The week of the Canada Reads “book-off” was a busy one for me. I had a school visit, as well as the ongoing pressure of a novel long overdue. I planned to listen to the broadcasts day by day, but what with one thing and another, it was Thursday evening before I was able to search out the podcasts and hear how things were going. Though, really, I already knew. There was no way not to know.

Total strangers made a point of telling me that they’d be voting for me. The librarians and teachers at the school I visited were cheering me on. A friend sent a virtual huzzah when my book made it through to Wednesday. Someone who bought some of my crafts from my online store wished me good luck on Canada Reads. A former writing student, herself shortlisted for a writing competition, sent me her thoughts on what was happening.

A psychologist friend said how great it was that CBC had gotten an astronaut to read a science fiction novel. That of course made me regret that I hadn’t put any spacemen in it, despite Jemeni’s expressed relief that I hadn’t. And my library technician mother kept phoning me every morning on behalf of her whole office, all of them hoping for an update, because they couldn’t listen to the broadcasts at work. I’m afraid I had to disappoint them.

But finally, Thursday night, there I was in front of my computer with a couple of hours reserved to catch up on what had been going on. And the minute I began to listen to the first podcast, I came smack up against something I’d managed to put out of my mind until then: listening to the broadcasts meant I’d be listening to an extremely articulate group of folks talk about why they didn’t like Brown Girl in the Ring. Yikes!

I’m used to reading reviews of my work, and I’ve been fortunate that they’ve mostly been respectful and considered, even about aspects of my writing that the reviewer hasn’t liked. I’ve become less defensive over the years. However, I usually receive commentary on my work, positive or negative, through the filter of text. Words on a page lend a cushioning distance to reviews. Listening to a recording of people arguing the merits and demerits of your work is something else again. So I took a deep breath and steeled myself for the worst.

It wasn’t so bad! The jurors mainly talked about the fact that my wordcraft wasn’t as strong as it could have been. Hell, I’ve talked about that myself. I wrote Brown Girl in the Ring over 10 years ago. When I read it now, I find my fingers itching for the pen. I want to remove half the adjectives, rework the sentences, let the characters’ actions speak louder than the author’s words. So no argument from me there.