My Year of Live Music

I made New Year's resolutions this year! Two of them! And I've already forgotten what one of them was! 

BUT, I for sure remember the other one: go to more shows (quantifiably, I'm thinking at least one per month, as a bare minimum). 

I used to go to so many shows—it was at least a weekly thing. I mean, there was a time where it was part of my job to go to shows, and it is much easier to do something when you're paid to do it than it is to do something you have to pay to do. But also, there are the kids I have to look after. You can't just go to shows all the time when there are kids you have to look after. And there is also the matter of getting older and being so tired all the time, which might also have something to do with the kids (but who knows; maybe I'd be tired either way). Then there's COVID, which kind of wrecked the music scene for a while there, and, saddest of all, there's the fact that I'm getting to that age where I have a hard time accepting that there are still new bands coming into existence and I can't keep up with the constant onslaught of NEW BANDS TO KNOW ABOUT AND LISTEN TO and I'm tired and I just want to go to shows where I know all the songs, and the bands dress and look and banter the way I'm used to bands dressing and looking and bantering. 

Like, I kind of look forward to being 60, you know? That magical age where all of the bands of your teen and young adult years start playing yearly shows at the Casino Show Lounge and it doesn't cost an arm and a leg and the crowd size is not overwhelming and there are nice plushy seats to sit in when you get tired. I know this is a thing that is going to happen because I have been to these shows; I have seen Nazareth and Honeymoon Suite and George Thorogood, and I have seen the 60-year-olds up at the front dancing and being so thrilled to be there and I have thought, that is absolutely something to look forward to. I'm ready. Death Cab, Jimmy Eat World, come on. And hey! I'm about as far from 60 as I am from 20! So. This is the meantime, I guess. 

And the meantime is what I'm talking about right now. In the meantime, I want to get reacquainted with the music scene as it is, not as what I remember it to be or what I hope it one day will be, but as it is right now. I want to see the local bands and also the touring ones that may deign to stop in Regina, Saskatchewan if, in the first place, they deign to travel north of the American border. I've missed the venues, and the regulars, and the pleasant ringing in my ears the morning after a night out that means I have hurt my long-term hearing just a little bit. A kind of self-destructive souvenir I'll regret in about twenty years.

So! On Saturday, I went to the Mercury with my friend Ashley to see a lineup of acoustic sets by artists who referred to themselves, collectively, as The Disgruntled Poet's Union. It was lovely, and in a little twist of serendipity, John and Debra were there too, and we got to have a completely unplanned little one-year reunion (almost to the day, but not quite) of this meeting in the exact spot where it had originally happened. 

I also appreciated this man who sat in front of us who brought with him a veritable library of books and a milkshake and read through the whole show by the light of his cell phone. Maybe, along with being a 60-year-old who goes to see my old favorite bands at the casino, I will also be a 60-year-old who brings six books to acoustic sets at the Mercury and reads in a booth with a milkshake. 

The future is bright!

THE ABCS OF 2024

Well there's another year gone. It flew past, a racecar. 

Or am I the racecar? Or maybe time is the car and the year is the track and I'm in the car? No, I think time is the track. The year is the vehicle that carries us through time. Right? Or is time the vehicle that carries us through the year?

This metaphor is not great. I'm spending too much time on it. 

No, that's it, actually: time is the fuel in the vehicle. The track is the year and the time is the fuel and I'm the bobblehead figure on the dashboard. Who's driving? It seems to be one of those autonomous cars. Terrifying concept, but probably safer than having me behind the wheel.

Anyway.

Once again it's time for the annual ABCs of post. I love writing these; I have done it for many years (since 2016, to be exact). You should do it too. They're fun to read at the end of each year—and helpful. I find that the years have started to literally blur together and I can't always remember which important things belong to which years. 

So! Ahem:

A - Arlo! My sister had another adorable baby. It feels like you should get used to babies, the more of them you meet. You should get used to how tiny and perfect they are, to their impractically-sized nostrils and hilariously small toes, to the way they look like all these other people you know but still manage to be a brand new special-edition never-seen-before human being. But somehow they just get more miraculous, the more of them you meet. 

B - Birthday filling. I went to the dentist on my birthday for a filling. I asked him, before he froze my mouth, if I'd be able to eat right after and he said, "Yes, why?" And I said, "Because I'm a dummy and I made plans for a birthday lunch right after this." And he was like, "It's your birthday?!" And I was like, "Yup!" The hygienist said she thought it was ridiculous that anyone would schedule a filling for their birthday, and I was like, "Well, I was just hoping this place had one of those deals like at Starbucks or Dairy Queen where you get a free filling on your birthday. And she laughed and I laughed but then when I went to pay at the end I found that the dentist had discounted me $300 off the price of the bill (I do not have dental insurance) and the receptionist said, "He said to tell you it's your free birthday filling." And the hygienist said, "Well good, because no one ever comes in here on their birthday." And I said, "Well from now on I am ONLY coming in here on my birthday."

C - Conferences: I got to take part in the Saskatchewan Writers' Guild's annual conference, on a panel with my friends Iryn Tushabe, Rhea McFarlane, and Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye. I also went to a literary conference at the RPL and Talking Fresh in the spring. 

D - Did a lot of interviews—podcasts, TV, radio, internet, in person, and newspaper. I tried to count them up, and I can think of almost 20 but feel like I'm missing some. 

E - Enjoyed my summer. For the most part, this year, I was able to just hang out with the kids and have a real summer (with a few stolen hours here and there to get work done). The summer of 2023, my edits schedules destroyed any semblance of relaxation, so this was loooovely. 

F - First Reads. I Think We've Been Here Before was selected for Amazon's First Reads program in the States, which means that it was available one month early, as an ebook, for anyone who subscribes to Amazon Prime. This was my third time in the program, and it's always such an honor (and a rush).

G - Grant! I got my first ever arts grant from SK Arts to take a book-related trip in 2025—to Denver, Colorado! More on that in next year's ABCs Of post, hopefully.

H - Hiking. People from mountainy places would maybe take issue with this one and say I should move it down to W and just call it walking. But I already have one for W and we did find a few places to "hike" in Saskatchewan this year. Our hills may be tiny but shut up; they count.

I - I Think We've Been Here Before was published, first in Canada in September, and then in the rest of the places in December. I had a party in November and so many wonderful people came out. 

J - Just taught one writing workshop. The people I met that day were so lovely. I don't think teaching is for me, but I'm glad I did it.

K - Kept on doodling on sticky notes to try to keep my brain fresh.

L - Live music: This year, the only live music I saw was at festivals! Cathedral Village Arts Festival (Marissa Burwell, Andy Shauf, Natural Sympathies, lots of other sweet bands), Regina Jazz Festival (my mom's cousin's husband's jazz quartet played a set in a park on a rainy day and that was lovely), Shake the Lake (Steven Page, George Thorogood and the Destroyers). I continue to be sad about how scarce live music has been in my life since about 2020. This year! This is the one! Bring back the music!

M - Met so many author friends IRL—such a treat, for a person who lives in the actual middle of nowhere. Amber Cowie came to Regina in the spring, and then when I went to Toronto I met Samantha Bailey, Marissa Stapley, Kerry Clare, Sherri Vanderveen, and Vikki VanSickle. Robert Penner flew in from Winnipeg to go on tour with me, and I know she's from Weyburn, which isn't very far away, but I met Victoria Koops this year too! 

N - News! My most exciting news in 2024 was probably the thing about my book being optioned. It was very fun to announce that and be excited with everyone. I reeeeealllly hope to have more exciting news on that front in next year's post.

O - On TV! Was pleasantly surprised a few times to hear that my book went on TV without me. This is my preference—not being the one on the screen, but still getting the publicity.

P - Public speaking. Dare I say that this is the year I finally conquered my fear of talking in front of people? This has been on every single ABCs list I've written since V&V first came out and I recognized both my intense fear of public speaking and also the frequency with which I would have to do it if I were to hang out in the author sphere. I had, for a while, begun to believe that my lot in life was just to be perpetually in panic attack mode, but I had an event just the other night and at one point I picked up my book to read from it and realized, with shock and awe and excitement, that it wasn't shaking in my hands. Like, at all. This is a huge deal for me! 

Q - Quantum Entanglement! This was the year of it. And hopefully every year from here on in also is.

R - Read lots of books. I don't know how many. Lots! Not lots compared to some people, but so many compared to others.

Or!

R - Russian copies of Valencia and Valentine landed in my mailbox.

S - Started working, EXTREMELY part time, for Barclay's landscaping company. 

T - Toronto! I still need to do a whole blog post about that trip. What a daydream come true. 

U - UM! The lovely people at Indigo put my books at the front of the store by the cash register. Thrilling, truly.

V - Voted! It felt like there were a lot of elections this year. Three, I guess? We voted in the ones we could vote in and tuned in to hear the results. 

W - Worked on three books. Finished none of them. That's okay! I was busy doing other things.

X - XXXVII (I turned 37) 

and 

 

X - XV (Barclay and I celebrated our 15th anniversary!)

Y - Yes! We started doing Fart Walks with the kids. I saw a lady on Tik-Tok talking about the benefits of a post-supper walk, including steady blood sugar, better mood, increased circulation, and smoother digestion. She and her husband go every night and they call them Fart Walks, because of the digestion thing, I guess. I don't know about noticeable benefits, but I'm sure they're good for us. And like, one time, it was raining when we left and Sully said, "Well. I guess tonight we're going for a wet fart walk," and that was gross and funny and we all laughed and I've heard that laughter is the best medicine. 

Therefore, fart walks are the best medicine.

Z - Zapped my friends in lazer tag, competed against them at that live video game place (the name of which escapes me right now), did an escape room, went to a dance party, and went to the arcade SEVERAL times. Apparently this was the year of acting like a preteen? Wonderful.

Okay! I'm sure there were other notable things about this year, but those are the ones that I thought of today. Tag, you're IT.

Talk About People Behind Their Backs!

I had a dream the other night that I went to a library that sold books. And I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, Suzy, that's called a bookstore. But it wasn't, though. It was absolutely a library, but you had to pay for the books and then you got to keep them after. How did I know, in the dream, that it was a library, not a bookstore? Because there were librarians working there. They were absolutely librarians. You could just tell. 

I know you think that's stupid. Okay, fine, bring me a librarian and a person who works at a bookstore. Just bring them to me and have them stand in front of me. 100% I'll know which is which. 

So.

Anyway.

The library in my dream was named Indigo—no, I know, I know, that's the name of a major Canadian bookstore chain in real life. But in my dream, it was a library. It wasn't at all the same as the real life Indigo, because there wasn't a Starbucks attached to it. And, like I said, the librarians! They were all over the place. 

So in this dream, I'm walking around this library, and I see this display with Valencia and Valentine (my first book) on it. Someone has made the cover artwork into a calendar, and it's very pretty and I call Barclay over and go, "Hey, look! They've made my book into a calendar!" 

I know. I know libraries don't generally have calendars, and that Indigo bookstores generally do. Your beef is not with me; this is a dream. So I guess your beef is with my unconscious self, which is not here at the moment, because I'm awake. So chill.

Anyway.

In this dream, I'm standing there looking at the calendar and someone passes by and says, "Huh, I wonder why they chose that book to make into a calendar? It's her worst one."

And that person walks away and I just stand there, looking at my sweet little debut and thinking, Is this not a good book? 

This, of course, is not the first time my brain has ever turned this question over. When I was querying that book and it got rejected, that was the first time I asked that question. And again when it was on subs and got rejected. And again when it was released into the world and people wrote mean reviews about it and, probably most of all, when people I knew in real life read it and then gave extremely half-hearted, "Oh, good for you for writing a book!" comments (or no comments at all!) (so well-meaning! I hold no grudges! I just internalize the self-doubt and move right along!). 

But there's this saying, "Frontlist sells backlist," which means that when you come out with a new book, and people like it, they might be inclined to go off and find your older books and read those too. And this has been a small source of anxiety for me (there are those reading this who are rolling their eyes and saying to themselves, "Good grief! Is everything a source of anxiety for you, Suzy?" Yep!). 

Because Valencia and Valentine was my very first attempt at fiction, and it was the most fun I've ever had writing a book, and it was a very vulnerable book to write, and one that sits very close to my heart, so when people shoot arrows at it, I get hit. And, also? It was probably my least well-received book—because it's a book about mental illness, and aging, and it's kind of sad and people found it fairly depressing, and again, I hold no grudges, but still! Ouch! 

So I'm not really surprised about this dream I had, is what I'm saying, with the Valencia and Valentine calendar and the stranger doubting the validity or the goodness or whatever of that book. Because the stranger, really, was my own brain. 

And because that book is now a full five years old, it's kind of faded away into the background—people aren't seeking it out, people aren't leaving reviews on it as much, people don't ask me about it in interviews. And I've been kind of okay to just let it float around out there, much more quietly—but now people might find it again and that's a little scary.

So I woke up from that dream and felt a little gross, the way you feel when someone sees you do something stupid and you can't take it back or make them unsee it. But then I logged onto TikTok and the very first thing that came up was...a video wherein someone was talking about how much they loved V&V. 

I love, love, love when things like this happen. It feels good, of course, but it also reminds me that it's always a good idea to say good things about other people (or other people's books) behind their backs. You never know when it might find its way to them right when they could really use it. 

The Dishwasher Post

I've been about as active as a tree these past couple of weeks. Swaying a little in the wind, but mostly staying rooted in one spot. You want me over there? You'll have to literally chop my legs out from under me and haul me over in a wheelbarrow.

To be fair to me, because it's important that we're fair to me, it's been kind of a busy fall. Barclay went to Louisville, I went to Toronto, we all went to Saskatoon and Frontier. I had my book launch events and parties, I did interviews. The book was published in Canada in September, then hit First Reads in November, and will publish everywhere it hasn't already been in less than two weeks (this is by far the most prolonged publishing experience I have ever had). Behind the scenes, I've been working on other things, pitching other things, hanging out with my family, and trying to keep the house clean. 

But I've also been thinking about how much I would like to write about the things that have happened this fall. It's been special, stressful, weird, fun, terrifying, miraculous, challenging, exciting, etc. Good. It's been very good. And I've learned a lot and grown a lot, and after 16 years of using this blog as a place to process life events, it feels like I haven't fully learned something or experienced something until I've written it down. But every time I sit down to write it out, I think, what first? Where do I even start?

Maybe it's like cleaning a house. You don't (or at least, I don't) start at the beginning of the house and clean it in order. I pick the most manageable thing and do that first. I load the dishwasher. An easy, small task that has a big impact and clears the counter off and helps me to see what needs to be done next. 

Okay, so this is my loading the dishwasher post. It's not the first thing that happened this fall, or the most important, or the biggest. It's just the first thing I'm going to write about because, oddly, it's the first thing that comes to mind when I think about Fall 2024. Ahem:

When I travel to a different city, my brain short-circuits with enthusiasm. It screams, LOOK AT ALL THIS NEW STUFF. IT'S SO SUPERIOR TO ANYTHING YOU HAVE BACK HOME. I just love everything so much. I think, Why don't I live here? Look how beautiful these people are! The buildings! The trees! Their strangers are so kind, their sunsets are so pretty. Even their squirrels are better than our squirrels! 

Rose-colored glasses, they call it. I always pack my rose-colored glasses.

So, okay,

I was landing the plane in Toronto—like, I wasn't landing the plane; I don't know why I wrote it like that but I'm leaving it because it's fun to imagine that I was landing the plane—but anyway, the pilot was landing the plane, and I was looking out the window. I saw the CN Tower and all of the lovely skyscrapers, and some tiny baseball diamonds and sweet little trucks doodling along that I could imagine plucking up off the roads and throwing right into Lake Ontario. As we got closer still, I saw rows and rows of what looked like lawn chairs, just perfectly lined up, a whole field of them, and I thought, what's this? It looks like an outdoor music festival! An outdoor music festival, on a Wednesday? In October? Amazing! I was so proud of Toronto for that. In Saskatchewan, we keep our outdoor music festivals to the summer months, because as soon as September 15 hits, everyone goes into their houses and starts complaining about the weather on Facebook. Oh,Toronto! I gazed down at it with my rose-colored glasses.

So I was sitting there in the sky, just thrilled that Toronto was holding some kind of outdoor music festival, and I was wondering who was playing and what I was missing and I was kind of marveling at how neatly the people had lined up their lawn chairs—maybe the festival planners had spray-painted lines on the ground so people would know exactly where to sit—when the plane dipped just a tiny bit lower and I noticed that all of the people seemed to be holding bouquets of flowers and I thought, wow! Everyone has flowers! That's just so lovel—and then I realized all at once that what I was seeing was not a music festival, not shiny happy people sitting in perfect rows holding bouquets of flowers and enjoying a concert on a Wednesday afternoon in October but actually...a graveyard. Neat rows of headstones with wreaths and funeral sprays on them. 

And if that doesn't perfectly showcase my rose-colored glasses travel situation, I don't know what does. 

Anyway. That's the dishwasher post. Tomorrow, I'll vacuum the floor. And I don't really know what that means just yet.

Ulp!

In my second novel, Sorry I Missed You, there's an aging punk named Larry, who can't quite get over the fact that the scene as he once knew it has changed. He misses shows in friends' basements and non-orthopedic shoes and he's quite gatekeepy about the whole thing (but only because he cares so much and feels so adrift). Over the course of the book, he develops this dream of writing for Razorcake, a respected punk zine, and it becomes kind of a lifeline to him, a way to stay connected to the music of his youth in and come to terms with where he is—and what it is—now. 

Razorcake actually is, in real life, a respected punk zine, published bi-monthly out of Los Angeles, California. However, the Razorcake in my book looks very different from the IRL one—it's more of an amalgamation of a few different sites and zines, and I had originally been planning on changing the name altogether, lest anyone familiar with the Real Razorcake read my little book and take issue with the things I changed to serve my plot. But then I was like, "Nah. I like this name, 

and 

I like that this is a real zine, 

and 

I like this zine, 

and 

no one from the real Razorcake is ever going to read this book."

Welp, fast forward to two days ago: I got an email from a guy named Todd who had finished reading Sorry I Missed You the night before. Oh, and...Todd just so happens to be the editor of Razorcake.

ULP.

It reminded me of the time I got an email from Ken Casey of the Dropkick Murphys, who also made an appearance in Sorry I Missed You. I didn't give him a very hard time in the book, but I also didn't take great care to speak effusively of him—because, like, again, as if the Dropkick Murphys are out there reading book club fiction about women working through relational issues in a coffee shop in Regina, Saskatchewan.

But again, I misjudged! 

Luckily, both Ken and Todd are gracious and very nice people, and they didn't give me a very hard time (though they each did give me a little hard time) (but Todd also gave me some great music recs, so I feel like it was worth it). 

But I've learned a valuable lesson—so valuable I guess I had to learn it twice, and I hereby solemnly swear that from now on, if I use the name of a real person or thing in any of my books, I will be so much more careful and conscious of the fact that one day their name could pop up in my email inbox. 

(Also, thank you, Jennifer Whiteford, for tipping off your editor to Razorcake's presence in my book. It has made for a lovely email correspondence and several new bands on rotation over here. :))

(Also also, speaking of Jennifer Whiteford, she is also a novelist who has a book coming out THIS TUESDAY and it looks so good.)

Book Tour!

Years ago, when I sold my first book, I made a list of writer goals. At the time, I didn't know very much about the actual life of a modern-day author. My ideals were informed by movies about fictitious authors, novels about fictitious authors, and magazine interviews with only very, very famous and successful real-life authors. I think this is why, when I made that list, it had on it all kinds of ridiculous, out-of-touch, nonsense goals. I really thought, there, I've done the hard part. Now it's all downhill; now I get to write down all my wildest daydreams and check them off as they come true, one by one.

LOL.

One of these goals? Go on a book tour! That was a feature in every single one of those movies and books, the debut author being sent by her publisher to various cool cities, picked up at the airport in a limo by a nervous publicist, somehow having amassed a large and loyal following in the three days since their book was acquired, edited, and published, despite not spending any time (on screen, anyway) doing any kind of social media marketing. 

I was like, yes, that! Me! Want. Need, even!

But movies about writers are rarely accurate or realistic (despite the fact that they would, one would think, sometimes be written by writers) and one of the first things I learned as an author newbie was that most publishers don't really send most authors on books tours anymore. Yes, you might see authors going on book tours, but often those are paid for by the authors themselves, not the publishers (the exception seems to be that if you are already a very famous, very important author, then, as with everything in this business, you get to live that dream movie version of the author life—which is why my magazine exposure to only the most important writers of our time didn't give me such an accurate glimpse into the life of the...less important authors, which in reality is most of us).

I've released two books now. For my debut my friends threw me a party at The Paper Umbrella, which I never really posted about on here because I was so overwhelmed that entire summer, but it was beautiful and amazing and I was spoiled with a massive crowd of good friends and cookies decorated like the cover of Valencia and Valentine and twinkle lights in the back alley for when people got too warm in the shop and needed to get fresh air. It was so perfect that I didn't even mind that no one was sending me on a tour. 

For my second book, I was meant to do a little signing at a book store in Saskatoon, as well as a launch party here in the city, and that was going to be the extent of my self-funded book tour, but everything got cancelled because it was June 2020 and there were, you know, other things going on in the world at the time. 

So when I wrote my third book, the idea of a book tour was like a helium balloon I'd let go of long ago and completely forgotten about. 

However.

When my agent sent me the deal memo from Radiant, who bought the Canadian rights to I Think We've Been Here Before, I was pleasantly surprised to see included in their offer that they would "support at least a three city tour" and that particular daydream came floating back into my brain. 

It's fun when you let go of a dream and then it sneaks up on you again out of nowhere like that.

So anyway, all that to say, above is an early draft of my little book tour announcement graphic thing. There should be another date added soon, but the ones on there already are fairly finalized. If you're in any of these places at any of these times, you should come hang out. If you own a bookstore or are a librarian or have a book club and you want to hang, I'd be very happy to chat about adding your bookstore or library or whatever to the little book tour announcement graphic thing. If you're in Saskatchewan, you can book me through this form, and if you're not, email me at suzy@suzykrause.com and we can at least talk about it. :)

Book Soundtrack: I Think We've Been Here Before

 It is September 6, 2024, exactly two weeks and four days until pub day. 

Or, so I thought. 

I went into this month thinking to myself, okay, that is happening this month, but not until the END of this month. But then a couple of indie book stores put the book out, almost a full month early, and people started messaging me saying they were buying it. And then today, I woke up to more messages from people saying that Indigo sent out their preorders.

So what I'm saying is, this book is launched. This book is eager and sneaky and jailbreaky and it is OUT THERE where just any old person can get it and read it, and I can no longer smile smugly at everyone and say, "Sorry, you'll just have to wait until September 24," while secretly freaking out inside my brain trying to figure out how to flee the country before I have to start having awkward in-person conversations with people about my book. 

It's here. We're there. Have mercy.

But in honor of this turn of events, I'm going share with you the Official I Think We've Been Here Before Playlist (pretend there are tooting horns now). If you've been here long enough, you know that I love making playlists and that I always make playlists for each of my books. 

This time though, I'm going to share with you the lyrics from the songs that go with the book. You can do one of several things:

1. Listen to each song after you've read the corresponding chapter.

2. Listen to each song while you're reading the corresponding chapter.

3. Listen to each song before you read the corresponding chapter.

4. Listen to the whole playlist before and after you read the book and see if you feel any feelings either way.

I'd probably do a combo of #1 and #4. But you do you.

Okay. That's the preamble. Here's the playlist!

Chapter 1 (Nora): Last Christmas by Wham! (The Jimmy Eat World version)

Last Christmas, I gave you my heart
But the very next day, you gave it away 
This year, to save me from tears
I'll give it to someone special


Chapter 4 (Hilda & Family): THE ONE MOMENT by OK Go

You're right
There's nothing more lovely
There's nothing more profound
Than the certainty
Than the certainty that all of this will end
That all of this will end


Chapter 5 (Nora and Sonja): WE WON'T LAST THROUGH DECEMBER by LJ Mercer

We won't last through December

My stomache's in my shoes

Chapter 9 (Petra): WE WILL BECOME SILHOUETTES by The Postal Service

I wanted to walk through the empty streets
And feel something constant under my feet
But all the news reports recommended that I stay indoors
Because the air outside will make
Our cells divide at an alarming rate
Until our shells simply cannot hold
All our insides in and that's when we'll explode
And it won't be a pretty sight

And we'll become
Silhouettes when our bodies finally go


Chapter 32 (Marlen & Hilda): SUBURBAN TREES by Jump, Little Children

(Note: This is a song I stumbled across on a Spotify playlist while I was doing my final edits. The scene where Marlen turns on the radio and the song The End of the World by Skeeter Davis is playing was already in there by then, so this felt like such a lucky find.)

Credits on the wall 

scrolling ultra vision 

static on the call 

applauding the decision 

End of the World 

is playing on the radio


Chapter 36 (Hank & Irene): IN THE VALLEY BELOW by Dove Season

The season's coming
There's room for both of us
You can't choose your love
You can't choose your love
I could use your love
Can't lose your love
If this is the end
Let's start all over
Start all over again
I believe we can
Start all over
On earth as it is in heaven

Chapter 37 (Nora & Jacob): LOVER by Taylor Swift

We could leave the Christmas lights up 'til January
This is our place, we make the rules
And there's a dazzling haze, a mysterious way about you dear
Have I known you 20 seconds or 20 years?


Chapter 55 (Marlen & Hilda): SONG OF GOOD HOPE by Glen Hansard

Watch the signs now
You'll know what they mean
You'll be fine now
Just stay close to me
And may good hope, walk with you through everything

CHAPTER 59 (Nora & Jacob): APOCALYPSE NOW (& LATER) by Laura Jane Grace and the Devouring Mothers

The bliss of your kiss in the apocalypse
On top of the world, at the end of the world, with you


Chapter 62 (Nora & Jacob): IN THE AEROPLANE OVER THE SEA by Neutral Milk Hotel

What a beautiful dream
That could flash on the screen
In a blink of an eye and be gone from me
Soft and sweet
Let me hold it close and keep it here with me
And one day we will die
And our ashes will fly from the aeroplane over the sea
But for now we are young
Let us lay in the sun
And count every beautiful thing we can see


Chapter 68 (Everyone): STARS AND MOONS by Dizzy

I am starting to see stars and moons
(It's an awful sham, but I follow suit)
This is how it ends, a courageous boom
(Neighbours wave their hands, as we're passing through)
And it's awful sad how two lovers bloom
(Come and watch them dance, dance into their doom)
I am starting to see stars and moons
(Come and watch them dance)


Chapter 69 (Everyone): DON’T BE AFRAID, YOU’RE ALREADY DEAD by Akron/Family

Don't be afraid, you're already dead
Don't be afraid, you're already dead
Don't be afraid, you're already dead
Don't be afraid, you're already dead


Chapter 70 (Everyone): THE LAST CHRISTMAS (WE EVER SPEND APART) by The Arkells
(Note: I put this song on the playlist before I read all of the lyrics. Then when I went to write this blog post, I laughed at how perfect they ended up being...)

I'm sitting by the windowsill
I got nothing but time to kill
I took this all for granted, but I won't do that again
That'll be the last Christmas

BONUS TRACK: 

TIME MACHINE by Daisy the Great

The sky is burning
No more need to hurry
We were right to worry
We were right to worry
The birds are gone now
The time has come now
Just close your eyes now
Just close your eyes now
The sea is crying
The moon is sighing
It's terrifying
It's terrifying
It's all around us
The end is ground us
The star has found us
I once read about a time machine
They learned to teach electrons
To go back to where they started
Should we go back to where we started?

Three Stories

Have I ever told you about the time I was invited to an undisclosed location for supper by a complete stranger?

I don't think I've told this story here yet. 

It happened a few years ago. I got an email in my inbox from someone who referred to themselves as 'The Concierge." 

Dear Suzy, the message began, You are cordially invited to participate in The Influencers Dinner. This exclusive dining experience brings together twelve industry leaders ranging from TV/movie stars, Olympians, scientists, and business executives to famed artists, entrepreneurs, and Nobel Laureates for great conversation, food and drink. 

Oh, I thought to myself, spam. 

I read the rest of the email anyway because I nearly never don't. It had a specific date on it, and a time (7:00 PM sharp), and it said that the location would be provided upon RSVP (it did specify that the event might not be in Canada). There was also a bullet point list of what to expect: 

* All attendees help prepare a simple meal together. No cooking experience is necessary.
* Guests do not discuss their careers.
* Once seated the attendees take turns guessing their fellow guest’s professions.
* The expense of the meal is covered by your host, Jon Levy.
* The guest list is kept secret.
* The invitation is non-transferable and only for you.

So then I was intrigued, right, because who wouldn't be? A meal at undisclosed location with quantifiably interesting strangers? It sounded cool, kind of shady, a little And Then There Were None-ish. I googled Jon Levy to see if there was a possibility that this thing might be real. 

Here's what I found: 

This

and this

and THIS.

Oh, I thought to myself, not spam.

I showed the email to Barclay. He said, "You should go."

I stared at him. 

"You think I should?" 

He nodded. "It sounds cool."

I frowned at him. "Doesn't it sound like we're all going to be murdered one by one by a host with a vendetta and I'm going to have to solve the mystery before he picks me off?"

"Well yeah," he said, "but there's a New York Times article saying it's not that. It looks legit."

He wasn't wrong. Still, I RSVPd no. 

Next story:

Did I ever tell you about the time I was invited to the Olympics in Tokyo?

This was a couple of years before the dinner party thing. I got a phone call from a guy I met once back in 2007. He lives in BC and he's a—well. He's a whole bunch of things. Podcaster, musician, studio engineer, etc. We hadn't spoken in years, but we followed each other on Instagram and he read my blog (maybe still does? Hi Jordan! Do you still read my blog?). 

Anyway. He called me up out of the blue and told me that he'd been commissioned by NBC to produce their Olympics podcasts, and he was going to Tokyo to do it, and he wanted me to come along with him as the writer. 

I told him I'd have to think about it. As one does.

Barclay got home from work and I told him about the phone call. I actually can't remember his reaction to that one, but it was probably similar to the dinner party thing. You should go and it sounds cool and all that. Barclay is truly the best, and that's one of the morals of these stories. 

But, once again, I emailed Jordan and said I couldn't go. 

(Side note, I just Googled him to make sure I was remembering correctly that it was NBC who commissioned the podcast and found out that, though the Olympics in Tokyo were kind of blighted by the whole Covid thing, Jordan went to the Olympics in Beijing in 2022 and won an Emmy for that podcast. One of two things is true: 1. I could've been on that team and won an Emmy or 2. I could've been on that team and kept Jordan from winning an Emmy and he's lucky I stayed home.)

So now you're blinking at the screen asking yourself, what is the point of these stories? You might be wishing I was standing in front of you right now so you should grab me by my shoulders and give me a good shake. You might be wanting more of an explanation as to why I said no to such objectively cool opportunities. Maybe you're wondering if I regret my decisions. 

So.

Here's the thing: Sullivan was born almost 11 years ago and in that time, I have never—not once, not one single time—left the city overnight without him. I have done one staycation in a hotel in Regina while he slept at his grandparents' house twelve minutes away. I have, twice, gone for a day trip while he was in school. 

I have watched friends go on trips without their children. Barclay has gone on trips alone. I see these people do this and while I do feel a twinge of envy, mostly I just think, HOW ARE THESE PEOPLE DOING THIS? It feels like watching someone swim with sharks or jump out of an airplane or sit with their legs dangling over the side of a mountain—things I abstractly want to do but cannot comprehend doing. My jealousy toward those who can is tempered with terror. I can't picture myself doing that, just like I can't picture myself stepping off a high diving board.

I know it's not healthy. I know it's objectively kind of silly. But it's my fear, not yours, and if you were right inside my head, you'd get it.

Have you read Valencia and Valentine (it's okay if you haven't, but there are spoilers ahead)? I wrote that book when Sully was a few years old and this terror was new to me. In the book, there's a woman who is terrified of leaving her city. She can't fly, she can't drive. She goes to the airport and eats airport muffins while she watches the planes take off, and she reads travel books from the library and she daydreams, but she doesn't get up the courage to get on a flight herself until <spoiler> she's an elderly woman. 

Lots of people on the internet were big mad about that ending. They said the book was depressing, because this woman spent her whole life afraid to do something and only did it at the very last minute, and even then she only went as far as the airport in New York and then turned around and flew home again. They felt that she didn't conquer her fear. But lots of other people understood the ending, and I think the people who understood it are the people who get that conquering a fear doesn't have to be this huge, extravagant thing, especially when your fear feels so insurmountable, and that there's not really a time limit on it either. To have done something that scares you, even at the last minute, and even if it's something that most people feel is no big deal...is a big deal.  </end spoiler>

All that to say: I said no to Tokyo and to the Mystery Dinner Party because I was afraid. And both times, I thought of the book I had just written and published, and I thought of the scene where Valencia is sitting in the airplane seat looking out the window and thinking I should've done this sooner, and while I felt a tiny bit hypocritical, I didn't feel hopeless or regretful about any of it. I just thought, hm, I'm already working this out subconsciously. I'll get there someday. And wanting to get there is probably half the battle.

Okay, one more story.

When I signed with my Canadian publisher, they asked me to go get blurbs from a few Canadian authors. I already had some American ones, but this was a Canadian book published by a Canadian publisher, so we wanted to have some Canadian authors on the cover of it. One of the authors I reached out to was Marissa Stapley (I've told this part of this story before, here). Long story short (because you can read the long version of it at that link), Marissa read my book and sent along the loveliest blurb.

Then, in June, she also sent an email asking if I would like to do an event with her in Toronto. Just me and her, at a bookstore, talking about our books.

I admit, I dismissed it right away as something that would be amazing, but which would not be happening.  I would allow myself a quick daydream, like I had with the Tokyo and dinner party emails, and then I'd come back to reality, my reality, where I can't leave the kids, and I would send a sad and apologetic email saying thank you so incredibly much, but no. 

I closed the computer and told Barclay about the email, and he did his usual supportive-but-not-pressuring husband bit. And I said, Yeah, yeah, I know. But no.

And he said, But maybe you should actually think about it. Before you say no.

So I did. Being invited to go to Toronto and do an event with a literary superstar was absolutely a dream come true—but even more than that, Marissa and I have become friends, and I really think it would be so fun to actually meet her and go for supper and get to know her IRL. Not to mention the other friends I've made but not met who live in the Toronto area—other authors and people from the blogging world and people from the publishing world and a whole sweet book club of people I've met only on Zoom...

I thought of Valencia on the airplane saying I should've done this sooner and I thought of the angry Goodreads reviewer who said that she couldn't think of anything more depressing than an adult being stuck in a jail cell they've made up in their head (and I mean, this is a terrible perspective on anxiety but I still thought of it). I thought of Tokyo and all of the interesting people I might've met at the mystery dinner party. I thought of the times I travelled on my own before becoming a mother, and about how much fun I had then, and I thought of how often I talk to my kids about anxiety and fear and how I tell them that sometimes it's okay to sit something out if you feel like you need to, but sometimes it's really, really worth it to push yourself and do something that feels scary.

And then I realized that if I kept thinking, I would go in a circle and end up at the beginning, so I stopped thinking and I sent Marissa an email.

I said yes and I hit send before I could change my mind.

And today I'm booking my flights. 

So. If you are in the Toronto area on October 10, you could come to Type Books (Junction)  at 7:30 pm and witness a 37-year-old lady doing something incredibly normal and chill, but you'll know how big of a deal it'll all be inside my head and we can exchange knowing glances. 

Spiraling

Our mailman is one of those weirdos who listens to podcasts at full volume on his phone's speaker instead of using earbuds or headphones. So, every single morning at about 9 o'clock, I hear what sounds like a small crowd of self-important men making their way up my sidewalk, talking over each other, forcing laughter, saying, "Yeah, no, but here's the thing, my guy, here's the thing—" 

This is about the time I'm making my first cup of coffee for the day. The kids go downstairs and play video games, and I sit next to the open window and try to work on the new book, or publicity stuff for the other book, or, if nothing's flowing in either of those places, I'll come on here and write a blog post. 

Clearly nothing's flowing in either of those places at the moment, because here I am.

This is kind of to be expected though and I'm trying to be gentle with my brain. My next book comes out in a little more than a month (unless you're in the States, because the pub date there has been changed, but more on that later), and I'm in this awkward space where I know I'm supposed to be yelling at everyone to post about my book! and preorder now! and ask your library to order it in! but...I still feel so weird doing that. I thought this part of things would get easier as I gained confidence in myself, but I have learned, as I've said before, that publishing is a humility boot camp and I have not actually gained said confidence. 

Maybe later?

But now is not later, and I know this because I posted a giveaway the other day on Instagram (which is still open), and the way you enter is just to share the giveaway post, either on Instagram, or by text message to a friend, or with your book club, or on Facebook, or whatever, and it is so ridiculous how nervous I was to do that. I made the post the day my author copies came in the mail and then sat on it for a week, and then decided I might not do it after all, then made a quick mental u-turn, cutting dangerously across several lanes of oncoming traffic (this is maybe a metaphor for ignoring my self preservation instincts?) and hit that terrifying post button head-on.  

Then I spent the whole day cringing, wound up so tight I thought I was going to snap my neck if I turned to look at something behind me. The worst was when the name of one of my friends appeared on my screen. I worried they were secretly judging me for being so annoying about the whole book promo thing—or, worse, not secretly judging, but openly judging in group chats and in-person conversations with other people I know. And I was sympathizing with them! At what point do you start rolling your eyes a little, you know? At what point do I start to sound like the self-important men on my mailman's blaring podcasts? Join my Patreon! Buy my sponsored products! I have opinions about the infrastructure of New York!

There's just so much noise online these days, and we're all very tired of being advertised at; I'm worried about adding to it. Words like 'must read' have begun to sound less like a glowing endorsement and more like a homework assignment. I wish my books could just go out into the world, separate from me, and do their thing, but they're clinging to my legs, hiding behind me, making me speak for them like shy children. And I have to do it, because if I want to write more books, I need to sell the ones I've already written. I hate the word 'hustle' and yet hustle I must.

I guess at some point you just need to trust that your friends are going to love you even if they need to mute you on social media for a month or two? Or maybe you can even dare to believe that some of them enjoy seeing your name pop up on their screen, yet again, because they understand that a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do and she is so, so, so sorry but she's gonna do it anyway?

Anyway. There is no point to this ramble. I'm just spiraling (just a dainty, neat little spiral, nothing dramatic) and I need you to know that I am EXTREMELY aware that I'm very annoying, and I will continue to be annoying until probably December, and then I'm going to chill right out and be so fun to be around. 

(But actually I will be spiraling in a different direction at that point because my book will be out in the world and I never handle that well. Who keeps letting me do this?)

Quantum Entanglement and Modest Mouse

I have this friend; her name's Becky. We've known each other for almost two decades now, but we didn't become Actual Friends right away. She was one of those people who just kept crossing my path until we realized we were destined to be in each other's lives.

We went to the same school in The Middle of Nowhere, Saskatchewan but ran in different circles. She moved to Saskatoon after that and just so happened to live in a house with a close friend of mine. I'd stay in that house when I visited that friend, but didn't really interact with Becky at all when I was there (although! Once I played a Modest Mouse album on my friend's laptop and Becky got into them because of that, so that counts as the very first of many music recommendations to pass between the two of us. Years later, I would go for coffee with her for the first time and we'd talk about music and she'd say she liked Modest Mouse and I'd get so excited to have something in common with her and she'd tell me that it was me who'd introduced her to them in the first place).

When I moved to Regina and started dating my now-husband, he mentioned one day that he'd said my name at work and one of his coworkers had been like, "Huh, I wonder if that's the same Suzy I sort of know." I said, What's the girl's name? And he said, Becky. And I said, Of course it is. 

We became real friends after that. I don't think we really had a choice, which is a good thing. 

She moved away a few years ago, but we stay in touch, texting and visiting and sending snail mail. And here's the weird thing: on some other inexplicable level, our brains have stayed in touch even without our technological aid.

The first time I really noticed this, I was sitting at my desk working on a book and a song popped into my head that I hadn't heard or thought of in years—probably since I was a teenager. I texted Becky:

Remember this song from, like, 1998? It randomly popped into my head this morning.

Her reply:

SUZY. That song just as randomly came to me today; I've had it on repeat over here!

This keeps happening, and it never gets less weird—if anything it's stranger each time because the probability goes down. Chances of something like that happening once? Slim but not nonexistent. Chances of it happening over and over...?

So weird.

And it extends beyond music. She'll become interested in a very specific topic and text me about it, only to find I've been reading articles about that thing and listening to podcasts about it already. A person from some leg of our shared history will come to both of our minds, unbidden, at the same time. I'll think of her and my phone will light up with her name on the screen. It's like some part of our brains, at some point, got synced up.

One day, a year or so after the first notable instance of our invisible communications, I was listening to a podcast (and I so wish I could remember the name of it so I could share it with you) on which a physicist was explaining the concept of quantum entanglement. He was talking about how scientists had figured out how to entangle two particles so that they behave as one object. They could put one particle on a spaceship and send it into outer space, and still the objects would not become unlinked. The podcast explained that this was a process that happened naturally as well, but it wasn't very well understood yet how.

As described by Space.com:

"Quantum entanglement is a bizarre, counterintuitive phenomenon that explains how two subatomic particles can be intimately linked to each other even if separated by billions of light-years of space. Despite their vast separation, a change induced in one will affect the other."

Or, as Einstein famously put it:

"Spooky action at a distance."

I found this concept fascinating. It feels, at first, a little magical and abstract, but I think the thing I love most about it is that it's just...science. It's testable and provable and it points to the fact that there is so much more going on around us (and within us?) than is physically or easily observable.

So. Am I saying that Becky and I are entangled on a quantum level, and that's why we always get the same super-random songs stuck in our heads, or get obsessed with the same topics at the same time without each other's knowledge, or any other number of strange coincidental things? I don't know. I've done a lot of reading about it, and there seems to be some debate about whether it's possible for people to become entangled with each other, but there also seems to be some proof of it. And when I was writing I Think We've Been Here Before, I decided that in the world in which I was setting this scenario and these characters? Yes. It's possible. And this is the cool thing about writing fiction: you get to learn as much as you possibly can about the way the world actually works, you get to marvel at it, sit in awe of it...and then, once you feel like you have a grasp on the rules, you get to break or bend or stretch whichever ones you want to suit your purposes. You get to fill in the blanks where scientists have said, "We don't know about this!"

It's very fun.

Book Soundtrack: Sorry I Missed You

Shortly after Sorry I Missed You came out, I began to get emails and texts and passing comments from various people asserting that they knew—they knew—exactly who I had used as inspiration for the character of Larry, the slightly embarrassing, badly-aging ex-punk. And their confidence was so funny, because no two people guessed the same person, and no one guessed the person who had really inspired him. 

Partly because no single person had inspired him—he was an amalgamation of people I’ve seen in coffee shops and people I’ve met once or twice and now follow on instagram and people I knew in high school and people I know now and…well, me. 

Actually, mostly me. 

I get why people didn’t guess that one—Larry is a man, first of all, and I’m not a man. Larry is a solid decade or so older than me. Larry listens to old punk at the exclusion of all else while my taste in music spans a lot of genres and decades. Larry is a whole bunch of other things that I’m not.

Besides all of that, a lot of people just plain didn’t like Larry, and thought I had written him in an unlikeable way because I didn’t like him either. So how could he be me? If I were basing a character on myself, wouldn’t I cast them in a more agreeable light? 

But this is true for pretty much every unlikeable character I’ve ever written: I think they come across as unlikeable or unliked because they’re based on me—because when I’m writing looking inward, I’m not afraid to be mean the way I would be if I’d been inspired by someone who could conceivably read the book and recognize themselves. Aren’t we all our own worst critic? And isn’t that, kind of, an asset in this case?

So what of mine did I give to Larry? A deep love for music—live music, especially—and an instinct to be a little gatekeepy about it, borne mostly out of sadness for the way the world is changing, sadness for the way that he himself is changing, sadness that things can’t just stay the way they were (because how they were, in that little pocket of time, in those venues, with those people, was just so fun. And maybe Larry, like myself, suffers from a lack of self-awareness about this. He has a hard time recognizing that things are fun for the next generations too, even if it looks different now). 

But, as characters often do, Larry also gave some things to me!

Like I said: he was more than a decade older than I was when I wrote that book, so the music scene of his youth was pretty different from the one I’d experienced. I grew up in Frontier, a tiny village far, far away from…well, anything. We did not have a thriving punk scene. We did not have an indie record store. We didn’t even have high speed internet; if I wanted to download a single song it required four hours of internet connection, usually thwarted by a family member innocently picking up the phone somewhere in the house. So my exposure to punk music in my teen years was limited to a couple of local bands (“local” meaning within a two hour radius of me) and a CD binder I borrowed from a friend for the better part of a year that contained a lot of burned CDs and every single Fat Wreck Chords compilation album ever made. There was also one Very Exciting Road Trip to Calgary for the Warped Tour at the end of my grade 12 year. After that, I moved to Saskatoon and started going to punk and hardcore shows at the Bassment all the time, but that scene was, by then, fairly far removed from the DIY punk scene of the 90s. 

So I had to do a little research, is what I’m saying, which was very fun. I read Razorcake and a lot of very pretentious but wonderful blogs and I scoured Reddit and followed several musical rabbit holes all over the place on Spotify. I found, expectedly, that people who are really intense about music are intense about it in very similar ways across genres and generations—and maybe that’s why so many people read Sorry I Missed You and thought, “HEY, that’s meant to be so-and-so!” or “Hey, I think that’s me!” or whatever.

Annnnyway. 

Here’s the playlist I made when I was writing that book. It has a few songs from my “research,” as well as a lot of songs about ghosting and being ghosted, songs about aging, and songs about getting over people who feel impossible to get over. Because those are the things that book is about. :)