I spent a lovely evening with an Ottawa book club last night. One of the women in the group heard me read at the Ottawa International Writer’s Festival in September 2001, and she recommended Brick and Mortar as one of her group’s monthly picks. I’m so glad she asked me to join in the discussion.
I always find it a little strange to talk about Brick and Mortar, partly because it’s been so long since I wrote and read it. Over the years, the details of composition fade. And when I talk about the stories, I never know whether I’m actually being true to what’s there, or filling in my own imaginings around it.
One of the women mentioned that no one talks much about faith in the book, and she wondered whether faith was even important to the characters. I said that I had wanted to show their faith through their actions, and the symbols of worship that they find important, rather than having them talk about faith (conversations like that tend to be didactic and preachy). But if this particular reader didn’t get the message that faith, and not just community, is a crucial part of these characters’ lives, perhaps I erred a bit on the wrong side? As Flannery O’Conner says “To the deaf, you have to shout.” I’m more of a whisperer, myself.
We leave for California on Saturday, and I still haven’t decided which books to take. I’m considering John Steinbeck, for the geographical connection. Or maybe I need a good mystery, like Alexander McCall Smith’s The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency.
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