Hello again, Canadian readers!
Have all of you recovered from the excitement and drama of Friday’s final debate? I think I’m still trying to pick my jaw up off the floor now that Paul Quarrington’s King Leary has been crowned king of Canada Reads 2008.
As I was lying around this weekend, trying to decide which CanLit book to read now that this year’s titles have been sent back to my shelf, I started to feel a few debate-withdrawal pangs. My apartment felt very quiet, and somehow, thinking about books wasn’t as much fun without hearing five animated panelist voices talking about characters, words and themes in the background.
Just when I was ready to fall into the kind of black despair that hermit bookworms are sometimes prone to, I remembered there’s still some very cool Canada Reads-related material slated to appear on this site in the coming weeks. So, even if Steve MacLean didn’t get his Canada Reads “debrief,” we can still have ours…
The kingmaker
On the heels of King Leary’s thrilling Canada Reads victory, I find myself wanting to learn more about Paul Quarrington, the delightfully imaginative author who dreamt up all of the colourful characters who won over this year’s Canada Reads panelists. Later this week, Paul will be posting a blog entry in this space. And if the stars align correctly, Paul will make another, more interactive appearance on this site in future, where you will be able to ask him some questions about all of the blood, sweat and tears that went into the writing of this year’s winning title. So, keep your fingers crossed and start dreaming up your questions for Paul.
Meet the bloggers
In other blog news, I couldn’t write a post-game rundown of Canada Reads without giving a big shout-out to Steven Beattie and Alex Good, who offered up a fantastic daily play-by-play of all of the Canada Reads debates on That Shakespeherian Rag. On the off chance you missed their blogging during debate week, I suggest you catch up on their entries now — these two were required reading for me last week, and for my money, they provided the best commentary going during Canada Reads 2008.
Crunching the numbers, one more time
Another thing that added to the excitement and overall suspense of this year’s competition for me were the weekly rankings provided by BookNet Canada, which offered a sneak peek at which of the five titles was faring the best at bookstore counters across Canada. Now that the outcome of that tight race has been revealed, our friends at BookNet Canada have graciously agreed to provide us with some post-show numbers, and I’m very curious to see how many copies of King Leary are moving off the shelves in light of its recent win. I promise to let you know as soon as the numbers are in.