Much as I love

Matt Damon and the Bourne franchise, I don't think I would be the ideal travel companion for Jason Bourne (and not just because I'm happily married to James, who is not on the run, which I appreciate when I'm doing things like planning dinner parties and trips to the garbage dump.)

But let's say that I wasn't married to James...
[insert dream-sequence-y twinkly noise and some dry smoke]

SCENE
Susan is walking down the side of the road in Nanaimo, B.C. with her dog, Frank.
A mysterious man in a dark jacket and trousers and short hair leaps over a backyard fence and sprints down the road. He stops when he reaches Susan and Frank.

Mysterious Man: (panting) Excuse me. Can you tell me where the nearest international airport is?

Susan: Oh, god. I'm not sure. I HATE flying. And international travel, because it's so far away. The world, I mean. Although, I did pick up my friend Abbie at the Vancouver International Airport a few months ago. Her flight was like two hours late. Man, I was in such a bad mood by the time she got in. I had low blood sugar. Also, I was in a healthy snack phase and all the kiosk sold was dried fruit and nuts for like $5 a bag. Say, is everything all right? You look a little sweaty.

Mysterious Man: Have you seen any dark coloured SUVs driving slowly by? Or silver sedans idling near here?

Susan: No, but if I do and they start going too fast, I will take their plate numbers. You wouldn't BELIEVE how people speed in this neighborhood. It drives me crazy. Seriously. I've stopped like five or six cars and told off the drivers. I hate it when people drive like maniacs.

Mysterious Man: (stares at his shoes with a guilty look on his haunted face. There is a loud ping as a shot ricochets off a stop sign. The man leaps in the air and tackles Susan to the ground.) Get down! They're after us!

Susan: Ooof!

Mysterious Man: Quiet.

Susan: Watch Frank! He's afraid of gunshots. Last time he heard one he ran away and went to this trailer owned by this woman called Mrs. Bugsby. It was like he wanted to live with Mrs. Bugsby forever. Just because of one shot. After all we've done for him. Ungrateful little bastard.

Mysterious Man: Please be quiet.

Susan: I don't think it was a gun. I think it was a firecracker. Halloween is coming up in two months and all the little pyro kids around here like to get started early.

Mysterious Man: OWWWWW! Get him off me!

Susan: Frank! Are you biting this nice man? Stop it. I know you are becoming increasingly grumpy as you get older but there's no excuse for biting.

Mysterious Man: Owwwww! My asset training at the secret training facility didn't prepare me for this!

Susan: Frank! Heel! Off! Down! Abort!

Mysterious Man: (leaps to his feet, gives Susan and Frank a horrified look and limps off quickly down the road)

Susan: I didn't get your name!

Mysterious Man: (doesn't look back, just limps faster.)

Susan: I think the airport in Courtenay might have direct flights to Mexico. It's...

But the mysterious man is gone. Susan and Frank continue their walk alone.

First Times

Remember your first time?

Yeah, well, as you know, the details are probably best kept to yourself. But for those of us without your excellent sense of discretion, here is an anthology you won't want to miss! Edited by the marvelous Marthe Jocelyn, First Times includes essays and stories by many of my favourite writers, Richard Scrimger, Sarah Ellis, Bill Richardson, and Tim Wynne Jones to name just a few. Oh, and it includes an overshare by yours truly.

It's coming out in September. (Okay. I confess, it's about all kinds of first times. Not just the kind you were thinking of. The kind that Alice hasn't yet managed.)

Holdin' onto Holden

On a recent episode of Criminal Minds I learned that a persistent passion for Catcher in the Rye is considered an indicator of sociopathology. Seems that Holden's disaffection is shared by quite a few assassins,serial killers and other miscreants. But, I thought with dismay, I LOVE Catcher in the Rye! And I've loved Holden since I was morose nine-year-old! Could I be a sociopath?

I went onto Google to investigate further.

According to Lovefraud.com, sociopaths exhibit the following symptoms:

• Glib and superficial
• Egocentric and grandiose
• Lack of remorse or guilt
• Lack of empathy
• Deceitful and manipulative
• Shallow emotions

R-uh, oh! I'm completely glib! Apparently sociopaths are often "witty and articulate." That's me! "They can be amusing and entertaining conversationalists, ready with a quick and clever comeback". Me! Me! I'm also self-centred and like the world to revolve around me! On the other hand, I'm usually drowning in remorse and guilt over one thing and another. I'm not too deceitful and my emotions, especially when it comes to criminal justice shows on television, are anything but shallow.

I empathize with others to the point where sometimes I don't like to leave the house in case I see something to empathize with. Which brings me to the other sociopathic traits (I mean, besides an abiding love of Catcher in the Rye). Sociopaths also demonstrate an tendency to have antisocial lifestyles! Gulp.

Sociopaths are:

• Impulsive
• Have poor behavior controls
• Need excitement
• Lack a sense of responsibility
• Demonstrate early behavior problems
• Adult antisocial behavior

Okay, well, I don't have any of those really. Except for a tendency to pretend dishes aren't mine. I definitely do not suffer from a need for excitement. Oh, and I did have early-behaviour problems. But they've most cleared up now. Seventy percent, anyway.

So, it's looking like I'm not a sociopath. What I am is a YA novelist. Other than among the sociopathic population in prisons, the other big fan base for lovers of Holden is a certain type of YA writer. So where does the sociopathology start and the YA writing begin? Is YA writing something we get into because we are nearly sociopaths?

I'm going to keep watching Criminal Minds to find out and at literary festivals and so forth I'm going to keep a VERY careful eye on the the teen writers!

Site Maintenance

Well, since facebook is doing "site maintenance" (I love that "Hey" they add at the beginning of the message telling you that the site is down. So chummy.) for the fifteenth time in as many days, I thought I'd check in on my old blog here.

Soon I hope to be doing a bit of maintenance on this site as well. Another Kind of Cowboy comes out September 1 in Canada and December 1 in the U.S. and its existence ought to be reflected on my website with a lovely new site design. (By the way, thanks to all of you who read advance reader copies of Cowboy and sent me such lovely messages.)

On Monday I handed in a new book. If all goes well, it should be out in fall 2008. I will post more more about that later.

Finally, part of what has been great about this past month has been the time I've spent observing boys and their varieties of behaviour.

A week ago I was resting on "our" rock on the lake near our house when I happened to notice an object moving slowly across the water. Frank and I went in for another swim and got closer to the object. It was a dock and it was being towed by about four young men. We swam near enough to hear them cursing and complaining. "Damn," said one. "They better get in the water now that we brought them this f#^%* dock to sit on." I looked toward the shoreline they were headed for and there, naturally, were four girls sunbathing.

Eventually, Frank and I got tired and went back to our spot. I watched as the boys swam for at least another thirty minutes to bring these young vixens a dock, presumably "borrowed" from one of the houses or the beach on the other side of the lake. I didn't see the girls get on the dock, but I hope for the sake of those dedicated young swimmers that they did. God, what perseverance! What strength and indomitable spirit!

The other notable boy moment occurred recently when we were tubing down a local river. We got a late start, so there weren't too many other tubers about. We'd been traveling for about two hours when we rounded a bend, saw a group of other floaters and heard music. Loud music. We got closer and saw that one of the guys had a giant sound system tied to his inflatable raft. It included sub-woofers. He was playing Metallica so loud that the trees were shaking. Oh, and he wasn't a little boy. He was more of a forty-something boy. His raft was outfitted with a little flotilla of devices that floating along behind him, most designed to hold his beer cans and his snacks.

When one of our party said something along the lines of "woo hoo" the captain of the Love Boat said, "You like that song?" and very generously played it again.

This kind of thing is why I like the male of the species so very much.