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In Stray Bullets, Robert Rotenberg takes the reader to a snowy November evening. Outside a busy downtown doughnut shop, gunshots ring out and a young boy is critically hurt. Soon Detective Ari Greene is on scene. How many shots were fired? How many guns? How many witnesses?

With grieving parents and a city hungry for justice, the pressure is on to convict the man accused of this horrible crime. Against this tidal wave of indignation, defense counsel Nancy Parish finds herself defending her oldest and most difficult client.

But does anyone know the whole story?

Stray Bullets is Robert Rotenberg’s third intricate mystery set on the streets and in the courtrooms of Toronto.

PRAISE FOR STRAY BULLETS

~ “Rotenberg knows his criminal law and is intimately familiar with how the Canadian legal system works. But he never forgets that characters come first.” ~ Sarah Weinman, National Post

~ “[Rotenberg] delivers the real goods in his new book.” ~ Toronto Star

~ “Rotenberg really knows how to build legal suspense.” ~ The Globe & Mail

NOTE FROM  THE AUTHOR

I really can’t remember a time when I wasn’t thinking of stories, then writing them. When I was seven years old, my oldest brother got a portable typewriter for his Bar Mitzvah. I was transfixed by it. I would sneak into his room and use it. And I read everything on the bookshelves of my two very smart older brothers.

When I was 15, I sent a short story to The New Yorker magazine. (I kept the rejection letter, on their letterhead no less, for years.) I wrote my first film script the next year.

After studying English literature at University of Toronto, I took a year off to drive cab (my Razor’s Edge phase), hang out and write a book. I drove, I partied, I went to Europe and I think wrote a line or two in a journal. At law school I spent most of my time in the free legal clinic, doing criminal cases, rarely going to class. The writing faded.

After I was called to the bar, desperate to get out of Toronto – and avoid being a lawyer – I went to the London School of Economics to get a masters degree in International Law, and managed to travel all over Europe on various scholarships.

Back in Canada, I finished my bar exams and nine days later hopped on a plane to Paris, where I became the managing editor of an English-language magazine, Passion, The Magazine of Paris. I turned 30 in Paris, living in a tiny basement apartment, working insane hours, with almost no money – a recurring theme in my life.

I had this plan to start a magazine in Toronto, came home and, with a partner, created and published T.O. The Magazine of Toronto.

Read an INTERVIEW with the author of Stray Bullets

Visit Robert Rotenberg’s WEBSITE   

Read the FIRST CHAPTER

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If you are a registered reader and this book appeals to you contact us by midnight, Tuesday, May 22, 2012 and ask to be entered in the draw.

We randomly select a winner from those responses and will post the winner’s name in the list of book recipients on May 24th.  Please use your registered email address, and send your request to: bookclubbuddybooks@gmail.com  This is the only address from which names are drawn.

PRODUCT DETAILS
Touchstone, May 2012
Hardcover, 304 pages
ISBN-10: 1451642350
ISBN-13: 9781451642353

Text used with permission  © 2012 Simon & Schuster Canada and Robert Rotenberg

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Curious about all the hype surrounding 50 Shades of Grey, by E.L. James, I recently bought the book. How unfortunate that I did not ask for a  review copy instead. I could have bought lunch, or at least coffee and a bagel, with the 18 bucks I wasted. This is not a positive review, and it contains numerous expletives, mostly quoted from the novel. So if you dislike negative reviews and curse words, please move on.

Also, my preference is for literary fiction, so please bear that in mind. After all, no one has ever suggested that 50 Shades of Grey is great writing. Nonetheless, I was surprised at just how dreadful the writing is. By any standard, it is only slightly better than all those unedited 99 cent novels cluttering up Amazon of late.

The hype surrounding this book is much ado about nada. Great for Ms. James, and I’m always happy to see another writer hit the jackpot, but please, this is the breakout novel of the year? Really?

50 Shades of Grey is a very long romance novel that uses the promise of sex—in this case dominance and submission—as its hook and then delivers the Disney version of the “playroom” and what goes on inside it.

For sex scenes to be interesting, the plot and characterization need to have a bit of depth, and this story is so shallow that were it a puddle I could walk through and not get my soles wet. No sex happens at all until a quarter of the way through the book, and at least this creates some welcome tension. Holding off on the sex is a nice bit of foreplay for readers, who will likely be itchy for the characters to just get on with it, for heavens sake.

When the couple—Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey—(surrounded often by steel grey colours, no less) finally have sex, readers will be eager and forgiving if only because the plot has finally advanced.

But holy crap! Christian doesn’t make love; he f**ks. Hard. Or so he says. Holy shit, thinks Ana. That sounds so … hot. When she finally sees the playroom, “Holy crap,” and “Holy shit,” progress to “Holy f**k!” All these expletives associated with the word “Holy” and it’s easy to understand why the book has been banned in several southern US states.

And still readers must wait for the first sex scene as we learn in detail about the leather and wood, polished with a lemon scent—very pleasant—and the lighting—soft and subtle. We learn the colours of the walls and ceilings, and how the floor is old varnished wood.

At last Ana’s eyes move to the huge wooden cross on one wall, and as if to mess further with the christian right, she then notes the cuffs attached to each corner. This single artifact could be the subject of a religious studies dissertation, but we’re far from that level of intellect.

Inexplicably, Ana finds the whole medieval picture soft and romantic. She hesitantly touches the flogger. After a few more “holy f**ks” and numerous “ughs” while reviewing a contract—that a sensible idea, at least—Ana predictably admits she is a virgin, and poor Grey is at a loss.

“May God forgive me,” he says, groaning. Because he’s such a nice guy, he cannot now f**k her hard but must instead “make love” to her. Oh my, what a major complication!

Then follows a somewhat decent sex scene—plenty of foreplay, with none of the dreaded “throbbing members” or “steaming holes” one might expect given the quality of the writing. Instead, thankfully, James opts for the correct anatomical terms.

She does use the word “backside” numerous times, which struck me as ridiculous given the other choices, noted above.

I am reminded of a day last week, when I used the word “A-hole,” for what is possibly the first time in my life. Its use was neither convincing nor satisfying, and as soon as the word left my mouth to hang in the air, I wished I had cut loose a little, gone whole hog, and had chosen “asshole” instead. Similarly I think that given the nature of the text, discussing Ana’s ass would be much more in keeping with the tone of the story than the numerous references to her “backside.”

Aside from this oversight and quite a lot of “groaning,” I would argue that this first sex scene is the best in the book. From a writerly perspective it:

• Raises tension by building slowly, in real time
• Uses all the senses as they touch, smell, taste, hear, and see each other in the most intimate ways
• Plays to several known fantasies, both male and female, dominant and submissive
• Mostly avoids cheesy terminology
• Is explicit enough to send a bit of blood surging in readers
• Lasts long enough for readers to feel involved

All the sex scenes after this one are repetitious, right down to the way Ana thinks Holy f**k! and numerous times shatters into a million pieces beneath Christian. To be fair, for variety, she sometimes only shatters into a thousand pieces.

Readers are introduced to a bit of light bondage, some spanking, a harness, and a few other toys, none of it interesting as presented.

The book has mildly erotic moments, different I assume for each reader, and Ms. James covers the gamut, in the tamest way possible, so that nothing ever feels threatening, and everything remains in fantasyland.

The fact that most readers will remain undisturbed by the content is likely part of the appeal. Ana can negotiate her contract with Grey, she has a “safe word,” she is curious and game for anything, and yet she remains feisty and will paricipate only when she chooses to.

In this way, she is not the best submissive, perhaps, but romance readers can close the book feeling happy and safe, nothing in their world shattered into a million pieces. Or even a thousand.  Mission accomplished on the author’s part.

I suspect that E.L. James meets the expectations of the genre. She introduces something a bit different, something not everyone knows about, and then she keeps it soft enough that no one is likely to be offended. Except the religious right. And those of us who value exquisite language, original characters, and a good plot.

Still, I wish I’d written it. I’d be writing this on my new yacht, while taking a break from the press, and from concerns about how to invest five million dollars plus.

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The book trailer for The Bone Cage, by Angie Abdou, is long at almost six and a half minutes, but it’s so much fun that it doesn’t seem long at all. Angie says that the funniest part of filming was when her  5-year-old son asked in a women’s store: “Excuse me, we need some women’s lingerie. It’s for my friend Paul Ragusa. We’re making a movie.”

The Bone Cage is about Digger, an 85 kilo wrestler, and Sadie, a 26-year-old speed swimmer, on the verge of winning a gold medal at the Olympics just as both near the end of their careers. Each confronts the question: what happens to athletes when they’re too old compete? As Digger and Sadie become involved in a relationship numerous obstacles test their ambition and loyalties.

“The Bone Cage captures the physicality, sensuality, and euphoric highs of amateur sport, and the darker, cruel side of sport programs that wear athletes down and spit them out at the end of their bloom. With realism and humour, author Angie Abdou captures athletes on the brink of that transition—the lead-up to that looming redefinition of self—and explores how people deal with the loss of their dream.”

About your Book

What do you think readers will find most notable about Untitled Child?


Nancy Jo Cullen: When I was writing the book I was trying very hard to take an honest look at my experience of addiction and mental illness, both as a witness and codependent.  I hope that readers feel this book is a confession of sorts without being either melodramatic or romantic.

I imagine that this book must have been a difficult book to write in many ways. Do you have any anecdotes you’re willing to relate about either the writing process or the book’s reception?

Nancy Jo Cullen: At first it was very easy to write the book. It was really about an outpouring for me. Of course, as I realized it was really a book then I had to think about it as a reader and a writer.  I took a lot out.  I didn’t want anything in the book that smacked of self pity. I was very, very nervous at the launch.  I was really afraid that people would think it was an exercise in navel gazing but I’ve had a really positive response to the book, including, and maybe most importantly, from my partner’s family, who have been very supportive.

Did writing this book open any new doors for you?

Nancy Jo Cullen: I think each creative venture opens new doors.  It takes the mind in new directions.  What followed this book was the feeling of a need to take a hiatus from poetry and so it led me to writing short fiction, which is more like poetry than one might think. And it has been very fun to work on stories.

Can you suggest one question readers might find interesting to discuss, concerning you, your writing in general, or Untitled Child?


Nancy Jo Cullen: I was thinking of the writing of confessional poets when I was working on Untitled Child, particularly the work of Anne Sexton, who wrote frankly about her own madness. Perhaps if readers are familiar with her work they might consider where my work falls in this spectrum.

How can readers help you promote this book?

Nancy Jo Cullen: They can buy it.  And ask their libraries for it.  And tell their friends to buy it.

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About You

Why do you write?


Nancy Jo Cullen: I write because I always have and so it seems now I can’t really be happy if I don’t.

What is your greatest strength as a writer?


Nancy Jo Cullen: I like to write about things that are simultaneously funny and terrible. I think that could be the strength of my work.

What quality do you most value in yourself?


Nancy Jo Cullen: My sense of humour.

What quality do you most admire in others?

Nancy Jo Cullen: Emotional stability.  And humour.

In addition to writing, what else are you passionate about?

Nancy Jo Cullen: Not much.  Well, eating. I like good wine too. Sometimes I knit. I like my kids too. And my partner. And our dogs. I’m even passionate about my cat.

What are you most proud of accomplishing so far in your life?


Nancy Jo Cullen: Four years ago my kids and I packed up our life in Calgary and came to Toronto.  I completed an MFA (without having an undergraduate degree) and we basically started over. In that time I’ve written a collection of short stories, several new poems, began a novel and fallen passionately in love. I just turned 50.  I hope my kids will take away the lesson that the best time to begin again is any time.

Is there any new or established author whom you feel deserves more attention, and what is it that strikes you about his or her work?

Nancy Jo Cullen: I think Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer is a terrific writer.  She has three books published by Comorant Books.  Her writing is really gritty and sometimes raunchy.  Her characters are strong and experience the world very physically. I think she writes in a way very few Canadian women are writing and I find it really exciting to read her work.

Read more about Untitled Child

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In her third collection of poems, Untitled Child, Nancy Jo Cullen once again turns her questing and multidimensional mind to the nature of madness, addiction, impermanence and loss. This confessional collection takes an unflinching look at the path of a life’s destruction to create a harrowing chronicle of bereavement.

In 2006 Nancy Jo Cullen’s life partner died after a long struggle with mental illness and addiction. Untitled Child examines the trajectory of the end of the marriage between the two women and the author tries to understand her role in a series of painful events.

Untitled Child is part memoir, part rant and part lament as Cullen examines the rage, grief and surprise about the terrible havoc that addiction can reap on a life.

Praise for Untitled Child 

Reading Cullen’s poems is a little like drinking booze. Definitely not wine, because it’s not all that genteel, and not beer, because it’s not all that commonplace, but hard liquor because it’s edgy, fast-acting, more than a little disorienting and frequently mixed with something sweet…Cullen understands how we are entertained by our emotions, and this poetry is trained like a laser scope on our limbic systems. – Globe & Mail

Excerpt

Bad Hair Day

That coroner fucked with your hair
left you, cold, odd and stuffed in a box
in the condition and quality of being deceased
you made a strange package
chin tucked like a new shirt sleeve
style clearly immaterial to the act of dissection
anyway, it’s not as though pretty would have solved the problem of your corpse

On television the dead are perfectly lit
easy faces framed by chic cuts
those styling cadavers couldn’t foretell
the greased hair pushed from your brow
after all those thousands of dollars you spent at the salon

Today I loaded your boxes into the car
the material verification that you once lived
that we fought and loved
these books and towels, these t-shirts and glasses
this stuff of your life has left me weak
now it will become the good bargain of someone else’s trip to the thrift store

I am keeping your hair cream

Read an INTERVIEW with Nancy Jo Cullen

Untitled Child, Nancy Jo Cullen, Poetry
Publisher: Frontenac House, 2009
ISBN 978-1-897181-27-0, 80 pages
Paperback, 6″ x9″, $15.95

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The Uninvited Guests by Sadie Jones

Publisher: Knopf Canada
Paperback, 272 pages
ISBN: 978-0-307-40253-0 (0-307-40253-3)

All their preparations had been in vain. Emerald’s birthday celebrations had begun in confusion and disarray. She cast about for something sensible to say, something that would reassure her mother and friends that an hospitable timetable would be re-established, and was about to suggest the library, and tea, when she halted, arrested in movement like a musical statue.

Text © 2012 Random House of Canada Limited

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About Western Taxidermy

What do you think readers will find most notable about this book?

Barb Howard: Because the stories were written over two decades, I think readers will find variety, in topic and tone and characters, in this book. Much of the writing was prompted by my observations during the time I aged from 30 to 50 years old.  A lot happens during that time! For me, it was a period I started as a single lawyer, then moved through raising kids and working as a teacher/editor stage, then started arcing into nonfiction interests and an empty nester life. I believe the writing, as a whole, reflects all this.

Have you acquired any good anecdotes surrounding this book? If so, could you share one?

Barb Howard: The book has a fabulous cover image of a snowy owl.  I was thrilled when I saw it. But there was this problem: no owls in the book.  And as much as everyone with artistic sense told me it was about the “essence” of the book, I wasn’t convinced.  I am linear and I needed an owl in the text.  So, for my own sanity, I put two owls in the text during the copy edit. They are still there. Good luck finding them!

Did researching and writing this book teach you anything or influence your thinking in any way?

Barb Howard: It taught me a lot about treating my work as a mural, not as a pyramid where the latest publication is always best and sits on top.  Some of the stories in this book are almost 20 years old, and some are brand new.  During editing  I had a chance to witness my various writing phases, and see where I have improved,  but I also came across areas of the craft that I was good at that I haven’t used for a while and that I could reinstate.

What would you most like readers to tell others about this book?

Barb Howard: I think Marina Endicott tied it up nicely by writing that the stories are “smart, funny, disturbing and sad.” But it is important that that they add “in a good way” after “disturbing and sad.”

Can you suggest one question readers might find interesting to discuss, concerning you, your writing in general, or this book?

Barb Howard: Where’s the owl?(See above)

Another discussion point might be to explore how the stories with the older publication dates compare/contrast with the stories that were published more recently.

How can readers help you promote this book?

Barb Howard: Arrange a reading (and also arrange for an audience to be there!), tell people about it, tweet or facebook about it, put it on a book club list, review it for a magazine or bookseller (online or hardcopy), recommend it to a bookstore – and tell them to put it face out on the shelf or on a table. It’s hard to sell a lot of books when all shoppers can see is the spine.

About Barb Howard

Why do you write?

Barb Howard: I write mainly to work through the stuff that bugs me. Social commentary, I believe is the official term – but I think the story aspect is more important than the commentary. Mostly I write about the world surrounding me, although occasionally I write to sort through something in my personal life  — oh! the (perceived) injustices! the dull baggage!  I often write on the same themes because I am still trying to get the story or the underlying commentary “right”.

What is your greatest strength as a writer?

Barb Howard: My greatest strength as a writer is narrative timing, in the comedic sense and in escalating drama.

What quality do you most value in yourself?

Barb Howard: Objectivity, fairness.  I believe in giving people second chances, and respecting the autonomy of individuals.  This all sounds very lofty but, on a day-to-day practical basis, it really just means I am a good delegator.

In addition to writing, what else are you passionate about?

Barb Howard: My family, being outdoors, justice, mental health, and all types of cheese – even the really scary stinky types.

Is there any new or established author whom you feel deserves more attention, and what is it that strikes you about his or her work?

Barb Howard: I feel Alberta authors in general need more attention, more reviews in national newspapers, more table displays in Chapters-Indigo, more consideration by playwrights and filmmakers. Because I teach creative writing I see a lot of new talent and try not to pick favourites. So far, when it comes to new authors, I have been a terrible (but luckily silent) judge of who is going to be crazy enough to go the distance. (i.e. keep writing)

Read more about Western Taxidermy

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Western Taxidermy consists of 16 short stories, 10 of which have been previously published, several which have earned awards or shortlists. It is a “best of” collection from Barb Howard’s stories of the last 20 years. While it is always hard to summarize a collection, especially when the stories are not linked through characters or events, it can be said that many of the stories in Western Taxidermy contain the common motif of uncovering what it is that the characters, deep down, really desire.

The narrative process of uncovering these desires can be funny, or suspenseful, or unsettling, or plain weird, or all of these things. The uptight etiquette expert in “Buckaroo Drive-thru,” for instance, is hot after the body of Adrian the slob. The taxidermist in “Western Taxidermy” seeks revenge at a baby shower. The gynecologist in “Eulogy for the Feminist Movement” wants a better stock market.

There’s a western flair to most of the stories in Western Taxidermy, but it is not so much cowboy-related as it is plain everyday Albertan. Even when the prairie or foothills setting isn’t mentioned, the sparse writing style and the empty space around the words bring a unique sharpness to the stories. A review in the April 2012 issue of Quill and Quire found that “[W]hile Howard’s stories and characters are indeed slightly offbeat, and as Canadian as Tim Hortons (a locale that features in several stories), a level of starkness is also present.”

The same Quill and Quire review found that “Howard’s stories are an odd juxtaposition of the quirky and the mundane. Whether it’s the new couple in “Last Seen at Teeny Town” on a trip to meet their respective families for the first time, or the pair of protagonists in “Still Making Time,” who reminisce about a summer fling two decades earlier, Howard captures pivotal moments in her characters’ lives. In some first-person stories, the reader is invited to experience events from perspectives that are not always comfortable.”

There is humour in this collection, but it is rarely used just for a laugh. Rather, it is used to lure readers in, to catch readers off guard, or to find a new avenue into subjects that range from unworthy grant recipients and unworthy dinner guests to domestic abuse and death.

About the Author

Barb Howard is an author, editor, creative writing instructor and workshop facilitator. Before receiving her MA in creative writing from the University of Calgary she worked as a lawyer in Calgary.

Barb’s book-length works include the new short story collection Western Taxidermy, Notes for Monday (a novella), Whipstock (a novel), and The Dewpoint Show (a novel for young adults). In the nonfiction realm, Barb occasionally publishes personal essays on sports or family, and she is co-editor of an upcoming anthology tentatively called Embedded on the Homefront: Where Military and Civilian Life Collide (Heritage House, fall 2012).

Barb won the Writers Guild of Alberta 2009 Howard O’Hagan award for short story. In 2012 she is shortlisted for both the Howard O’Hagan award for short story and the Ross Annet award for children’s literature. Her work has been published in anthologies and periodicals across Canada including Grain, The New Quarterly, The Dalhousie Review, Room, Alberta Views and Canadian Lawyer.

Barb is a lifelong Albertan who has lived in Bragg Creek since 1993.

Read an INTERVIEW with Barb Howard

View the BOOK TRAILER for Western Taxidermy

Visit Barb Howard’s  WEBSITE