Outro

Okay I'll admit it. I skipped a lot of the festival this year. There were events I had planned to go to, like the Family Business mainstage and Amy Jo Ehman's Big Ideas reading to name only two. But sometimes, life gets in the way, or you just get tired.

But I did catch a few of the nooners, an afternoon bookchat, a big ideas session, but only one-and-a-half mainstages. All of these events I enjoyed, some just more than others.

The Tuesday's mainstage (which I had to leave halfway through) was well worth going to for Ken Finkleman's performance alone. A slightly self-deprecating, slightly off-colour reading from and critique of his first novel, Noah's Turn, which is "minor stuff," he said casually as he held up the book and shrugged. At least compared to great poetry. Poetry is the great art.

Here is a photo from that night of hunter-turned-conservationist David Carpenter, author/photographer AJ Somerset, and former Winnipegger Ken Finkleman perusing his book with sunglasses on. He took the glasses off when he took to the podium because, he said, "the speaker's gotta see the fuckin' audience."

I also quite enjoyed David Carpenter's reading that night, and then again the next day at the Big Ideas series. David's reading from his latest work of fiction in addition to his non-fiction went on a little too long and took away from the discussion that was supposed to happen. And that's what the Big Ideas are supposed to be about. Still, the reading was good, and David's a nice man.

Here's a picture of him:

And then there were the little things. Beers with Toronto poet Michael Lista and Hot Air blogger-in-chief Ariel, and the brief time spent in the hospitality suite getting a glimpse of what it's like to be one of the authors at a festival like Thin Air. It's things like these that are worth the most.

And there's always the wine and there's always the cheese.

Served up by fine folks like these ones:

I don't know quite what else to say. It was a different festival experience than last year. I think that has to do in part with not being at the opening on Sunday night. Because of that it was like the festival didn't start. There were just all of a sudden all these things to go to. I should have planned better.

But let's end this thing on a good note. The festival was good, and I enjoyed it. There's no poison, psychotropic drugs, or brainwashing. It's just good people having a good time talking about good books. And there isn't any harm in that. See you next year?

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Brandon James Bertram is a perpetual student. When he's not at the university you might find him going casually about his business in his West Broadway apartment or spending his leftover student loans on beer at Cousins. He sometimes reviews music for the Uniter and his poetry has been published in Rhubarb magazine. He might graduate with a bachelor's degree next year.