Canadian Mysteries Need Your Support

These are difficult days in Canadian publishing. My publisher sent out a notice to her authors yesterday, informing us that while our latest books are in the Chapters/Indigo warehouse, and have been for over a month, they will not be in the stores until after Christmas. For smaller publishers and authors who have not written blockbusters like Going Rogue (and you might ask yourself how Sarah Palin became a bestseller in Canada), this lack of distribution is like a death knell. Our work is good. It deserves to be on the shelves.

I encourage each of you to take the time to write to Chapters or to call your local store and ask that your favourite Canadian mystery author's work be brought into the store right away. If we do not take a stand, good, new authors will stop writing, smaller publishers will go out of business, and a blossoming segment of Canadian writing will disappear. We need to start making noise.

On my writing front, Kitchissippi Times printed a little article this week about my book launch with Barbara Fradkin - it was a well written piece and will help to get our names out locally. I've been settling in to write the next installment in the Orca Rapid Reads series and have the first three chapters written. I'm still sorting out in my head where the storyline will go. I'm happy to be working on a new piece and not editing.

Well, the weather in Ottawa has been unbelievably mild as we head into December, with the odd sprinkle of snow followed by above-freezing temps and rain. As I look out the window, I see green grass and a coating of frost on the roofs across the street. Makes it hard to get motivated to go Christmas shopping. We better get some snow soon or there won't be many gifts under the tree.