The other day my book A Van Full of Girls 

was selected by Kerry Clare, author of Mitzi Bytes and literary rainmaker, to be on the One-Of-A-Kind list. https://49thshelf.com/Blog/2017/03/02/The-One-of-a-Kind-List

If you’re thinking that “one-of-a-kind” is some sort of backhanded compliment and that this designation is like being sent to the Island of Misfit Toys,

well, you’re an idiot and you have never been more wrong about anything in your entire, often wrong, life. This is a tremendous honour, and as if that wasn’t enough, Kiley Turner, who owns a goddamn company AND is managing editor of 49^th Shelf, implied, very, very strongly implied, that I had written the BEST BOOK DESCRIPTION IN HISTORY for my book A VAN FULL OF GIRLS, which you can order from any fine bookseller or from me, a shady bookseller.

Put on your sunglasses and read this:

“Have you ever been in a van full of girls? All the girls are alive and they’re happy. You’re all heading off to do something whimsical and flirty and maybe a little bit drunk. You’re going to see a Beach Boys tribute band. You’re going to the casino to bet it all on red. You’re going to a séance that you just know is going to end in skinny-dipping. Something like that. A Van Full of Girls is a collection of short, dizzy, funny things. It’s zippy and unpredictable, like a mongoose, but it’s dead sexy. You will want to take Polaroids of each precious, little missive contained within and then tape each one to your fridge. You will want to give this book to somebody you need to love you.”

That’s the description.

The best book description in the history of the world.

At any rate, all of these accolades have inspired me to write a letter to Canadian literary legend Margaret Atwood. This is the letter:

*********************************************

Dear Margaret:

You probably heard that my book A VAN FULL OF GIRLS was recently awarded the prize for BEST BOOK DESCRIPTION IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD.

Let that just sink in for a moment.

Maybe a little longer.

Okay.

You feel it?

Peggy, I beat Crime and Punishment.

I beat Paradise Lost.

I beat The Shining.

I beat every book you ever wrote.

I even beat the fucking Bible.

You might be on a stamp,

and one of your books might have been made into a movie, (Only 29% on the Tomatometer, though), but nobody, not even a drunk person, has ever declared that you wrote THE BEST BOOK DESCRIPTION IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD.

So next time you see a small man dressed in as much Adidas wear as he can afford and using supplemental oxygen

waving frantically at you while you’re out for one of your ponderous, unfriendly strolls through the Annex, you might deign to wave back to him, because you know what? That man is me, your literary better.

Michael Murray

PS: We have one spot available in our fantasy baseball league this year if you care to finish behind me in yet another competition!

This is a link to Kerry Clare’s new book Mitzi Bytes: http://www.harpercollins.ca/9781443449229/mitzi-bytes

Kiley Turner is Managing editor of @49thShelf, dictator at Turner-Riggs ( http://turner-riggs.com/) and content manager at brand-new ReaderBound: the easiest way for publishers to get a great website.

And you can order my book here: https://www.chapters.indigo.ca/en-ca/books/a-van-full-of-girls/9781554831685-item.html

While out for a run on Canada Day, Joe Killoran came across Toronto Mayor Rob Ford (fresh from an apparently combative two month stint in rehab) and his entourage stomping about Toronto looking for votes. Killoran, who looks a little bit like Zeus or one of those Spartans in the movie 300, began, in an admirably articulate state of rage, to scream at Ford. “Yes,” we collectively said, “these are my words manifest in the pleasing form of a man!” The Ford brothers, normally masters of physical intimidation and the death stare, shrivelled up in Killoran’s presence.

Killoran, stripped to the waist, looked like the truth. Radiating a masculine power that seemed fueled by the archetypes of the 1970’s, Killoran was our single-combat hero. He was what we wanted to see in the mirror, saying what we wanted to say. In short, he was the ideal proxy, and Rob Ford, the actual proxy of Toronto, was it’s pale and receding antithesis.

The irony is that Rob Ford’s narrative positions the Mayor as Toronto’s Everyman. He’s just a regular Joe, a guy who likes helping out the common folk, hates the high-minded, mocking elites and struggles with the same sort of demons that we all do at the end of hard-working day. Ambushed so vividly by an actual regular Joe, the myth was laid bare. Ford, the man who stakes his brand on his ability to connect, his ability to be real, man, was a paper tiger, a bully stripped raw by the confrontation that stood unblinking before him.

It was an entirely awesome and revealing moment, so naturally it’s been co-opted and ruined. Inspired by Killoran, a handful of protestors who look like some agitated soccer dads yelling at the ref from the sidelines, have taken to calling themselves The Shirtless Horde.

One of them, after unconvincingly shouting, “I’m not intimidated by you!” at Rob Ford’s sobriety coach, was actually kicked by him, in the shin, I think. It’s exactly the sort of thing you remember taking place at recess, and as much as I might want to imagine myself the Shirtless Jogger, I do not want to imagine myself a member of The Shirtless Horde.

Even worse than showing us what we really look, The Shirtless Horde has the distinction of reinstalling the Ford myth. Surrounded by their limp chants, Ford puffs up– like he’s just eaten some spinach– and once again projects the confidence of a man who believes the script that he’s just here to bring some sense and fiscal restraint to a downtown that’s spun wildly, indulgently out of control, and this, this will be an exhausting way for us to spend the rest of our summer, so Shirtless Horde, please stop, your work is done.

Dear Queen Elizabeth II:

Happy birthday!!!

I just want to say that you look absolutely fantastic for 88! Really, I could see in the photograph that your skin was just glowing so I really want to congratulate you on that. I had my passport photograph taken yesterday, after only a five year interval, and I’m very sorry to say that I looked asymmetrical, angry and jaundiced, like a hard drinking 68 year-old. Really, I looked like I live in Russia or something, and I don’t!

I’m actually from Canada, so I’m one of your subjects, and when I was a boy I used to collect stamps with you on them. There must have been hundreds of them, and they all looked pretty much alike—you, looking regal in front of some aspect of Canadian industry.

None of them were valuable for collectors as so many were printed and used to mail letters. (You remember mailing letters, don’t you? Or maybe you don’t. Maybe you always had a fancy butler to mail them for you and put the stamp on the envelope, otherwise I guess it would have been pretty weird to put a stamp of yourself on the envelope. That’s the sort of thing that could go to a person’s head, I think.) At any rate, they were everyday stamps, the sort that filled the pages between the cool ones of Grizzly Bears or hockey players, but every once in awhile for a special occasion they’d put out a stamp of you that was practically the size of a hockey card. It would be either silver or gold and it was like finding a jewel. Suddenly, we got to see you in all your majesty, if that makes any sense.

Everybody has regrets, but I imagine a queen might have more than most. You were locked into a very particular life from the time you were born and you must always wonder about that boy you thought cute way back when, or what it would have been like to have been a hippy and get high with a Beatle. What would you say your biggest regret is?

I regret never learning how to fire a gun.

And if you could sleep with either Colin Firth or Russell Brand, which one would you choose?

Don’t be shy, it’s your birthday.

Michael Murray

PS: Is Gwyneth Paltrow really British?