First of all, I forgot to mention last month that I made the list of the top ten “Best Living Local Authors” in the annual Montreal Mirror’s Best of Montreal readers poll. The full list is available here and also includes my old friend Heather O’Neill, who I published for the first time in 1996 in my Fish Piss Magazine and whose most recent novel, Lullabies for Little Criminals, has done extremely well since its publication in the fall of 2006.
I’ve also begun posting a bit more material to this site — see new posts on the video-photos and blog sections. I’ll also be posting a couple more times to the Broken Pencil blog (see links in the previous news post) until I pass the reins of resident blogger to someone else in mid-July.
Lastly, another review of my novel A Fine Ending appeared in the May 7 issue of the Suburban newspaper in Montreal, although the review is not available online.
Hello everybody! Just so you know, I began blogging here on the Broken Pencil website, where I expect to add posts every couple weeks through to the end of July.
I also DJed on CKUT earlier this week (Tuesday May 27, 2008), and you can click here to download the one-hour show. I was filling in for the Reverend Randy on the Harvey Christ Radio Hour, a bi-weekly mix of sermons, fables, hymns and music related to the Church of Harvey Christ and also satirical jabs at some of the wackier God pushers out there. I just spun records myself, mainly gospel songs done by rockin’ funk and soul artists from the 60s and 70s.
For those who want to hear more (but in a very different style), I will be DJing next Tuesday at Casa del Popolo for their weekly rock and roll night. You can check their calendar for the dates of my DJ gigs there over the next few months. Don’t hesitate to come up and say hi or make a request.
Lastly, my novel A Fine Ending will be released in the US and UK/EU on June 1, which means people there will be able to order it in bookstores or from www.amazon.com or www.amazon.co.uk .
A Fine Ending disappeared from amazon.ca’s rankings for a few weeks after the first printing sold out in March, but after being back in print for about a month, it has raced back up the rankings. As of May 8, it sits at number 11 on the Canadian short stories chart, and number 86 on the overall short stories chart. (Of course, it’s a novel, not a short story collection: an early book catalog published many months before its release listed A Fine Ending as a short story collection, and obviously amazon.ca is a little slow to correct such errors!) It remains to be seen whether amazon.com will repeat this error when the novel becomes available in the US and UK in June…
In the meantime, check the blog on this website next week for the author’s reflections on the novel and the feedback from readers six months after it hit bookstore shelves.
You can also check out Broken Pencil Magazine’s website where, starting next week, Louis Rastelli will be the resident blogger for the summer.
Louis Rastelli will be presenting excerpts from his novel, A Fine Ending, in person at Montreal’s Blue Metropolis International Literary Festival on Sunday, May 4 from 3:30 p.m. to 4:45 p.m. The event is hosted by Marianne Ackerman and also features readings by Mary Soderstrom, Nigel Thomas, Issa J. Boullata and Sanja Domazet. Tickets are available in advance or at the festival, which takes place at the Delta Centre-Ville Hotel, 777, University Street, Square-Victoria metro.
A Fine Ending will also be available for sale at the festival, and the author will be signing copies after the Sunday reading.
In other news, A Fine Ending is back in print after a quick sellout of the first printing. It is once again available on www.amazon.ca, where it cracked the top 100 sellers shortly before it ran out. It will be available in the US and UK sometime next June.
In case anyone is having trouble finding a copy of A Fine Ending, please note that the first printing is almost sold out. It is currently listed as unavailable on most online sites (such as amazon.ca or the chapters-indigo online site), but will become available again in about a month. In the meantime, copies can still be found in some bookstores, but it’s recommended to call first to see if they have copies in stock. Most stores will gladly take orders and will let you know when the book is back in stock.
The second printing will be identical to the first, except that some typos have been corrected and “rave reviews” of the novel are quoted on the back cover. If you’re the collector type, you might want to get a copy of the first printing while it can still be found!
In other news, Louis Rastelli will be reading at Capilano College in Vancouver as part of the Open Text reading series on Tuesday, March 25. He will also be reading as part of the Short Line series at the Railway Club in Vancouver that same evening (579 Dunsmuir Street, on the corner at Seymour).
Other festival appearances are planned for the spring and will be announced shortly.
There is a review of Louis Rastelli’s novel, A Fine Ending, in the Globe and Mail, available online here. Excerpt:
“A Fine Ending reads like a middle-of-the-night yarn from a slightly stoned scribe who has set himself the task of telling everybody’s story - for a laugh or at least a smile. Yet hovering overhead is a powerful metaphysical gravitas heightened by the narrator’s innocence. Evil and death surround him, lives are ruined by drugs and drink, clouds of violence and doom are gathering. Fittingly, the story ends on the last night of the 20th century in a melancholy scene heavy with foreshadowed nostalgia: Something sweet and good is going, gone.” - Marianne Ackerman, The Globe and Mail
¶
Posted 09 February 2008
‡
Louis Rastelli’s Distroboto project is celebrating its 7th anniversary on Friday, Jan. 25, from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. at Salla Rossa, 4848 St-Laurent.
It is a benefit show for the non-profit project which involves former cigarette machines selling local art, music, books, comics, short films and crafts for $2.00 in various cafés and bars around Montreal. (See www.distroboto.archivemontreal.org for more info. There are also articles about the event in the Montreal Mirror here and here.)
The show costs $10 at the door and will feature performances by Think About Life, Exhaust, Gambletron, Giselle Numba One, and Random Recipe.
___________
Another review of A Fine Ending just came out, this time in the Montreal Mirror. You can read it by clicking here.
“A Fine Ending is at its best when life is at its worst. When Rastelli is fully engaged in the numb nihilism of the time, and giving detailed descriptions of the consequences of that life, the novel cooks.”
¶
Posted 17 January 2008
‡
A Fine Ending was reviewed in last Sunday’s Halifax Daily News (click to see review). The paper also ran an interview with Louis Rastelli (available here). There is a longer version of this interview available on the journalist’s personal blog, right here.
From the review:
“Louis Rastelli’s debut novel, A Fine Ending, is a captivating tale of a compelling place at a unique time that takes readers on an intimate journey through the twists and turns of la vie boheme…
“Amidst this maniacal milieu, it is only Louis’ affection for two adopted kittens that keep him rooted in the reality of the heart. In fact, the tenderness of those short passages is filled with a melancholia that is not unlike J.D. Salinger’s uber-protagonist, Holden Caulfield. Alas, more Catcher in the Rye than On the Road, Rastelli’s book is over-flowing with the sombre tone of life at the end of the millennium, when some dreams die off as others are born.
“And this is perhaps the author’s greatest accomplishment with the novel; by touching upon the lives of those who inhabit the region - a generation with nothing to gain and nothing to lose - he has successfully painted a timeless portrait of the spirit of bohemia that not only permeates the vibrant and colourful Montreal neighbourhood in which he lives and loves, but would feel equally at home in Greenwich Village, Soho or along the left bank of Paris. And, like the Plateau itself, A Fine Ending shines with both substance and style”
¶
Posted 14 January 2008
‡
A very positive review in the Montreal Gazette is now online. Some excerpts:
“Although Louis Rastelli’s A Fine Ending is written in a smooth, flowing style reminiscent of J.D. Salinger or Jacques Poulin, that doesn’t fully explain the novel’s appeal, which is voyeuristic as well as literary This roman à clef pulls back the curtain on the young anglo Plateau scene of the late 1990s.
“Not all readers will have memories of the long-gone bohemian haunts that Rastelli mentions, like the Monkey House and Café Phoenix, but many will remember the Ice Storm, low rents and the fears surrounding Y2K, which should only add to their enjoyment of this book. There is something titillating about reading a fictionalized account of an event or reality that you yourself have experienced.
“His unique, insider perspective and matter-of-fact voice are the real draws in this warm-hearted account of an artistic community’s defining years.”
In other news, Louis Rastelli will be selling and signing copies of his novel during the Festival des Voix d’Amériques at the beginning of February, stay tuned for more details.
Also upcoming is the gala 7th anniversary/ benefit party for Distroboto, happening at La Salla Rossa, 4848 St-Laurent, on Friday, January 25, 2008.
Lastly, here is a link to an interesting interview with Louis Rastelli about the state of the small press and zines, from the November 20 issue of the Concordian.
¶
Posted 22 December 2007
‡
Another review of A Fine Ending has just come out, in Montreal’s free weekly, Hour.
“… an untroubled immortalization of a bygone era in the Montreal underground. There is something undeniably compelling in the openness and innocence of the telling, in the largely non-subjective subjectivity. We feel safe in his story, and therein lies the draw - whatever the faults, A Fine Ending offers a comfy barstool perspective on the times, a cold beer and good company, and that’s always hard to pass up.”
There is now audio on this website, in the form of Louis Rastelli reading a chapter from A Fine Ending, as well as an interview with him that aired on Montreal’s CKUT Radio on Friday, November 23, 2007. Click on the “Audio” page to listen to them, or right-click and “save as” to save them as MP3s.
¶
Posted 13 December 2007
‡