Author Stalking: Yann Martel

It's kind of a funny story, how I ended up getting to see Yann Martel (reknowned author of Life of Pi). More of a right-place at the right-time sort of thing.

Basically, Sunday I claimed I was going to do work. But then you know, you get caught up chilling with people in the dining hall for brunch and next thing you know, half the afternoon is gone. But I was adamant that I would get caught up on my reading!

Knowing me, after getting back to my room of course I had to procrastinate for awhile first. Then at approximately 3:46p.m. I figured I'd go to the bathroom and really get down to work. Whilst in there, I ran into a buddy who mentioned that she just got back from Word on the Street, a book festival happening, well, right-now! in Queen's Park, which is basically right-here!
So of course I ran back to my room, Googled it, realized that Yann Martel was speaking in approximately 10 minutes! WHAT? Screw work, of course I quickly grabbed a buddy and we headed over to Queen's Park and beelined for the reading.

Got there just in the nick of time. Mr. Martel was introduced, and then he read an excerpt from his new piece Beatrice and Virgil, answered some questions in a back-and-forth interview-style session, and then answered four more questions previously submitted by the general public.

All in all, it was a very impressive experience. Mr. Martel covered a wide range of topics in his answers, and it was great to hear the witticisms, the take on politics, on philosophy, and just about all else in between.

It was also super-interesting to hear more about the whole letters to Stephen Harper project (91 and counting!) and a bit about the next work (chimpanzees and automobiles and Northern Portugal!)
After the reading, we walked around a bit just to see what it was like, although time was really tight as the festival ended at 6:00pm and a lot of tents were running out of stuff/starting to pack up. However, at the Simon & Schuster tent I did manage to snag (brand new!) copies for the tenth Pendragon book The Soldiers of Halla (DJ MacHale) and a GI Joe activity book for $1. Seriously. Also got a bunch of bookmarks and pins/buttons, which is always really fun.

The Harlequin tent was very well stocked ^^