Sarah Lane's Blog, page 6
June 28, 2013
Mushed Cookies and Sylvia Plath’s Poetry in Rain City
An excerpt from The God of My Art: A Novel. Helene and Matthew are outside a bakery on Fraser Street in Vancouver.
As Matthew stepped out with the grease-stained bag in his fist, the rainfall turned torrential. He hesitated under the eave then pulled me in under the overhang. Rain ran off my bare arms in rivulets; my hair stuck to my cheeks.
“Even the monsoon rains in India give you more warning than this,” he grumbled, letting go of my arm. We stood there watching the water gush from the sky, splashing up off the sidewalk and streaming in small rivers toward the storm drains. He offered me a chocolate chip cookie. The moisture in the air and the wet on my hands dampened it to a mess of melted chocolate and mushy dough.
“So,” he asked, when the cookies were gone and the rain was still streaming down, “do you know any poetry?”
I was about to recite Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy,” which I had obsessively memorized in high school, when Matthew crumpled up the paper bag into a tight wad and tossed it through the rain into a nearby trashcan. Most likely, he wouldn’t recognize Plath’s poetry anyway, those words I had made my own as a teenager—Daddy, I have had to kill you—and realizing this distanced me from him. Standing there in silence in the doorway, his damp arm brushing mine, I sensed once again the chasm separating our experiences.
Read in paperback or as an eBook.
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June 27, 2013
Nocturnal Skinny Dipping in the Freezing Waters of Garibaldi Lake…
Here’s an excerpt from my new book The God of My Art: A Novel. In this scene, the characters are camping in the mountains in Garibaldi Provincial Park.
I tried again to rouse Matthew. “Let’s go jump in the lake!”
“It’s cold,” he protested, his eyes closed again.
“Let’s go,” I insisted, shaking his knee. I crawled out the flap door, pulling him after me.
I ran so I wouldn’t change my mind. The rocks on the shoreline cut into my feet as I leapt through the water before stopping short. Only knee-deep but already my calves were twitching in shock.
Matthew didn’t hesitate. He tossed himself in with a gigantic splash, sending a ripple of frigid waves crashing into my thighs.
It was now or never, so I let myself fall. The moon hung low on the horizon. Above us, a trillion sparks rained down through empty space to bathe our bodies in their indigo glow. First the water ate my hands. Then it ran up my arms. I fell in slow motion through the orifice swallowing up my breasts, its teeth at my nipples, stabbing, erotic. Its arctic mouth licked across my stomach, sucked in my hips, and slid its tongue across my back, drawing me down by the shoulders.
No way to stop it now: ice sank into my hair.
I was thrashing. I couldn’t remember anything but this gasping—this clamouring of numb feet over a rocky lakebed onto shore.
“Shhh! Quit screaming!” From behind me, Matthew clamped his hand across my mouth. I lost my balance as his arm pulled my head back, and I fell against him.
Read the whole book or eBook (Kindle, Kobo, iPad).
May 26, 2013
Short Story “Breaking Up” Featured on Front Cover of Antigonish Review
My short story “Breaking Up” appears in the most recent issue of The Antigonish Review. In receiving my copy, I was very excited to see that my story was one of the few selected to be listed on the front cover. It is about a Congolese refugee who suffers from posttraumatic stress disorder, thirteen years after deserting the army in his homeland. His terrible memories prevent him from connecting emotionally with the women in his life, leaving him increasingly isolated and lonely.
I encourage you to pick up a copy of The Antigonish Review, or check it out at your local library.
February 14, 2013
Book Trailer for The God of My Art
Check out the book trailer for my novel The God of My Art, coming in the spring of 2013.
http://www.sarahlane.ca/the_god_of_my_art.html#booktrailer
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February 12, 2013
Press release for The God of My Art: A Novel
Check out the press release for my novel, coming out before the end of June:
August 30, 2012
Short Story “Skin Deep” Featured in Roar Magazine
My short story “Skin Deep” appears in the most recent issue of Roar Magazine: A Journal of the Literary Arts. It is a story in which manufacturers change the skin colour of the new domestic help–robots–according to the volatile opinion of consumers.
I encourage you to pick up a copy of Roar Magazine and check out all the talented writing in the current issue.
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May 22, 2012
The Best Novel I’ve Ever Read (at least most recently)
I have just finished reading Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun.
I am blown away by Adichie’s talent. I love it when this happens: I discover a new author (well, new to me) and fall in love with literature all over again.
This novel succeeds on so many levels. It follows two dramatic love relationships and all the complications that ensue from intimacy with another in a world where betrayal and jealousy exist. It portrays the various classes of post-colonial Nigeria through the voices of three very different characters: a houseboy from the village, an educated middle-class woman and a British expatriate. Then, once you as a reader have begun to deeply care about these characters, Adichie unleashes upon them all the horrors of the Nigerian civil war.
Next up on my reading list: her first novel Purple Hibiscus and her more recent collection of short stories The Thing Around Your Neck.
Below is an interview in which Adichie discusses her writing and influences, most notably that of Chinua Achebe.
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Meet the Amazon Finalists
Amazon posted online today the finalists for its Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Contest (ABNA).
Anyone with an Amazon account can vote to choose their favorite excerpt. The finalist with the most votes will be the grand prize winner.
To browse the finalists’ excerpts, go to the ABNA finalists page and click on the link under the author’s photo. On the new page that opens, you will find a link to the author’s excerpt.
March 31, 2012
Independent Publishing and the Literary Novel
Most articles on the independent publishing of e-books are either about non-fiction or genre fiction. So I was pleased to come across this blog post by Christopher Meeks called “Marketing Your Literary Novel Through Independent Publishing.”
In summary, to successfully publish and market your literary novel yourself, Meeks says you need to:
Write a great novel “worthy of being published.”
Hire a good editor for $500-$2500. This is an investment, he says, in making the book the best it can be.
Hire one or two proofreaders after the editing is done. Friends can be used here.
Hire a graphic designer for the cover jacket. (Don’t judge a book by its cover…but we all do.)
Get reviews before you release the book. This can be a tricky step, especially if you’re a new author.
Promote your book. The end of Meeks’ blog outlines various strategies to do this.
Meek’s blog post is worth the read if you are a literary novelist; whether you are considering independent publishing or already have a traditional publisher and need tips on marketing strategies, you will find plenty of ideas there.
March 30, 2012
Amazon Contest Excerpts Now Available Online
Amazon has posted online the first few chapters of each of the quarter-finalists’ novels in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Contest (ABNA). My excerpt is the first two and half chapters of my novel The Primary Colours of a Self-Portrait.
There are many great entries in this contest. To browse some of the excerpts, go to the ABNA homepage and click on the genre that interests you under the “Quarterfinalists by Category” on the left sidebar.
To read any of the excerpts, you will need to click on the “Buy Now with 1-Click” button (they all cost $0.00 = free). You don’t need a Kindle reader as you can easily read the excerpts online in your browser or alternatively download them to your iPhone.
Happy reading!
