Date
Thu April 18, 2013
Books Get Both a Push and the Squeeze at Luminato 2013
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The Word on the Street and the Weather
Submitted by Becky Toyne on September 26, 2014 - 10:37am
On the morning of the 25th annual Word on the Street festival (WOTS) in Toronto, I awoke at 7 a.m. to the dispiriting sound of torrential rain. I snuggled under the covers with the Sunday paper and guiltily wished I hadn't made a commitment to go and stand in a tent for most of the day. I wished the rain would stop. I wished I owned a pair of wellies. At 8 a.m., the rain was still hammering down. At 9 a.m., thunder had joined the rain. By 9:30 a.m. I’d realized it was also humid. My hair had tipped me off: it was large. I began my now annual ritual of figuring out what to wear to a) be presentable in front on an audience, while b) standing exposed to the elements for four hours. I have learned that for Word on the Street, sartorial options are key. I left the house in T-shirt and jean-jacket, toting a scarf, a light sweater, a waterproof jacket, and an umbrella in a bag — just in case. But by the time I’d even made it as far as the front porch, the sun had struggled out from behind the clouds. And out it stayed for the rest of the day. The weather gods had smiled kindly on WOTS 2014. From late morning until mid-afternoon I hosted the Vibrant Voices of Ontario Stage, hearing readings from, and engaging in some lovely onstage chit-chat with, seven writers in four hours. In case you missed it, here’re the Coles notes:
When my stint on stage was over, I took a stroll around Queen’s Park in the now-scorching sun to see what was what (or should that be "what was WOTS"?). I peeped into some tents to check out the programming (including sign language on stage at the Amazon.ca Bestsellers Stage), and said Hi to many friends manning magazine booths, who still had wet feet from setting up shop in the early-morning monsoon. Like the Coach House Wayzgoose (which I wrote about earlier in the month) WOTS is a massive end-of-summer coming together of the publishing crowd, but unlike almost anything else, it’s also a huge community event: fun, family friendly and free to attend. I met one of my best friends at my first WOTS, many chapters ago, and have had memorable conversations with both book-trade friends and book-reading strangers alike at every festival since. WOTS attracted a crowd of more than 200,000 this year. And when you consider than 5,000 sales can a Canadian bestseller make, those 200,000 represent a pretty significant voting block for the future of our business. But that big change is a year away. With Eden Mills Festival in Guelph and WOTS chapters across the country already having taken place, the 2014 fall festival season is officially underway. As I write, the Kingston WriterFest is in progress (in Kingston, obviously), and Toronto’s International Festival of Authors is a mere month away. Writers: it’s time to meet your readers. There are hundreds of thousands of them. I saw them with my own eyes last weekend. See you at the festivals, rain or shine.
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