Just before Living Underground was published, my editor George Down of The Book Band said, “Your book has legs. It’s the kind that will be a steady seller and it will build.” While I relished hearing his words, like most writers I am filled with self-doubt and second guessing.

As part of my ‘second wave’ marketing plan, I thought a book trailer could generate some fresh interest in Living Underground. My novel is not easy to explain in an elevator pitch but a book trailer of 90 seconds or so – that could gather up the many threads and themes. I reasoned it just might do what my tongue-tied self could barely manage. My publisher Maureen Whyte of Seraphim Editions and I worked out a budget. And I knew exactly who I would ask to produce the video.

Studio shoot of La Traviata album cover

I admired the work of Carla Sinclair and Colin Burwell of Empty Cup Media from my artist-in-residence work with the Durham District School Board. They are risk-taking filmmakers with an eye for “the moment” and they live to capture emotion in film. A couple of meetings to chat about the central themes and plot, research and gathering of archival footage and staged filming, an outline or two and music selection – and they went to work. Llewellyn Jones provided the voice over. Several record albums from the 1960s, a 45-year old pipe and tobacco pouch and some special effects were part of the live filming.

Two proofs later, we had the finished product. I posted the book trailer for Living Underground and less than 2 days later, it garnered the highest viral level at facebook.com/LivingUndergroundbyRuthWalker.  The reactions have been amazing. A colleague told me that she kept meaning to get the book but, after she watched the trailer, she went to that night to Book City to buy it because “Now I had to read it.”

Thanks Carla and Colin for finding the emotion in my words and conveying the sense of mystery and secrets. It was a grand adventure, I learned so much and – along the way – gained a greater understanding of the art and science of film.

All through the years — at least 50 of them — I’ve continued to wear glasses. Vanity rarely kept them from my face (except at my wedding and a pounding headache for most of the evening was the miserable result.) They have been my pal, helping me see the world. They have been my barrier. Made me a bit different in grade school. My glasses have been my crutch–a mask, if you will. A barrier that kept some part of my face hidden. Safe.

Cataract surgery has changed all that. And how. It all started with socks. One black sock ‘matched’ to one blue sock. It took sunlight and that oh-so-familiar Grade 3 squint for me to notice my colour errors. My vision was deteriorating, and not just getting fuzzy. Cloudy, too.

Over the years, my natural lenses aged. Not only did they become cloudy, they also cast a yellow hue over the world. With crystal clear lenses, I have rediscovered colour. Never mind that I can watch television (imagine!) without glasses, I can see that red is not red-orange-ish. It is, indeed, red. Crimson. Ruby. Scarlet. Oh my. And I can see that blue socks are not black socks. And that fresh white snow is, really it is, white. Not a hint of yellow. Except where the dog has been.

I confess that the vision is not yet perfect. I’ll need glasses for reading. But my old glasses? I have another confession. Sometimes I put them back on because, well, it just feels odd not to wear them. The world is fuzzy now with my old friend perched on my nose, so I take them off. Yet I still reach up to adjust them when they aren’t there.

It’s a bit like smoking. I gave all that up in 1983, but every so often, I think maybe just if I held one in two fingers…just for a moment…raised the filtered end to my lips and…

Yup. Some habits, even when we give them up, remain part of us. So please say nothing if you see me reaching up to my face and then, blushing a bit, pretending I was just whisking an errant hair from my eyes. I am sure it has nothing to do with what used to be there.

Ten Interview Questions for the Next Big Thing:

What is your working title of your book?

“A Winter Project” (entirely apt at this time of year; it’s the end of December 2012 and outside the snow is already falling…)

Where did the idea come from for the book?

Listening to As It Happens on CBC Radio several years ago, they interviewed a California mail order company about their biggest seller of DIY wood projects. Hands down, it was the plan to build a coffin. And just where and when were the highest points of sales for this set of plans? Canada…in the winter.

Go figure, thought I.

I’m Canadian and have survived more than 50 good old Canadian winters. But I don’t know a single soul who is building a coffin. So clearly I had to write about a person who is doing this just to figure out who would WANT to do this.

What genre does your book fall under?

Fiction. After that, it’s anyone guess. Set in tiny “Brigham Village” somewhere within a long north-easterly commute of Toronto, the narrative focuses on savvy union consultant Carl Booker and his off-kilter relationships with his disintegrating family and the “hicks” in his small community. I’d like to think I’m writing a literary fiction (at least a book that pays attention to language and form) but really, it’s just a story about a guy trying to figure out what he hasn’t understood for years: human connections.

Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Bruce Greenwood in “Dinner for Schmucks”

Ooh. Now that’s a good one. Well, Carl is smart, rather irascible but with some charm. And he is a bit useless in the workshop until carpenter-philosopher Joe Ducharme teaches him a thing or two about wood and life. Carl could be played by Bruce Greenwood or maybe Barry Pepper. And Joe? Donald Sutherland comes to mind. He does convey a sense of practical wisdom and a delight in puncturing those with an inflated sense of self importance. A good tutor-mentor figure for Carl.

Donald Sutherland in “Dawn Rider”

Truth be told, I have no idea really. Once you hand a book over to a production house, it is the same as once you publish to the book and put it into the hands and minds of readers. It no longer is “yours” and is experienced through the vision of the director and actors. Just have to hope for the best.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

A savvy but jaded trade unionist rediscovers his place in the world after catastrophe tosses him into the jaws of small town village life, where a nod on the street can fuel gossip, guesswork and generosity.

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Like most other writers, I live in hope. I have the interest of an agent and expect that, like my first novel Living Underground, “A Winter Project” will find a publishing home.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

About 1 year to write the first draft. Ten or so years of cooking in and out of the drawer. And now, about to be revised and edited and refined one more time. Who knows how long THAT will take? tick, tick, tick…

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

It is still too in-progress to be nailed down like that. After all, some rewrites toss out much of what is already written and I may have to go that route to realize what I hope to here. So, I’ll reserve that answer until AFTER this latest draft is complete.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I worked for a union for a few years and I met many people there — most of whom were inspired in their work by social justice issues. They wanted to make a difference and worked tirelessly to achieve that noble end. But a few of my union colleagues were tired of fighting the good fight and had even moved beyond “jaded” in their sense of frustration. Union leaders are elected by their members and any kind of politics is indeed a strange animal that sometimes bites the hand that feeds it. Carl is a kind of amalgam of those I met who once longed to put the world right but lost patience and the heart that led them to social justice in the first place.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

I am fascinated by people who struggle with fitting in and I think others are too. Because don’t we all, at various points in our lives, own that struggle?

I am also intrigued in urban vs rural interests. How is rural and small town life viewed by ‘the city’ and vice versa? And this consideration exposes an important slice of modern reality. We rely on that rural community to fill the bellies of the nation but how often do city folks consider where that pound of beef and head of lettuce comes from? And all the human dramas that lie behind that question are worth exploring.

And what about “social justice” — is it the same thing to all of us? I don’t think so. Sometimes it encompasses simple things, like kindness to a neighbour or donating time to a community food bank. Sometimes, it’s fighting to keep a nursing home open and protecting the jobs of ordinary folks. Social justice can be found in any community effort when that effort aims to make better the life of others. And sometimes, social justice comes from uncovering self-interest and lies told to protect massive egos and big salaries…and not always in the corporate world.

And here, dear readers, are the blogs of other writers for you to visit and discover what is cooking in their ‘creative kitchens’.

Phil Dwyer is obsessed with books and stories and has been a journalist, editor, publisher and lay preacher. On the board of The Writers’ Community of Durham Region, Phil is working on his first novel, a love story in reverse.  http://phildwyer.wordpress.com/

Heather O’Connor is a freelance writer, editor, social media practitioner and creative writing instructor. Her first novel is a medieval fantasy, Twice a Ghost and is already attracting the interest of agents and publishers. http://www.merlinwrites.com/

Deborah Rankine is a national food writer, covering the food scene in Canada for 15 years. A.K.A. The Fridge Whisperer, “Chef Deb” allows us a tiny peek at “50 Shades of Eh!… truly tantalizing Canadian cuisine”, her next book. http://thefridgewhisperer.com/fridge/

Deepam Wadds is a poet and writer with work in acclaimed journals and anthologies. Deepam has been a therapeutic bodywork practitioner of Osho Rebalancing and leads writing retreats in Canada and Costa Rica. The last of 4 children, she swears she wasn’t an accident. http://deepamwadds.wordpress.com/

Dale Long is a blogger extraordinare and a writer with work in magazines, newspapers and anthologies. He is completing his second novel manuscript inspired by the complexity and twists found in the gothic horror genre. http://drlong67.wordpress.com/author/inkstr0kes/

And here’s another writer who has  already been tagged for the Next Big Thing by U.S. author Mary Glickman, Dennis Fleming author of the literary true crime memoirs She Had No Enemies and The Girl Who Had No Enemies and the serial memoir The Sex Life of Andy Ashling.  http://www.dpressingnews.blogspot.com (Thanks to Dennis for giving me the LinkedIn kick to answer Michael Bryson’s invitation.)

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Message for tagged authors:
Rules of the Next Big Thing

***Use this format for your post
***Answer the ten questions about your current WIP (work in progress)
***Tag five other writers/bloggers and add their links so we can hop over and meet them.

Ten Interview Questions for the Next Big Thing:
What is your working title of your book?
Where did the idea come from for the book?
What genre does your book fall under?
Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?
What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?
What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Who or what inspired you to write this book?
What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Include the link of who tagged you and this explanation for the people you have tagged.
Be sure to line up your five people in advance.

Campfire at Twin Pines in Haliburton

Our world is noisy and often noisome in the disagreeable sense of the word. Horns. Fire engines. Shouts. Diesel engines. Air brakes. Train whistles. Now I can love urban life, take pleasure in the roar of a crowd or the blast of a great rock song on my car radio. And I sure enjoy some noisy aspects of being a published author: talking about the book, talking to publishers, talking to booksellers. Frankly, you have to be fairly noisy these days if you want to bring some attention to your work. So I, too, can be a noisemaker on the radio, at launches and readings and other appearances. But I do worry about how little time anyone has to take in silences. And the rewards that exist when you do take in silence are enormous.

Back to the campfire.

Around that campfire, I’ve heard spring peepers whistling froggy love songs into the night. Coyotes that yip and yelp, and at least once, wolves calling to the stars. I’ve heard the whip-poor-will at dusk and the hooting call of an owl. All of this flavoured by pine, woodsmoke, a mug steaming with coffee or tea and the quiet companionship of my love at my side. And when I listen and hold myself still, I’ve heard the sound of poetry tickle the back of my brain — though up there, it often takes time to simmer and move around in my thoughts, sometimes waiting weeks before falling out and onto the page.

Listening brings its own rewards. Listening to the world around you can, perhaps, help you sift out what is noise and discover what is worth listening to. And keeping.

It will be a long winter of no campfires. I’ll have to settle for the silences brought by heavy snowfalls and those two a.m. strolls through the house that sometimes, when the quiet is perfect and moon shafts some blue through the mini-blind cracks, take me to where I think I can hear something important, something worthwhile, something that longs to find its way from pen to page.

Receptivity. Being receptive and open to what life hands us. That is, I think, the gift of the artist. And the more receptive and open you are to life’s offerings, the richer your work becomes.

I was in Paris August 2012. Lovely city. A bit on the orderly side (it’s all those buildings being restricted in size, shape, etc., as part of the Haussmann effect) but there were crazy, unscripted bits such as doggy doo left for anyone else to pick up. (It appears that Poop and Scoop is struggling to catch on.)

Paris as seen on a walk is unlike Paris seen as a tourist. We signed up for the New Europe Tour with Sam from Minnesota as our walking tour guide. Love hearing the snippets and bits about the ‘story behind’ this or that. Hitler’s hat falling off when he went to see Napoleon Bonaparte’s resting place — an errant bit of wind, apparently, that nabbed his hat so that even Hitler was forced to bend over & bow down at Napoleon’s shrine. Even if it isn’t true, it becomes so for me because I created the scene as Sam told us about it.

Or Henri IV’s drunken lords’ faces being the inspiration for the faces carved into the Pont Neuf over the River Seine. I can see it — King Henri plies them all with goblet after goblet of wine, watches them devolve from Lords into Louts, sketches his happy little heart away and replicates those goofy guys all along the bridge. I bet he was a prankster in more than this episode.

Fiction comes from such places. You just need to be, as Alissa York suggests, “receptive.” Now, how to work those scenes into a future novel or story or poem. Ah me. A writers’ work is never done.