When I'm not writing novels I spend most of my time editing magazines. On days like today I'm glad not to be a daily journalist trying to cover breaking news. Let's see: Senator Robert Byrd dies, which has the unforeseen effect of endangering financial reform, just as the death of Ted Kennedy seemed to doom health care reform; the Elena Kagan hearings begin; the Supreme Court rules that cities can't restrict handgun ownership while it upholds the power of the government to regulate the accounting industry and agrees to hear a challenge to Arizona's notorious new immigration law. Plus the Netherlands (my sentimental favorite of the remaining teams) eliminates Slovakia from World Cup contention. And it's only just past noon.
A Sea of Librarians
I am at the annual American Librarian Association conference in Washington, D.C. as a guest of the publisher of my large-print edition, Center Point Press (which is based coincidentally in my home state of Maine). I signed copies of the book yesterday and will be back at the booth between 1 and 3 pm today. If you are in town and coming to the conference, I hope you'll visit me.
Yesterday, I arrived at the convention center just as the gates were opening, and I don't know how to say this, but I was just overwhelmed by the sheer number of librarians present. Because libraries are some of my favorite places in the world, I have found this conference a reassuring place to be, although I worry about the future of community libraries in an increasingly digital world. But there is a vibrance here and a feeling of good fellowship that is bracing.
I also had what I think was my first official celebrity moment. A woman in line saw my name badge and exclaimed, "The Poacher's Son!" It turns out she is a huge fan of the book. And yes, that experience, of being recognized and praised by a stranger, was as cool as it sounds.
Welcome to the "Real Maine"
I was delighted to read Judy Harrison's review of The Poacher's Son in today's Bangor Daily News. The review's title alone —"Doiron Mystery Takes Readers into the Real Maine"—is cause for celebration. I worked hard to describe my home state without any whitewashing or bullshit, and winning the imprimatur of the BDN is a big deal for me.
If I might be allowed the permission of selectively quoting from Harrison's review:
It is not the rather predictable plot that makes Doiron’s writing so engaging. It is his descriptions of the Maine rarely advertised by the state Department of Tourism or showcased in the glossy pages of Down East that captivates the reader. Doiron could do for Maine what the late Tony Hillerman did for the Southwest in his mysteries featuring Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee.
Residents of the Pine Tree State...will snatch up these mysteries because the author takes readers into “the real Maine” from their armchairs.
I'll gladly accept having my plot called predictable (I'll aim to do throw in more surprises the next time, Judy) if it earns me a comparison to the late, great Tony Hillerman.
"Dimestore Dostoyevsky"
Love this line from Allen Barra's first-rate essay on Jim Thompson's Legacy:
Thompson’s influence on recent crime fiction is profound, including James Ellroy and even Cormac McCarthy, whose No Country for Old Men, despite its high-falutin’ title from Yeats, is Jim Thompson with an existential oil slick.
I'm not a Michael Winterbottom fan, but I like Casey Affleck (who made a surprisingly effective Patrick Kenzie) and I might make an exception for this film:
Update on 2010-06-21 00:47 by Paul Doiron
This line from Barra is pretty good, too:
No other pulp writer, not even Mickey Spillane, will give you the feeling that when you put his books down you need to wash your hands with antibacterial soap.
Teddy Roosevelt in Maine
It's a little known fact of American history that Theodore Roosevelt spent a considerable amount of time in Maine as a young man. While the future President was still a Harvard student, he began the project of transforming himself from "a thin pale youngster with bad eyes and a weak heart" into the Rough Rider he later became. During this impressionable time in his life, Roosevelt made the acquaintance of a legendary North Woods guide and logger named William Wingate Sewall.
Starting in 1878, Sewall began taking TR hunting, camping, and trapping in the backcountry around Mount Katahdin in northern Maine. Sewall's true legacy, however, was helping to instill in the young Roosevelt a deep reverence for wild places that led, indirectly, to the creation of the modern conservation movement.
We've told this story before in Down East, but now my colleague Andrew Vietze has written a critically acclaimed book on Roosevelt and Sewall's unconventional friendship. It's called Becoming Teddy Roosevelt, and if you are interested in Maine and history, you should read it.