Baffled By Travel Guide to Toronto and Niagara Falls
The Toronto Guide I wrote is now in the stores and I have been busy finishing up the New York guide which is being published next month. There’s an online preview of the guide right here. If youwant your very own copy it is available at better bookstores everywhere or online at Indigo.ca.
Once I finish New York, or it finishes with me, it’s on to the Chicago Guide which will be published later in the fall.
Julian Comstock by Robert Charles Wilson
My friend Bob Wilson aka Robert Charles Wilson, has a new book out entitled “Julian Comstock” and it has gotten great reviews including a featured review in Publisher’s Weekly. Bob is a great writer and this is his best novel yet.
Don’t just take my word for it Stephen King says “Robert Charles Wilson is a hell of a storyteller.” And the New York Times agrees, “In his quiet way, Robert Charles Wilson has produced one of the most impressive bodies of work in contemporary science fiction.”
If you live in Toronto Bob is signing copies tomorrow night (July 2nd) at the Merrill Collection on College Street starting at seven.
I’m afraid that our old friend Joe the Plumber aka Samuel Wurzelbacher is a little past his “best before” date. Since John McCain hailed him as “my hero” during last fall’s Presidential election Joe has managed to keep himself front and centre in the media with his regular knuckle-headed pronouncements. Read the rest of this entry »
We went down to the launch of our friend Rob Sawyer’s new book Wake. Rob just got off the plane at noon from an 18 day book tour across the U.S. and Canada, but that didn’t slow him down as he gave a spirited reading from the book. Read the rest of this entry »
Over the past few months I have been working with the Baffled By Travel team helping to create an entirely new type of city guide.
In my position as Senior Writer on the guide I got to discover new places in Toronto. I also got to rediscover many of the attractions that make the city so great. Read the rest of this entry »
Today is Earth Day and to mark the occasion I am considering buying an electric scooter. No, not the type the morbidly obese drive in the supermarket, these are traditional motor-scooters of the Vespa variety with an electric motor instead of a gas one. Read the rest of this entry »
Warner Brothers sent along a copy of The Big Circus under their new Archive banner. With shaking hands I inserted it into my DVD player fully expecting, even though the box graphics and the label said The Big Circus, that it would be some cruel joke or another movie altogether.
But, be still my beating heart, it was the real deal, in glorious widescreen. Sure the menu was pared down to just a “Play” option, but after all these years that is good enough. It plays and it looks great, best of all it is a legitimate copy.
Bravo, Warner Brothers and keep the Archive titles coming.
In my ongoing quest to find a new template for Sparkplug I am trying out yet another new theme. Let me know what you think of this three column format.
I locked myself out of the site for a couple of weeks by eliminating a piece of code on a style sheet that I thought I had backed up but hadn’t. The result? My sidebar disappeared for a couple of weeks along with with Admin login. I finally found a way in and selected this theme so that I could repair the damage.
But now I am not sure. I kind of like this theme.
I may try it for a couple of weeks while I decide.
It worked. Enough of you out there sent enough letters to Warners to convince them to release it on their exclusive Warners Archive collection which is only available to American customers on their website.
They provide a preview on their site which shows that The Big Circus is in its original widescreen format and is a decent print. To get your copy follow this link to Warners site.
As a Canadian I will have to find another way to get a copy, Ebay perhaps.
Thanks to reader Simon Howson for the heads up on this release.
Still it is finally out there in full widescreen glory.
Yes, it’s Oscar night again. If I sound less than enthusiastic it’s because I am. Again, like last year the Best Picture line up is a collection of quality films, but I am still in a snit because The Dark Knight did not make the cut.
“If you can’t write your idea on the back of my calling card, you don’t have a clear idea.”
–David Belasco
During the past year I have been helping to write several travel guides for a publisher.One of the guidelines from the Editor is that no single review can be longer than 60 words due to the constraints of the page design. Read the rest of this entry »