Fake It So Real - Book Launch

Start: Wednesday, November 04, 2020• 7:00 PM

End: Wednesday, November 04, 2020•11:00 PM

Fake It So Real Book Launch: The Most Fun You Can Have During a Pandemic!

Come out of hiding and (SAFELY) celebrate the publication of Susan Sanford Blades’ debut novel, Fake It So Real (Nightwood Editions, 2020).

Wednesday, November 4, 2020
All-Ages / ID Required for Alcohol Service
Doors: 7PM / Festivities: 7:45PM

All guests will receive a free Fake It So Real face mask upon entry
Free admission but all guests must RSVP with their additional guests to enter

Join us for a reading from Fake It So Real, followed by Music Bingo with a playlist inspired by the novel. And PRIZES!!

Signed books can be purchased before the launch at Munro’s Books. There will also be books and Fake It So Real 2020 Canadian Tour T-shirts for sale at the launch.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Fake It So Real is a raw and honest novel that dredges up the pain and ecstasy of lives lived authentically. In 1983, Gwen meets Damian, the lead singer of the (fictional) punk band, Dorothy’s Rainbow—a band that Tom Holliston of Nomeansno says is “arguably the best punk band to ever come out of Victoria, British Columbia.” Gwen is feral and insults his band; Damian is beautiful and pours himself over his mic like Johnny Rotten. They fall in love—or something. After seven years and two accidental pregnancies, Damian abandons Gwen. Told from the perspectives of Gwen and her two daughters, Sara and Meg, this novel spans almost four decades—from Nancy Spungen to Courtney Love to Grimes.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Susan Sanford Blades lives in Victoria, BC, where she completed an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Victoria. She has been published in the anthologies The Journey Prize Stories 32: The Best of Canada’s New Writers and Coming Attractions 16, and in literary magazines across Canada as well as in the US and Ireland, including Minola Review, Event, the moth, The Puritan, Numéro Cinq, The New Quarterly, Grain and Prairie Fire. She was longlisted for the 2020 Journey Prize—a prestigious award honouring Canada’s best short fiction—for her story, “The Rest of Him,” which has become part of Fake It So Real.

≫ COVID Safety Info≪

  • Due to COVID-19, there will be a limit of 50 tickets available for purchase. Tickets must be purchased in advance in groups of up to 6.
  • You will be seated at your table once the whole group has arrived.
  • Physical distancing must be observed between groups.
  • The bar will provide table service. Instead of going up to the bar, a server will visit you to take orders and to clear empty glassware.

  • Bathrooms are limited to 1 person at a time. We’ve installed groovy high-tech foot switch-activated lights. Please tap the foot switch on when you are going in, and tap it off when you exit

Read the VEC's full safety plan here.


≫ Land Acknowledgement ≪

We would like to gratefully acknowledge that the territory on which this event takes place is on the traditional, stolen, unceded land of the Lekwungen and W̱SÁNEĆ peoples. We acknowledge the rich cultural history of the many peoples and rituals that have been affected by the ongoing process of dispossession and colonialism. We hold this understanding in our interactions and engagements with this land and its people.


≫ Accessibility ≪

Our seating is a combination of high tables, bar stools, and cocktail tables with chairs. If you require assistance with this, please contact us at events@victoriaeventcentre.ca and VEC staff will do their best to accommodate.

There are three multi-user, gender-inclusive bathrooms with stalls. One bathroom has a larger stall with its own sink and a grab bar (more details in the ‘Bathrooms’ section).

The Victoria Event Centre currently does not have an operational elevator, and there is one long flight of stairs at the venue entrance. The only way into the VEC is up 27 wood stairs, 11″ deep, 6″ high. There are wooden 2.5” handrails 38” up the wall on each side of the staircase (54” apart, so not graspable on both sides at once). See further details in ‘Getting Inside’ section)

If you would like to attend the event but require assistance with accessing the space, please contact us at events@victoriaeventcentre.ca and VEC staff will do their best to accommodate.

Inside the Victoria Event Centre there is a gender inclusive wheelchair accessible washroom that technically fits necessary size dimensions, but is missing a bar and a handrail beside the toilet. There are two stalls, in the washroom, but only one of these has been renovated to meet 5'x5' wheelchair clearance.

More detailed venue accessibility info is available at:
http://www.victoriaeventcentre.ca/attendees/accessibility/