The Geek and the Giant. A visit to Cathedral Grove.

I’ve been on Vancouver Island for about five days and will be here for another week. The primary reason I’m on the Island is to guest host All Points West on CBC Radio 1, filling in for the regular host Jo-Ann Roberts. The show airs Monday – Friday 3pm – 6pm on CBC Radio 1 and can be heard everywhere in BC except Vancouver.

This past weekend I tagged along on my wife’s Vancouver Island tour to celebrate our first anniversary, hitting Tofino (thanks to everyone at Sobo Restaurant, the Middle Beach Lodge, and the Tofino Legion for treating us so well) and then to the Waverley Hotel in the little town of Cumberland, which resembles a kind of West Coast Deadwood.

This week, I’ll be doing two book events on the Island: on Monday May 16, I’ll be at Bolen Books at the Hillside Shopping Centre at 7pm for a signing, reading, and Q + A. On Friday, I’ll be at Volume One Books in Duncan at 8pm for an event that will include a reading, slideshow, Q + A, signing, and short movie.

Hope to see you!

You may recall a few weeks ago, upon my first trip to the Desolation Sound cabin this year, that I made good on a promise I made to a friendly fellow named James. James attended a Calgary book event for Adventures in Solitude back in January, presenting me with a bottle of moonshine that he had brought from his home on Prince Edward Island. I in turn promised him that I would complete the moonshine’s cross country opus by bringing the bottle of white lightning with me to Desolation Sound. Above is the video proof.

Moonshine receives reoccurring mentions in my book, as it was the Desolation Sound contraband of choice for many years. Thanks very much to James from PEI for the firewater! I have enough to last me the rest of the summer, and the tiny bit I sipped in this video, and three more subsequent swigs, made me wonky for the next couple hours.

With the gang from Harbour Publishing

It will be a long time before I forget the week of April 17 – 22, 2011. Several of my favourite passions collided, including my hockey team the Flying Vees winning our division championship, my other favourite team the Canucks going up 3-0 in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and the BC Book Awards last night.

Everything but the Canucks has worked out pretty well so far.

The BC Book Awards was held at the Kay Meek Centre, a sparkling new theatre located not only in my hometown, but actually attached to my old high school, West Van Secondary (I went to both Hillside and West Van highs).

Before I even arrived at the theatre, a few signs pointed to possible good things ahead. A listener/reader/fan in Newfoundland tweeted me her new tattoo: “Amor Fati”, the credo of Russell the Hermit in Adventures in Solitude, meaning love your fate.

A few minutes after 7pm, my inbox was flooded with people from across the country saying that Ron McLean, host of Hockey Night In Canada, had given huge pre-game shout outs to Said the Whale, my wife Jill and her new album Mischievous Moon, and to me! Outrageous! Sadly, the only full moon over the Canucks game would be that ominous “0” on the scoreboard…

But those random acts of ink and kindness boded well at the BC Book Awards, when the last award of the night was read for the Bill Duthie Booksellers’ Choice Award for the BC Book of the Year… and Adventures in Solitude won!

The certificate says “Adventures in Solitude merits distinction as the most outstanding work published in BC this year in the opinion of the judges of the BC Book Awards”.

Since I was in my old high school I made sure to thank my favourite creative writing teacher Mr. Weinberg, (“if a book isn’t good after the first 50 pages, toss it… and somebody flip the Pink Floyd record, please?!”) and my favourite English teacher Mrs. Martin.  Also, Harbour Publishing, all of the incredible bookstores across BC and Canada who have been so supportive of this book, as well as my family, my wife, all my friends at CBC, and all of you for your unbelievable kindness.

I’ll be celebrating on Savary Island this weekend. Happy Easter!