New virtual book club to feature author shortlisted for Leacock Award

NEWS RELEASE

CREATIVE AGING BOOKS & IDEAS

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Jen Tindall of Art Your Service and Cece Scott, of Cece Scott Photo & Writing Services, have joined forces to launch a free monthly virtual book club titled, Creative Aging Books & Ideas.

The inaugural sold-out event on April 29 featured Toronto Star columnist and author, Moira Welsh, who read from her book, Happily Ever Older, which was followed by a discussion with Cece and a rich interactive question-and-answer session with attendees.

The May 27 2 p.m. Book Event features Joseph (Joe) Kertes, author of Last Impressions, which has been shortlisted for the 2021 Leacock Award for Humour, as well as longlisted for the 2020 Toronto Book Awards.

Encouraged in his early days of writing by renowned Canadian philosopher, Marshall McLuhan, (the medium is the message), and Canadian poet, Irving Layton, Joe Kertes was recognized by the best of the best as having something special – the ‘it’ factor that defines a successful and brilliantly witty author. In fact, Kertes’ first book, Winter Tulips, won the Leacock Award for Humour in 1989.

Also adept in the telling of hardships experienced by the Jewish people during the Second World War, Kertes’ novel, Gratitude, based on his family’s experiences in Hungary during the Second World War, won the U.S. National Jewish Book Award for Fiction in 2010.

“It was stunning news, and humbling, since I’m now keeping company with the likes of Philip Roth, Michael Chabon and Saul Bellow,” Kertes says.

There is a recurring theme, a common thread that weaves its way through each of Kertes’ seven published books, which is, love transcends all differences. 

The main characters in Last Impressions are keynotes to this ongoing, open-ended emotion, underlying currents entrenched into the daily intimacies of caring and affection.

The outsized personalities, forces to be reckoned with, are alternately over-the-top, and sometimes frustrating, but in all cases, laugh-out-loud funny. Certainly, Zoltan Beck, the patriarch of the family, who, except when he is asleep, is causing some kind of kerfuffle, is an endearing and resonant figure.

As the book opens, Zoltan’s son, Ben, sits with his father in his private room in palliative care and watches him as he eats.

“Zoltan slurped purply and rapidly on the (blackberry) jam, and while it was not a full-blown Prince concert, Ben had to sit back to avoid the purple mist falling around them.”

A familial accounting of poignant wit and true-to-life family experiences and interactions, one that is set both in mid-20th-century Hungary and contemporary Toronto, Last Impressions is a story of lost love, new found connections, and unspoken secrets that demand to be shared.

You can find Cece’s full interview with Kertes and a review of Last Impressions here: Volume VII – Joseph Kertes (cecescott.com)

Don’t miss this delightful Creative Aging & Ideas author chat with Joe Kertes.

To register for this free May 27, 2 p.m. virtual event, send an email to [email protected]

Also make sure to mark June 24, 2 p.m. on your calendar when Creative Aging Books & Ideas will be chatting with one of Canada’s beloved and talented poets, Lorna Crozier, author of Through the Garden: A Love Story (with Cats).

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