of the interview series Writers at Night: The Writers' Trust Gala. Keep reading to find out which of your favourite authors took part.
Open Book spoke with author Brian Francis to talk about his new book Natural Order (Random House). If he could sit next to any Canadian writer at dinner, living or dead, he says he would pick Margaret Lawrence because "I think she’d be a hoot. I’d ask her if Piquette in The Loons was a real person. Then we’d swing back the rum and Cokes and pass out fashion violations." Read the full interview here.
Author Alison Pick also took part in Open Book's Writers at Night: The Writers' Trust Gala Series and spoke about her latest novel Far to Go (House of Anansi). She jokingly said she planned to wear "Fishnets, stilettos, and [her] pink bikini" to the gala. Click here to read the full interview (and to find out what she really wore).
Author Shuaghnessy Bishop-Stall spoke about his novel Ghosted (Random House Canada), which was part of the New Face of Fiction program. If given the chance, Stall would ask Alice Munroe "if she would like to accompany me to a Mad Men party this Saturday night." Read more here.
Author of The Beauty of Humanity Movement (Random House Canada) Camilla Gibb told Open Book about her favourite part of the Gala. "I always enjoy landing at a table of people I’ve never met before and discovering uncommon connections and a shared love of literature," she said. Read the full interview here.
Martha Schabas also took part in the Writers' at Night Series and talked about her new book Various Positions (Random House Canada). Her designer of choice for the evening was "down to Versace or Valentino." Read the rest of her interview here.
Writer Russels Smith shared his thoughts on the Gala with Open Book and also talked about his latest novel, Girl Crazy (HarperCollins Canada). When asked to describe his recent book, Smith said that it "is a love story set in Toronto. It has a lot of sex in it." Read the rest of his interview here.
Stephanie Pearl-McPhee is also known as the Yarn Harlot and is the author of All Wound Up (Simon & Schuster Canada). She answered The Proust Questionnaire for Open Book and talked about her love of knitting, her desire to live in "a far and gone outport of Newfoundland" and her favourite authors of prose and poetry. Check out all of her answers here.
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