I’m going to be in the 2019 Ottawa Fringe!
I’m going to write, direct, act, sing, and dance on stage, risking humiliation and tragedy.
Why would I do this? As my brother once put it, “Mel, you’re a doctor. Why don’t you just be a doctor.”
Bob Peters interviewed me for ChooseCornwall.ca last month. Then he took pictures of me for a page in Cornwall Living Magazine. I got to feel like a movie star because I rushed out of the livestreamed North York Emergency Medicine Update conference to get my photo taken in the emerg on my lunch hour. Bob was great, and the nurses and clerks enjoyed getting their photos done too.
(Aside: I’d just worked the day before, which was hellish, but for some reason, that day, we didn’t have as many patients jammed in the hallways. Is that like how patients say, “I was sick until I got here”? Maybe we just need to hire a photographer every time we get overcrowded.)
The day after the ChoseCornwall.ca article, my husband, Matt, sent me a picture. “You’re on Google News.”
Hey! I beat out dozens of gardeners on Google News!
Now, Matt had set his Google News to our small town. But even so. Kind of cool, non?
Today is the debut of the newest edition of Cornwall Living Magazine. Par-tay at 4 p.m. I’m bringing my kids.
Max is wearing a shirt by Fili. I love the African trim. I’ll try to get a better picture, when he’s not hurrying for the school bus
Anastasia refused to show her face. But you can see she likes Chirp Magazine, a gift from Helen, the SDG librarian.
At 7:30 p.m., I’m appearing on the radio show Vankleek Cooley, in an interview with Louise Sproule, the publisher of The Review, a 121-year-old, award-winning community newspaper. This is my first show where the interviewer has read my novel, TERMINALLY ILL, in advance, so that’s exciting. Even wilder, it’s live radio, so anything could happen. Listen locally at 88.7 FM or livestream it here: http://vankleekfm.com/live-streaming/
After today, my paperback Hope Sze books will be available for sale in the lobby of The Review. They’d make a perfect end-of-school present, Father’s Day gift, or “because you’re worth it” pick-me-up. Just sayin’.
Here’s my baby again. Hello, Terminally Ill! Soon to be distributed through Ingram Spark.
As I’m gathering my wits and my books for Bloody Words 2014, I noticed an uptick in sales of TERMINALLY ILL. I fully credit, Steve Steinbock’s “utterly likeable” review in July’s Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. I blogged about how I’d told Steve that Kris Rusch had pointed out the review to me, and that I’m a big Smokey Dalton fan. He’d never read any of her books, but after my tip, he just messaged me to say that her latest, Street Justice, rocks. (Well, he put it more poetically than that. You get my drift.) Sweet!
Speaking of giving credit, I’m appearing on Vankleek.fm because my friend, the artist and financial planner Jessica Sarrazin, bought TERMINALLY ILL and got Louise hooked on it.
Jessica’s father, Jean Sarrazin, started the radio station. He used to work for the CBC and is “a seasoned audio editor, harking back to the days of 1/4 inch tape, razor blades and china markers.” He “sliced out-takes of piano music for Glenn Gould with those blades.” And now he’s editing the audio book of THE MOST UNFEELING DOCTOR IN THE WORLD. Nifty, huh? (BTW, this book was cited in the Ultimate Reading List for Nurses.)
E-book and print available. Audio coming soon!
If you’re sick of books (say it ain’t so!), Jessica’s having an art show on June 28th at the Quirky Carrot. Support the arts! As one of Hope’s men, John Tucker, quotes from Dead Poets Society, somewhat tongue in cheek, “[M]edicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”
