Toronto Reading Series

Golden Mean, Mistress of Nothing, Ice Lovers

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 14:34:00 +0000

OkOK so we're not great bloggers. Maybe cause we are great readers at TRS. So here we go ... a little catchup. We've been booking authors and reading like crazed book worms. First authors: Tues Jan 26 7:00 at Commensal resto on Elm b/w Bay and Yonge. Rev up those new year's resolutions with Rick Gallop and Joey Shulman along with two essayists from Edible City..very cool stuff. A foodie night for people who want to be healthy. Don't miss it. $5...Like the Toronto Star says, "Best deal in town"
More author news: We've lost Jan Wong 'til next fall (boo hoo) but great news is Joy Fielding is confirmed for May 25. She is one great dame...amazing woman...come meet her on May 25. Get new book signed...she is so much bloody fun.
Feb is all about Money Honey with lots of money tips from some pretty savvy people. Check out our listing at www.torontoreadingseries.com
OK: now for the reading part. Teddy Bearendson our money guru has just finished The Golden Mean.."bloody brilliant' he said. That is very high praise from Teddy let me tell you. Usually he shrugs when a book is terrific. Rose Bella our techno wiz loved the Ice Lovers "bad title...how could they create such a pathetic title for such a fantastic book. I loved it...it was amazing...I'm taking it to my book club for sure." The boss has finished Mistress of Nothing the GG winner - deservedly so. Pullinger is nuanced and subtle and very very smart. A wonderful wonderful story. "Get it."
Less than two months to spring...things are looking brighter already...we've gained more than 5 mins of daylight since equinox. Hey...every second counts.
TRS

Ian Brown, Catherine Gildiner & Michael Wex

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:06:00 +0000

WOW....what a fantastic start to TRS 2nd season. A sellout at Commensal Resto on Elm b/w Yonge and Bay. Ian Brown, Catherine Gildiner and Michael Wex broke our hearts and made us laugh. They talked about everything from flying collars to the human hearts longing for equality to narcotics and oral sex. Laughter rang out!
TRS takes December off (to eat and read natch) and returns with a bang Tuesday January 26. Get ready to get healthy with Rick Gallop the G.I. guy (G.I. would be glycemic index...how long foods 'stick to your ribs') Dr. Joey Shulman and Healthy Sin Foods along with the editors of The Edible City. Oh what fun we'll have. In the mean time if you are hungry for a terrific book event check out http://www.benmcnally.com/ for their 45 books in 45 Minutes.
Ben and his staff present their 45 top reads in 45 seconds...along with treats. It is great fun and you have to book your seat. Then walk up to Commensal for a tasty dinner and dessert http://www.commensal.ca/
In the meantime, buy books for gifts...they are a cheap and easy way to give hours and hours, years and years of pleasure. Think that spending $32 on a hardcover book is disgusting....stop being so bloody minded....how much would you spend on a concert seat? Food? What...for three or four hours of 'entertainment?" Now extrapolate the entertainment value of a book that costs $32. 00 over your life and the life of a book's impact on you....
Happy Holidays.....Happy Always
Toronto Reading Series Team

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:09:00 +0000

We're Back and Ready to Read!

Actually we've been reading like book worms all summer...when not in the garden! And now we are ready to launch Season Two! And great news: Classical 96.3fm is our media sponsor and Ben McNally is our bookseller. Both really 'get it' about literature, readings and how important books are to everything and everybody.

Tuesday November 24, 7:00 pm at Commensal Resto on Elm b/w Yonge & Bay.

Ian Brown, Catherine Gildiner and Michael Wex are teaming up to make a terrific opening night. Brown reads from his beautiful book The Boy in the Moon. In typical fashion, Brown will make you laugh, make you think and take your breath away! Catherine Gildner then takes the mike with her wonderful and poignant After the Falls. It's Buffalo and Catherine crashing through the '60's...you can't miss this! After intermission, Michael Wex tells us all we need to know about How To Be A Mentsh. We LOVE Wex's attitude: everyday presents endless possibilities for happy living.

Of course, an essential component to happy living is attending the Toronto Reading Series. Our opening night is sure to set the pace for a terrific season which will feature Dr. Joey Schulmann, Anne Michaels and Jan Wong just to name a few!

Want our e- brochure? Why not! Just email readings@torontoreadingseries.com AND: two complimentary tickets with every request received before November 10! Hey, what's not to like?

Toronto Reading Series Readers

Summer Reading!

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 09:01:00 +0000

Launch Year Raving Success
WOW: what a year! Toronto Reading Series opened on a very (very) cold night in November and closed it's first year on a sultry summer evening in June. Every reading was brilliant with entertaining, fun and informative authors reading with vibrancy, wit and enthusiasm. Our special event was indeed special with Eric Siblin and Tim Dawson chatting away about all things Bach and the 'stein way' method of dating musical manuscripts! Hahahaha!

As requested and as promised we are including here the TRS Summer Reading List. Naturally you can pick up your copies of any of these books at the beautiful Ben McNally Books on Bay at Richmond.

The Children’s Story
A.S Byatt

Possession
A.S. Byatt

Stone’s Fall
Iain Pears

February
Lisa Moore

Origin of Species
Nino Ricci

Little Bee
Chris Cleave

Laura Rider’s Masterpiece
Jane Hamilton

The Maze of Cadiz
Aly Monroe

The Secret Speech
Tom Rob Smith

Between the Assassinations
Aravind Adiga

The Little Stranger
Sarah Waters

Brooklyn
Colm Toibin

The Lieutenant
Kate Grenville

The Angel’s Game
Carlos Ruiz Zafon

February
Lisa Moore

Fugitive Pieces
Anne Michaels

Tell Ben that the Toronto Reading Series sent you.....have a great reading summer and see you November 24, 2009, 7:00pm at Commensal for our second season opener!
Tune in to Classical 96.3fm too! They are our brand new media sponsor....and will be featuring our authors in interviews, online coverage and more!

TRS Team

Season Finale

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Thu, 28 May 2009 16:00:00 +0000

Our first season is quickly coming to a close....we are overwhelmed by the response to our readings in our launch year. Fantastic. Heart felt thanks to the authors and their publicists who contributed and participated.
This week, we held our special event and special it was. Eric Siblin author of The Cello Suites from House of Anansi, spoke eloquently and enthusiastically about his journey into the world of Bach, Pablo Casals and classical music. He was authentic and inspiring. Tim Dawson from the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and founder of the Toronto Bach Consort joined Eric in conversation following Eric's reading. They spoke for an hour together and could easily have continued for another couple. It was a great evening.
A special thanks to Ben McNally (www.benmcnallybooks) owner of Canada's most beautiful book store on Bay, steps from Richmond. He gets it.
Our last event is June 23 2009 presenting Andrea Gunraj, Shani Mootoo and Emily Schultz reading from their new works....check our website. It will be a great evening and a great way to head into summer!
Watch for our kick off in September!
Over the coming months TRS staffers will be gardening, reading and generally loving life.
We hope you do too!
TRS Group

TRS Take on Canada Reads

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 11:49:00 +0000

So we've had a week or so to digest Canada Reads. First we admit at TRS that we did not catch every syllable of the discussions. Ghomeshi was very good, asking good questions that we hope every book club member in the nation was taking note of to enliven their club discussions! One of our fav questions was "What did you learn from this work...about yourself, Canada....humanity." At TRS we like the Canadian slant as we are staunch flag wavers.

Sarah Slean: Sarah Sarah....were you serious in the heat of your defense, did you really mean that 'literature isn't always pleasure" ?????Sarah Sarah....get you to our readings! What is not pleasureable about fine literature: the subtle, seductive use of language, the pleasure of following an unpredictably well crafted plot, the careful rendering of a credible character, the masterful management of original metaphor describing that character, the range of emotions evoked by the printed word on the page....if you don't find that in what you are reading, you are not reading literature....no wonder you don't find pleasure!

Let's talk about solemnity. There is indeed a solemnity to literature as there is to all great art and it is the solemnity that comes with the admiration spawned by a reaching work of art: an expression of humanity in a full and beautiful form - say, a novel. A work of art that reaches into our cores, our souls and our hearts and challenges us as humans to be better. At TRS we call it the "oh man" factor as we shake our heads in wonder over the achievemt wrought by an author when you arrive at the end of a novel. Even the saddest story, the darkest tale, the epic tear-jerker can bring intense pleasure in the reading of it because of the art of its expression. The ending may disappoint, the characters enrage, the ideas disgust, but the language and the metaphor, the plot and its higher purpose of revealing a little of the human condition always brings pleasure...the pleasure of reflection and what it can forge in the human heart. The pleasure of reading - the pleasure of hearing, albeit in our heads, a human story. The pleasure of reading a story fully expressed.

Third Event and More To Come

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 19:06:00 +0000

TRS' third event was hosted last night and what a night it was. It was pegged An Evening Of Peril and wow...that's what it was. John Geiger started us off with reading and speaking about his incredible new work The Third Man Factor. He talked about how individuals when in great peril, under life threatening stress find comfort and wise encouragement in a presence that presents itself to guide the individual to calm and safety. Over and over again Geiger has heard of this phenomenon, the first time when researching his work on Shackleton who himself experienced just such a powerful force when trapped on the polar ice. The book is quite beautifully written with simple but powerful prose and a very important book to have on your shelf. It might also make an inspiring gift for a pal or peer who is going through a rough time. A reminder that we are never alone if we allow our strength to speak.

Geiger's pal and fellow explorer Ken Mcgoogan took the podium with his latest Race to the Polar Sea, a fabulous adventure story about Elisha Kent Kane. What a presentation! WOW....this guy has energy to burn! His enthusiasm for the north and his subject matter is unflagging. His inspiring excitement about Canada's north began as a young boy after reading Jack London's tales and meeting that famous literary creature White Fang. He told the sold out audience how he stumbled upon a lost journal of Elisha Kent Kane in a small antiquarian book shop up the road from the famous Glen Bow Museum. Like a kid in a candy shop would explain his expression even as he retold us of that discovery. All we can say at TRS is that we each picked up a copy of Race to the Polar Sea and all Blackberrys are currently going unnoticed.

Andrew Pyper brought us back to the mire of downtown Toronto in his fantastic thriller The Killing Circle. Talk about peril! His character is in a slow and definite downward spiral as he very nearly loses himself in grief. He makes decision after decision that leaves the reader growing increasingly worried about the guy and increasingly puzzled trying to figure out how Pyper is going to pull it all together. But pull it all together he does and what a smashing ending. All we can say, is get it.

Now, onto April! Tuesday April 28 at 7:00 have we got a stellar lineup again! Giles Blunt reading from his new literary work Breaking Lorca. Confident enough to leave behind his detective fiction, Blunt has written a terrifying retelling of crimes against humanity. Provocative, powerful, poignant - Blunt has got it all, done it all. This is an important book that needs to be read by anybody currently concerned about the state of the human condition.

Kim Echlin: you loved (loved) Dagmar's Daughter and her elephants. Now for something completely different. The Disappeared is love in the killing fields of Cambodia...love and its ghosts. Once again powerful and poignant, Echlin's writing approaches poetry and her descriptions are truly breath taking. We are so looking forward to Echlin taking the podium.

Closing the evening is Absent by Sherri Vanderveen. This is an honest and clear-eyed look at a father who abandons his family following a horrific event that scars everybody. He returns to find their lives in ashes each having found a distinct and distinctively destructive way to deal with his absence. But will they be able to forgive while never being able to forget. A very very compelling family drama.

SO, there's the lineup for April! What's not to like? Get your $5.00 tickets at Commensal Resto on Elm b/w YOnge and Bay or at Ryerson U Bookstore. We've sold out every event so act sooner than later.

Spring is closer than you think!
TRS Group

The Third Man Factor

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 02:19:00 +0000

Good news and bad news in this post! Bad news is that Sally Amstrong is not able to join us. The TRS team wants to encourage to get your hands on her new book Bitter Roots, Tender Shoots. It is such an inspiring read....do it.
Good news now: John Geiger, adventurer, explorer, great writer, terrific speaker is joining the TRS on February 17. This you don't want to miss. His new book is The Third Man Factor. What a read! In this work, Geiger explores interior terrain and talks to many people famous and ordinary about moments of extreme anxiety, stress, or peril and how a presence arrived to comfort them. Sometimes female, sometimes male, sometimes simply a calming comforting presence, the 'third man' gives them the strength, power, inspiration to continue. This is an awesome read and so, so beautifully written. It is not about conversion but something else. Something else completely.
Ken McGoogan, pal of John Geiger is reading from his Race to the Polar Sea. What a terrific tale he tells of a dashing romantic Victorian hero who travels to our far north on a rescue mission. Breaking a few hearts along the way, disaster awaits that only adds to his enduring mystique.
Andrew Pyper wraps up the evening with his novel The Killing Circle. His sexy young character, a man in peril of losing himself in grief, struggles to stay connected. It becomes complicated when he joins a writer's circle and the bodies start piling up. A fantastic, slightly scarey read.
Come in out of the cold and meet these three powerhouse authors all in one evening.....how can you resist? Get your tickets at Ryerson U bookstore or Commensal Resto then be there at 7:00pm for an amazing evening of adventure, risk and redemption. Or, just call 905 271 9917 and reserve your seats.
Oh: remember Ryerson Book Store is giving some pretty hefty discounts on our readers' books! Just show your ticket at the store or buy the night of the reading and get your copy personally signed. How great is that?

Toronto Reading Series Team

Head to Toe

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 12:45:00 +0000

It's never too late to say it: Happy New Year!
We are really looking forward to January reading. Tuesday the 27th promises to be very interesting with some dynamic readers presenting very different POV's and strategies for feeling your best, thinking your best and being your best. The evening begins with Jen McLagan who has received mondo press for her gorgeous book Fat: An Appreciation. Part philosopher, part chef, part terrific writer, Jen has presented a highly readable tome with luscious recipes and stunning but simple photography. If you want to remodel your kitchen in these hard times, just buy Jen's book Tuesday night and set it on your kitchen counter....ta-daaa....kitchen remodeled into a chic, modern and charminlgy intellectual space! How easy is that?
Patricia Pearson is the funniest woman in Canada and we at TRS dare anybody to defy that! Witty, quick and piercing are the words we use to describe her humour and overall everyday approach to life and living. AND: compassionate. Her latest work A Brief History of Anxiety is an important read for anybody in the deep mid-winter. Pearson makes us laugh and thus forgive ourselves for all manner of quirks and foibles. She has looked into history for lessons from elders and searched the past and our ancestors to learn better and more constructive ways to manage modern-day anxiety. A meaningful and important volume.
The evening closes with the ever evervescent Bryce Wylde, frequent flyer on CityTV and CBC radio and tv. He gives nutrition personality and good looks and manages to make vegetables very sexy. His new work The Antioxidant Prescription helps you use food to rid your body of toxins and troubles. His work is insightful and inspiring.
TRS has you covered in January: from head to toe, you'll leave our Commensal reading feeling terrific. What's not to like?
See you Tuesday January 27 at 7:00pm sharp, Commensal Resto on Elm...look for the red awning.
TRS Team

Sold Out Reading

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 17:10:00 +0000

It was a cold and stormy night, but that did not daunt our audience: We were sold out! Thank you all who made our November 18 launch such a success. Edeet Ravel and David Rotenberg were hits! Sadly Scott Bakker was ill, but writer-pal and reading attendee Caitlin Sweet read for him...now that's a friend in deed! Books were flying off Ryerson's sales table and we suspect that many Christmas shopping lists were considerably shortened last night. A great success, a great launch.

Now into the future: Our three authors for January 27 reading are set and ready to go. Chef Jennifer Mclagan will be speaking about her delicious new book Fat: An appreciation. She has received some heavy media attention on this, so come out and hear what she has to say. Next up will be Dr. Bryce Wylde...you know the guy....you've seen his good lookin' mug on Breakfast Television. He is the nutritionist with personality. His new book The Antioxidant Prescription hits the shelves late December so TRS is one of his first stops. Come and learn how to easily get that holiday waist back into shape and feel terrific all over.

Finally we welcome the hilarious, witty and always clever Patricia Pearson. Her new book A Brief History of Anxiety rounds out the evening, giving us lots of fun and easy ideas on how to beat the January blaaahs and erase anxiety from our lives. Pearson, a Stephen Leacock Humour Award Winner (and also granddaughter to one of Canada's finest and most famous PM's) has that unique ability to look at the human condition with compassion and humour.

Remember, our first event sold out...we were packed! Don't miss out...get your tickets early from Commensal or from our terrific sponsor Ryerson University Bookstores.

Buy books for Christmas and be sure to get a couple for yourself....

TRS Group

IFOA

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 12:59:00 +0000

Recovered from International Festival of Authors...as always fantastic. We at TRS have been frequent flyers at IFOA since its inception in the days of Greg Gatenby, the founder. Thus, we notice subtle changes to formats and offerings. We are not sure we like 5 or 6 authors set into one reading event that lasts 2 hours. It also provides individual attendees scheduling problems and missed readings. While there are more authors, there is less choice yet your exposure is increased. A wash, a toss-up! We imagine this is a budgetary decision as fewer rooms need to be used. Gatenby, while always controversial, was quite correct when he said "The mind cannot absorb more than the bum can endure." Five authors is too many. Four is a push, three is comfortable. We take notes at the readings and the round tables but the readings are becoming too much of a blurrrrrrrrrr. We can't keep track of who wrote what (and argue about it afterwards while scrambling for our programmes.) Eschewing the organizing principal of 'themes' (boring but they do bring unity to a reading and are a temptation to which TRS has fallen) IFOA did a 'mash up' approach putting urban lit with historic fiction. Juxtapositioning was interesting at first but then felt too incongruous and a little jarring.

The round tables (discussions) were all fantastic with great moderators. The moderators were enthusiastic, well informed, well read but needed more coaching on how to balance each writer's contribution. A few were dominated by the loudest/funniest voice. While this can be entertaining, it is difficult to watch 'quieter' less effusive authors shrink into the shadows.

Speaking of shadows: TRS is a reading series that is small and intimate. The readers can see the authors and the authors can see the readers!

Talk soon.

Real Book Clubs

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 01:23:00 +0000

The Toronto Reading Series Group love to talk about book clubs. Every member of TRS belongs to very different bookclubs. SJ, our creative power source, belongs to a book club where it is reported they are learning how to drink and read at the same time. Hil is a long time member of a club that moves from resto to resto. All report that they read way too many sad and serious books and that often that night's 'leader' is totally unprepared thus often feel disappointed. We're thinking there has to be a better way. Thus, TRS all read with great fascination about a book club known in the Globe and Mail as Blythe Book Clubs (no website but email at blythebookclubs@sympatico.ca... we kind of like this no website for a book club thing....glad they're too busy reading books to do website stuff) Yes...back to the book club. We spied an advert for it in the Globe and Mail National Personals...always an interesting read on a Saturday a.m. .. this club seems to be dedicated to reading books that inspire "laughing and thinking" and it is catered. We like that part a lot. Years ago we recall hearing Ian Brown literati bon vivant, talk about how important humour was to literature and life and writing and the arts (especially important to ordinary Canadians who love the arts) We were wondering if this bookclub was connected to him in any way....hmmm. TRS shall investigate Blythe Book Clubs a bit further...sounds to tempting to allow to lie fallow.
The Donna Morrissey read earned the weekend book of the month award. Way to go Donna. Watership Down remains a solid read, particularly given our current eco debates. Green shift...pay now or pay later. It's the same thing as public education - try life without it.
Best
TRS Group

Book Talk

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 22:31:00 +0000

Today launched a new CBC Radio One afternoon programme: The Next Chapter. It started in great style: Shelagh Rogers is back as the host in relaxed and intelligent conversations with authors, readers, bookstore people and all those 'ordinary Canadians' who love literature, reading and books. Rogers, has learned, if we may say so, the art of the pause in an interview... giving the subject time to think, to reflect on the questions. Her colleague Wachtel is a Pause Artiste. It makes for very very meaningful radio. The opener with Donna Morrissey was terrific as they drove around Donna's childhood haunts in Newfoundland. The conversation was authentic and spontaneous. Listening to Morrissey as she moved in her memories was poignant and meaningful: I kept thinking - no wonder this person became a writer. By the way, The Globe and Mail ran a review today written by De Soto on her latest novel What They Wanted. One of the TRS group has just started it and is reportedly loving the voice. De Soto gushed to put it mildly. Morrissey teaches at Memorial U when not writing (probably still can't make enough $$$ writing in Canada which is not an unusual story. More on this later.) and thus will not be with the TRS this fall...but stay tuned. We're still hoping.
Rogers also interviewed Richard Florida who spoke about his new work Who's Your City? Gee, it sure was a darn pity that old blue (snake) eyes himself Stephen Harper had not been part of that conversation. Richard Florida spoke about the cultural economy and how that defines where people choose to live and how that defines where the economy grows. Not the other way around, Stephen. But then, I am just an ordinary Canadian, so what do I know??? I do know that Florida writes just as he speaks: with an ease and passion that engage you immediately.
What a pleasure The Next Chapter is. Perfect for a Saturday afternoon. Looking forward to many more. Well done CBC, Rogers et al.
Returning to that new phrase "Ordinary Canadian." Give a listen to the latest on Jian Ghomeshi show, Q also on CBC Radio One. Check out his pod cast from Wednesday September 24 and Thursday September 25. Great discussions about the cultural economy and cultural infrastructure (love that term) regarding the short sighted, wrong headed, philistine-like tax cuts to the arts. Very very interesting arguments and engaging listening.
TRS people are tucked in for a rainy weekend with our books: Shanghai, What they Wanted and Watership Down.
More to come...
TRS Group (we're a group, not a team...we don't wear uniforms or big sox, chant or throw things. We don't view life, work, anything as a win or lose game. It's all life...or Life)

Authors Authors Authors

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 02:19:00 +0000

The Toronto Reading Series is excited to announce their fall lineup.
Tuesday November 18 at Commensal Restaurant the Toronto Reading Series celebrates and explores friendship in all its shapes and guises over the centuries.
We open the evening with R. Scott Baker's thriller Neuropathy (Penguin Canada) And what a tale of terror it is. Two friends reunite to discover that their careers have taken strange and frightening twists that strain the friendship and test the moral strengths of each man. Surprising, terrifying and all too credible.
Then Giller Nominee Edeet Ravel joins us to read from Your Sweet Eyes and Unforgettable Mouth.(Penguin Canada) When two young women meet at a cleaners they learn that they share much history, but as their friendship deepens, they come to discover that their interpretation of that history is very different. Will their friendship bear the pressure of these differences. A moving and deeply poignant exploration of what a friendship means in the light of the past that shapes it.
The evening will close with the latest blockbuster from David Rotenberg, Shanghai (Penguin Canada) This is without doubt, the perfect read for a chilly fall weekend by a roaring fire. Two rival families tumble through history unaware that their children will shape one of the greatest cities in the world, Shanghai.
The Toronto Reading Series is off to a terrific start.
Tickets are just $5.00 for the evening...an event not to be missed.
Get your tickets at Commensal or Ryerson U bookstore...where you can pick up your novels for signing.

Pop back here again for detailed backgrounders on our authors' previous works and reviews.
Toronto Reading Series - Enlightened Entertainment

Welcome

noreply@blogger.com (Toronto Reading Series) — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 17:03:00 +0000

Welcome to the Toronto Reading Series - enlightened entertainment.
We bring great authors to great restaurants for great readers....like you!
Toronto Reading Series launch season begins November 18 at 7:00pm at the beautiful and delicious Commensal Restaurant...entrance off Elms Streeet, right between Bay and Yonge.
And there is free parking!! How great is that - great food, great authors, and all within easy reach.
Welcome!
The Toronto Reading Series