Becky ToyneTag

Ten Years of Type

In March 2006, across the street from the not-yet-hip Trinity Bellwoods Park, a storefront window on Queen Street West held a teaser display: a brown leather armchair piled with books. Behind the chair ...

Festival like a Pro at Toronto’s Great Big Literary Party

It’s October, the month when pumpkin fills our bellies, ghouls parade our streets and writers from around the globe flock like moths to the literary-festival flame. In Toronto (and many Ontario locations ...

Booking Up: with Big, Big Names at No, No Prices, Appel Salon Events Are Filling up Fast

As summer span slowly towards fall, and as book people gathered to talk about the heavy calendar that lay ahead, a new literary lineup was among the topics under discussion. The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon ...

On the Sensory Pleasures of Putting Pen to Paper

A few months ago, I lost a pen. A beautiful fountain pen with one of those squeezy ink chambers that you fill from an old-school inkpot. The pen had been a university graduation gift from my parents and ...

Could We Can the Cover Copy?

I’m going to tell you something about my fiction-reading habits: I always skip the cover copy. The publisher-penned description printed on the cover and used everywhere from retailers’ websites to ...

Pioneer Fashion Strikes Gold

Post-Victorian pioneer style is in. Big beards and work boots (boys); peasant skirts and sensible-heeled ankle booties (girls); huddling in old timey, barn-board-clad bars around old-timey-branded craft ...

Toronto the Good and Well Written

It’s been a while since I’ve had a huge crush on a book, but on May 18, along with the civic-minded masses at Lula Lounge, I was introduced to Stroll. A smart, adventurous, literate-yet-outdoorsy ...