Cabot Trail Writers Festival ... at North River

October 2 - 4, 2009

The Authors

Our inaugural lineup of authors includes Newfoundland's award-winning Donna Morrissey, author of Kit's Law and What They Wanted (Penguin), the latter named to "The Globe's top fiction of 2008" (The Globe and Mail).

Joining Donna will be Cape Breton's Douglas Arthur Brown, whose 2008 novel Quintet (Key Porter) is the winner of the 2009 Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Prize.

As well, we will be delighted to feature the Cabot Trail's own Susan Zettell, who recently published her first full-length novel, The Checkout Girl (Signature Editions 2008), after teasing us with her successful short stories in Holy Days of Obligation (Nuage Editions) and Night Watch (Signature Editions).

The Music

Because the now-famous Celtic Colours will follow our festival by just one week, the thoughts of all Cape Bretoners will naturally turn to music.

We are very excited, then, to invite you to our opening night Literary Cabaret, which will feature selected readings from her work by Donna Morrissey, in an evening of written words punctuated by the music of the Poes Trio—guitarist Paul MacDonald, fiddler and luthier Otis Tomas, and bassist Ed Woodsworth.

Our wrap-up Sunday Brunch with all the authors will highlight the living practice of story-telling in a performance by the Cabot Trail's Bill Conall, a musician and author who just has a way with a story (The Rock in the Water, Hidden Book Press 2009).

Tickets on sale at Blue Heron Gifts, Baddeck; The Curiosity Shop, Sydney; Wreck Cove General Store, Wreck Cove on the Cabot Trail. Remaining tickets will be available at the door, but call North River Hall on the event day first to confirm ticket availability. For detailed event and workshop information visit our website: www.cabottrailwritersfestival.com

The Checkout Girl: "Kathy's on a breakaway to find herself"

This is the title of Wilmot Township writer and educator,Cindy Matthews', review of The Checkout Girl. Cindy's review appears in today's Waterloo Region Record. If you live in the area, you can pick up your own copy of The Record. But if you live away, you can meet Cindy through her website, and by following her link to 'book reviews', you can read what she has to say about Kathy Rausch and her life in Varnum-Sandhills: www.cindymatthews.ca

Dawson City: a sunny day on the Dome and a rainy day down below

Wild apples: grafts and a crisp

This spring I grafted several branches from my favourite wild apple tree to another wild apple tree on our property. My fave tree is rooted precariously along the edge of a steep, heavily wooded ravine, so has developed a wicked lean toward both stable ground and the sun, and I worry about how long the tree can live angled over the ground the way it is. I took five whip-branches and performed a surgery that was more than a bit ugly, quite Frankenstein-ish in fact. (My very first grafts.) I checked daily for weeks but there was no sign of life so I felt my grafts had failed, but in mid-summer two of the grafts sprouted wee leaves, then bloomed fully. First tent caterpillars threatened them. Every day I picked caterpillars from the tree until there were none left. Later, a doe and her pretty, red, still-spotted fawn, the most lovely pair to watch so I'm not really complaining, chose the delicate branch-tips and the new leaves of my grafts to browse, but even with that the remaining leaves, or bits of leaves, have survived. So far. In a few years perhaps I'll have some apples on the grafts.

The apples on the old tree are delicious right now. They are medium to small sized, yellow-green apples, some with a slight blush but most not. Their flesh is solid, a cross between a granny smith and a spy apple flesh, yellowish, dense, and very juicy. There is a hint of tart at first bite, but nothing like some wild apples whose juice sucks the saliva right out of you. Under the tart, and blended with it, is a joyous sweetness. The apples are very fine to eat from the tree, and wonderful for baking. Last night I made wild apple crisp -- with a few peaches that I didn't want to go bad added -- from Kitchener-Waterloo area Edna Staebler's fabulous Mennonite cookbook, Food That Really Schmecks.

The end of construction

We're painting a tinted bleaching oil on the shingles (I'll post a before and after photo -- the stain makes the cedar turn silvery evenly), the toilet, installed, works, and I hung my first (outdoor) decoration, an anniversary gift from my parents. I'll be signing off on construction photos. Time to be back at my desk as ideas are coming for The Lazarus Maple and it is wise to get them down before they disappear.

Champagne day

There is still work to be done, but this was clean up day, and the last big day on the job. Well done Chris, Peter, Bjorn, Monty & Joe (and Jimmy, too, but he is coming tomorrow.)

Today & while I was away: construction

Ottawa visit to see Mackenzie Lynn Westland Watt

Thank you John & Tanja & Heather & Tom & Jan. It was a perfect visit.