What I've Been Up To -- Part II

 

After the Calgary-Banff Wordfest, the Half Brother book tour took me off to Victoria BC, my hometown, where I was very glad to see, finally, a statue of Emily Carr in the Inner Harbour, right in front of the Empress hotel. She has her monkey, Woo, on her shoulder.

I had a signing at the incomparable Munro's Books on Government Street, one of my favourite indepedant bookstores in the country. They put up a fancy red banner for me...

...gave my books a very flattering window display...

 

... and had a nice lineup of people waiting inside...

This is my intent signing face.

A highlight of the west coast book tour was getting to take my first harbour to harbour float plane, a Turbo Otter, from Victoria to Vancouver. Here's the ride...

And here's the pilot. I could actually see the altimenter and what he was dong the whole time. I think at one point he may have been scrolling through his iPod but I'm not sure...

It was sadly overcast when we approached Vancouver, but it was still a fine sight.

Here we are making our final landing approach in the harbour...

And a litle lower still... and then splashing down beside the Pan Pacific Hotel. Fantastic!



And then it was the Vancouver International Writers Festival where I did six events for groups like this:



Some highlights of Vancouver were meeting fellow YA authors Kevin Sylvester (also a CBC radio personality), and Australian writer Richard Newsome who has just released a really fun sounding book called The Billionaire's Curse. He was very funny. We shared an event in Vancouver -- here he is, doing his thing.

It was also great to catch up my long-time writer buddy Richard Scrimger, and we shared a panel with YA luminary Martha Brooks to talk about, um, writerly things. Another highlight was an impromptu breakfast with writer Yann Martel and his wife, YA author Alice Kuipers who, as the parents of an 18 month old, were up early and the only other people in the hotel dining room! They were there with Alice's parents, visiting from the UK, and I think they felt sorry for me, so they kindly invited me to join them. It was very pleasant to be included in a family breakfast after being away from my own family for so long. Oh, and the conversation was excellent!

And then home!