Michael Van Rooy is THIN AIR's Audience Development Coordinator. He also has a weekly column on writing and publishing in the Winnipeg Free Press and administers CMU's School of Writing...and there's probably things he does for money I don't know about.

Michael is also a writer, specifically a writer of thrillers. (A thriller-writer? A thrilling writer?)

Here's the bio they used for Michael when he performed at the festival last year instead of working for it:

Michael Van Rooy writes for documentaries, magazines, newspapers, and the Internet, and has been short-listed for the John Hirsch Award for Most Promising Manitoba Writer. His first book, An Ordinary Decent Criminal, gained him an enthusiastic audience as well as the 2006 Eileen McTavish Sykes Award for Best First Book by a Manitoba Writer. His second book, Your Friendly Neighborhood Criminal (Turnstone), introduces Monty Haaviko, an ex-thief, ex-burglar, ex-armed robber, ex-smuggler, and ex-drug-dealer who’s lured into using his nasty talents again. Michael Van Rooy was born in Kamloops BC, and grew up in Winnipeg where he lives now with his wife and three children.

Well, this week, when Michael was trotting from event to event, he got some VERY good news. Which I thought I'd share here, in case you missed it (also, in case HE missed it)...as published in the Winnipeg Free Press:

"WINNIPEG writer Michael Van Rooy's first two thrillers have been picked up by an American publisher. Thomas Dunne Books will release Van Rooy's debut, An Ordinary Decent Criminal, on its Minotaur mystery imprint in July 2010.

Van Rooy's U.S. editor, Peter Wolverton, confirmed the deal by e-mail this week.

In 2011, Wolverton said, Thomas Dunne will release Van Rooy's followup Your Friendly Neighbourhood Criminal.

Thomas Dunne Books is a division of the New York-based St. Martin's Press."

So, to sum: Yay Michael! And: Get some sleep!

* * *

T'ai Pu was the closing performer of the festival, when you think about it. I mean, Sunday's programming consisted of a screening of Book Shorts, which are book-inspired videos, but that's not an in-person author. Which means that on Saturday night, it was Guy Maddin, George Toles & T'ai Pu.

Anyways, T'ai plunked his hands down on Aqua's counter after his performance, pulling out a ring that broke during his set for the first series of pictures. Then he remarked, "I'm a bangle person," and rolled up his sleeves to reveal a number of bracelets.

But those photos weren't as good, so you'll just have to imagine the bangles.

* * *

T'ai Pu's bio:

T’ai Pu, aka PuConA, was born in rhyme cyphas, groomed in drum circles, nourished by DJs and bands. His word/sound power is expressed through verbals (lyrics, written pieces), spitz (extemporaneous spoken word), voxbox (beatboxing, chants), and percussion. T’ai Pu has performed at jazz and folk festivals, radio-shows, nightclubs, special events, and community projects, and has recorded with several artists. He has captured the attention of young kids in schools and at Kidsfest with his lively poetry&music show, “Keep Sweepin’!” He’s equally adept with teens and adults, mesmerizing audiences with his verbal virtuosity and genuine warmth. T’ai Pu lives in Winnipeg.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

During the first half of THIN AIR, I usually make it to three quarters of my yah-yah-yah list.

But then, as the days pass, I start to get tired.

Events during the day, events at night...and I ruefully eye the filling sink, the un-shuffled laundry in the washer, mostly in passing. My daughter waves to me from the dining room table, where her dad is feeding her dinner.

This year, I made it to more Mainstages than ever before, but by Friday morning, I was tired, so I didn't make it to ANY of the Friday daytime events I'd circled. And the only reason I made Friday night's After Words event was because I was wearing my working-at-Aqua-Books hat...

But watching George Elliot Clarke read and talk at such length, with such great gory pleasure, about his I&I verse-novel, was rejuvenating.

His face nearly split open as he recited and he seemed eager to lose himself in the work, to inhabit the psyche of his 15 year-old self.

(GEC explained that he was reading through his teenage journals before donating them to a university library and he was compelled by a line here, a line there, so he copied them into his journal...and then a narrative appeared.)

(He also said this one was written for fun; the gory pleasure of sex & violence, music everywhere, the loose incredible energy of youth.)

It took THIN AIR staff nearly an hour to pry GEC away from the people who stayed to chat and get their books signed, an hour they clearly would have loved to spend sleeping, but it was a good way to spend my mid-fest slump.

(I should also note that Kelly Hughes, the owner of Aqua Books, sent me upstairs after he'd intro-ed GEC out of the kindness of his heart. He'd had me come in to mind the store while he played host, after all...)

* * *

Tim Wynne-Jones, who read a segment from The Uninvited about a ailing mother with designs on her doctor's emerald necklace, very cooperatively put his unadorned hands on the poppy-coloured on-stage couch. Of his hands, Wynne-Jones said, "I always felt they were sort of small."

* * *

Tim Wynne-Jones has 3 books out this year:

Pounce De Leon. Markham: Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2008.
Rex Zero, the Great Pretender. Toronto: Groundwood Books, 2009.
The Uninvited. Cambridge: Candlewick Press, 2009.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

* * *

After receiving the Banff Center Bliss Carman Poetry Award - i.e. the ring - Linda Frank contemplated the other rings she always wears, a simple wedding band on the one hand and a silver double-ring on the other. She adjusted the rings, moving the Bliss from one hand to the other and wiggling her fingers until her hands felt 'right.'

* * *

Linda Frank's Books:

Cobalt Moon Embrace. Ottawa: Buschek Books, 2002.
Kahlo: The World Split Open. Ottawa: Buschek Books, 2008.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

It’s been a different festival this year for me.

Last year, I attended far more of the afternoon book chats and far fewer of the Mainstages.

Mainstage #1: Bonnie Burnard’s tough frailness while reading and thinking through how to describe her book about middle-aged friends.

How she quietly and unmusically took over the stage after the more performative Gregory Scofield, despite the fact that even she didn’t think she could do it.

This year, it’s been Nooner/Mainstage every day and I haven’t hit any of the uni readings. They’re sort of like my dirty little lit secret, you know? Mostly attended by students, who get assigned to write something about the book or the author, they’re a different window into the festival, a different audience, a different attempt to connect with readers…

Afternoon Book Chat #1: Observing the unspooling of Cyril Dabydeen quick and prodigious memory. He was charmingly self-praising and even, as THIN AIR director Charlene Diehl noted, glossed his own poems for the audience. And they had a little afternoon tea-table set up, where I was able to get orange pekoe and date square.

But I will console myself collegially tomorrow with George Elliott Clarke at RRC and the Friday afternoon panel (The Future!) at UW.

That panels consitutes another of my festival traditions. No matter the subject, no matter the authors, they’re always always memorable.

Mainstage #2: The familiarity terrain – geographically and, also I think poetically - of David O’Meara’s S. Korea poems. We talked bibimbop afterwards, mostly because I was feeling nostalgic about my time in S. Korea. Also, although I only caught the tail-end of Jaqueline Larson’s reading, I greatly appreciated her storm-trooper boots but also the sass and energy of her work.

Tonight is my last Mainstage, on the theme Love Actually. I haven’t seen local Struan Sinclair read yet, or heard Margaret Sweatman’s new novel yet, and both Rhea Tregebov and Tim Wynne-Jones’s fictional work is entirely new to me.

See you there?

Bloggers at the nooner, having made up.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

* * *

Priscila Uppal originally aped Elisabeth Bachinsky's on-the-shoulders pose but then quickly flipped her hands over to show me her palms, saying that she had "old people's hands" and that "fortune tellers love my hands, all the lines."

* * *

Over the next year, Priscila Uppal's books include:

The Exile Book of Canadian Sports Stories (Editor: Priscila Uppal). Exile Editions, 2009.
To Whom It May Concern. Penguin India, 2009.
Successful Tragedies: Selected Poetry 1998-2010. UK: Bloodaxe Books, 2010.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

* * *

I asked Elizabeth Bachinsky if I could shoot her hands immediately after her Afternoon Book Chat at McNally Robinson's Polo Park. She paused, then asked me to catch her during the Mainstage, as she was going for a manicure that afternoon. "Maybe french tips," she purred, before following Rhea Tregebov out of the bookstore.

But she might have had second thoughts, as her hands were shell pink and shiny when she laid them on her shiny shoulder. I apologized for the flash then walked away.

* * *

Books by Elizabeth Bachinsky:

Curio. Toronto: Bookthug, 2005.
Home of Sudden Service. Gibson's: Nightwood, 2006.
God of Missed Connections. Gibson's: Nightwood, 2009.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

The rush on the books table after Linda Frank's nooner.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

Poet Colin smith gestures at intermission.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

The Tuesday afternoon book chat...very frenetic, very fun!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

* * *

Scofield muttered about his homemade heart tattoo, saying he got it when he was fourteen on a camping trip, but agreed to have one hand photographed after checking with Lauren Kirshner that she'd also had "her hands done."

* * *

In 2009, Scofield will be releasing the following books:

kipocihkân: Poems New and Selected. Gibson's: Nightwood Editions, 2009.
Love Medicine and one Song. Wiarton: Kegedonce Press, 2009.
I Knew Two Metis Women. Saskatoon: Gabriel Dumont Institute, 2009.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

* * *

Jon Paul Fiorentino wouldn't let me photograph his fingers, saying he'd get in trouble. He didn't even want his thumbs showing, so I told him to tuck them in. And he did.

* * *

Books by JPF:

Stripmalling. ECW, Toronto, 2009.
The Theory of the Loser Class. Toronto: Coach House Books, 2006.
Asthmatica. Toronto: Insomniac Press, 2005.
Hello Serotonin. Toronto: Coach House Books, 2004.
Resume Drowning. Fredericton: Broken Jaw Press, 2002.
Transcona Fragments. Winnipeg: Cyclops Press/Signature Editions, 2002.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

Sara and Frank at the thin air mainstage bar (next to the cheese)...
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

* * *

As I was shooting these pictures, Burnard remarked, "I have my father's hands. So do my three children."

* * *

Writing is a pretty hands-on endeavor in that it is the hands that make our thoughts legible via pen-on-paper or keyboards. Without working digits, writers are reduced to working aloud, dictating their work to a machine or an assistant. Which would make it either too noisy or too public for my liking...

I'll be posting similar portraits throughout the week. If there's an author whose hands you'd like to see, let me know...

* * *

Books by Bonnie Burnard:

Suddenly. Toronto, HarperCollins, 2009.
A Good House. Toronto, HarperCollins, 1999.
Casino and Other Stories. Toronto, HarperCollins, 1994.
Women of Influence. Regina, Coteau Books, 1988.

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

Volunteer coordinator Karen san fillippo gets herself a coffee at the library while trying to spot an author.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone

Hey all,

My name is Ariel Gordon and this is my third year blowing HOT AIR.

This year, I'm planning to take in as much of the festival as is possible. I always enjoy the nooners and the afternoon book chats and I take great pains to attend at least a couple of the readings at Red River College and the U of Wpg during the day.

And then there are the Mainstages. I usually plan to attend far more of the Mainstages than I actually get to. I'm not sure why that is, but...this year, I'll definitely be at the Poetry Bash on Wednesday and It's About Love, Actually on Thursday.

I'm also going to continue to post pictures of writers' hands, something I started last year during the second part of the week.

Mostly, I'm going to try to make sure that the stomach flu that kept me from Opening Night yesterday doesn't keep me from any more of the festival. Nasty inconvenient virus!

* * *
Ariel Gordon is the Winnipeg-based author of two recent small press chapbooks and has had poetry published in fine lit mags such as Carousel, PRISM International and Prairie Fire.

Her first collection of poetry, Hump, is forthcoming from Ontario's Palimpsest Press in spring 2010.

When not being bookish, Ariel likes tromping through the woods taking macro photographs of mushrooms.

Kelly Hughes Live: Into THIN AIR
Featuring authors Deborah Schnitzer and Jan Andrews with musician Ben Wytinck

Date: Friday, September 11, 7 pm
Location: Aqua Books (274 Garry Street, between Graham and Portage)
Cost: FREE



THIN AIR festival venue Aqua Books is proud to present a brand new concept in ripping off other people's concepts: Kelly Hughes Live!

Winnipeg's only live talk show, KHL! will bring you all the trappings you've come to expect from the television talk show: comedy, music and celebrities. The only difference is that you haven't heard of any of my guests, and you'll have to leave your house. So it's not that much like TV after all.

This edition of KHL! is meant to lead Winnipeg readers into THIN AIR, the Winnipeg International Writers' Festival, Sept. 20-27.


About Deborah Schnitzer
Deborah Schnitzer’s work appears in several anthologies, including Children of the Shoah: Holocaust Literature and Education and Dropped Threads. She co-edited Uncommon Wealth: An Anthology of Poetry in English and, with Debbie Keahey, The Madwoman in the Academy: Writing on the Tower, a gathering of women’s writing about graduate school, teaching and tenure. She has published two books of poetry, Black Beyond Blue and Loving Gertrude Stein, and a novel, Gertrude Unmanageable. Her new book, An Unexpected Break in the Weather, is a novel of unconventional friendships in a Winnipeg neighbourhood. Schnitzer is a 3M Teaching Fellow in the English Department at the University of Winnipeg.

About Jan Andrews
British-born Jan Andrews is an internationally-respected writer and storyteller. Her many published titles include Winter of Peril: The Newfoundland Diary of Sophie Loveridge, Pa’s Harvest, and Stories at the Door (Tundra 2005). Over the last twenty years, she has told stories to children and adults across Canada, as well as in the US, Australia and England. She has coordinated storytelling series, and is the director of StorySave, a recording project with Canadian storytelling elders. Andrews lives outside Ottawa, but is spending the fall in Winnipeg as the Writer/Storyteller-in-Residence at the U of M’s Centre for Creative Writing and Oral Culture.

About Ben Wytinck
Southpaw axeman Ben Wytinck got his start at age nine, playing drums in his father's band at a rural Manitoba bar. He moved to Winnipeg in 2001, to play what he calls Bluegrazz (Bluegrass and Jazz). His eponymous debut CD contains ten of his finest self-penned songs.

About Kelly Hughes
Bookstore owner Kelly Hughes has worked as an actor (Pacific Theatre), a pre-teen TV star (Let's Go!), an arts administrator (Winnipeg Cultural Alliance), and an operations manager (WHERE Winnipeg). He founded Aqua Books a decade ago, and is somewhat infamous as the writer of This Week at Aqua Books. He does dozens of media interviews each year, and has done hundreds of speaking/hosting engagements, from the kindergarten class at Kumsheen Elementary to the Burnaby Correctional Centre for Women.