Cory Doctorow at 5:42 am • 
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Horror writer David Nickle is a master of the creepy -- the reveal at the end of the horror story that lodges in your brain and revisits you in goosepimply moments of fear. I stole the idea of ambulatory thumbs in Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town from one of his short stories ("The Unshackling of Thumbs"), because once I read that story, the image just wouldn't get out of my head.
But with his new novel, The 'Geisters, Nickle manages to capture another of horror's delicious thrills: spookiness. From the first page, The 'Geisters exudes a hindbrain-teasing sense of lurking menace, the haunted-house creak of an impending apparition. It's a spectacular feeling, and Nickle tightrope-walks it for 300 too-short pages, building to a climax that's spooky, creepy and scary besides -- and all the moreso because of that long journey on the verge of fear.
Geisters is the story of Ann LeSage, a girl who manifests a violent and elusive poltergeist she calls the Insect. We meet Ann as she is about to get married to a lawyer named Michael Voors, who bemusedly resolves the cognitive dissonance of salt-shakers that move on their own without resorting to supernatural explanations. Ann knows better. She knows that the Insect has escaped from the mental prison she built for it after it killed her parents and turned her brother into a quadriplegic. As she and Michael depart for a lavish Caribbean honeymoon -- paid for by Michael's mentor, a rich winery owner -- the Insect manifests more frequently and in ways that grow ever more violent, culminating with their return flight making a disastrous emergency landing that kills her husband. That death sets her on a journey across America, hunted by people who seem to know the true nature of the poltergeists -- and who have a darkly erotic relationship with them.
The story is a white-knuckler from page one, and Nickle is a master of luring you into thinking that the supernatural can be rationalized and systemized, only to reveal, time and again, that the orderly patterns we try to make of the irrational are figments of our imagination. I was off-balance and more than a little scared throughout.
Nickle has posted the first chapter to his blog, and ChiZine, the publisher, have furnished a PDF.
The book's also got its own power-ballad:
Kari Maaren wrote and performed this anthem for the book on her uke.
The 'Geisters
Cory Doctorow at 3:50 pm • •
Toronto police carried out a series of dramatic raids on alleged gang-members across the city in Friday. They raided 15 Windsor Rd, a run-down and notorious bungalow that is also noteworthy for providing the backdrop against which Toronto Mayor Rob "Laughable Bumblefuck" Ford was photographed, arms around three men -- two of whom were arrested in the sweep, the third of whom was murdered in an apparent drug-related slaying. The photo of Ford was provided by the now-unlocatable gentlemen who offered to sell the Toronto Star and Gawker a video of the mayor allegedly smoking crack.
The mayor reportedly told his staff that he knew where the video was, and gave an address in a high rise in the suburb of Etobicoke (that unit was also raided in the sweeps), but insisted to the press that the video didn't exist at all. Many have speculated that the mayor or his representatives arranged to have the video deleted. However, given that at least one computer was seized in the raids, it's possible that the may yet surface.
In the meantime, we're left with the mayor palling around with men whom the police consider to be members of organised crime; a Globe and Mail investigation that accused the mayor's brother, Councillor Doug Ford, of having served as one of Toronto's top drug dealers in the 1980s, and a mayor who refuses to directly address important questions about his conduct:
Kassim, 20, was arrested in the raids Thursday and has been charged with trafficking in weapons and drugs (cocaine and marijuana) for the benefit of a criminal organization. He also faces charges of conspiracy to commit unauthorized possession of a firearm, breach of house arrest, and theft under $5,000.
His longtime friend, Muhammad Khattak, also flanking the mayor in the photo, was charged with participating in cocaine trafficking for the benefit of a criminal organization and trafficking in marijuana.
Police officers carried evidence bags, including what appeared to be a Toshiba laptop, out of the 19-year-old’s home on Mercury Rd. Thursday.
Khattak was wounded in the same March shooting that killed the third man in the photo, Anthony Smith.
Dixon Road raids help complete infamous Rob Ford photo
Cory Doctorow at 3:15 pm • •
This wonderful porthole-made-of-books is part of the design for the John W. Doull Bookseller store in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and warrants a side-trip all on its own.
John W. Doull Bookseller
(via That Book Smell)
(Photo:
Celia Moase Photography)
CBC radio's excellent magazine show As It Happens conducted
a short, lovely interview with Scottish sf writer
Ken Macleod about Iain Banks, who had been his friend since high school. It's a beautiful piece of audio, and a heartfelt one. My condolences, Ken.
— Cory
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Cory Doctorow at 5:40 pm • •
Michael Geist sez, "Privacy and surveillance have taken centre stage this week with the revelations that U.S. agencies have been engaged in massive, secret surveillance programs that include years of capturing the meta-data from every cellphone call on the Verizon network (the meta-data includes the number called and the length of the call) as well as gathering information from the largest Internet companies in the world including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple in a program called PRISM. This lengthy post provides some background on the U.S. programs, but focuses primarily on the Canadian perspective, arguing that many of the same powers exist under Canadian law and that it is likely that Canadians have been caught up by these surveillance activities."
Why Canadians Should Be Demanding Answers About Secret Surveillance Programs
Cory Doctorow at 8:15 pm • •
Quebecois convenience store chain Couche-Tard has rolled out a new drink: the Pizzaghetti Sloche, a shave-ice drink that comes in both pizza and spaghetti flavors, which can be combined to customer specifications to make Pizzaghetti flavor. Couche-Tard's slogan for the drink is "love in a cup." Redditor plagues138 posted a photo of the actual Pizzaghetti Sloche machine in situ.
Sloche - Pizzaghetti
(via Neatorama)
Cory Doctorow at 5:40 am • •
Picture Day is one of the best movies I saw last year. It's Kate Melville's directorial film debut, but for those of us who've followed her career since she was the youngest-ever playwright-in-residence at Toronto's Tarragon Theatre, it is the apotheosis of everything Melvillian -- witty, wry, insightful material about teen relationships, the dreadful and wonderful desire to experience adult life, and the fundamental bizarreness of being a teen who has the self-awareness to understand how reckless actions are self-destructive but can't seem to give them up.
Here's the official synopsis:
Forced to repeat her senior year of high school, Claire’s (Tatiana Maslany) reputation is sliding from bad-ass to bad joke. Armed with an acid tongue and shielded by ever-present headphones, Claire locks onto the only student clueless to her sordid rep: Henry (Spencer Van Wyck), a nerdy freshman she used to babysit. At night, Claire escapes to raucous concerts where she catches the eye of 33-year–old Jim (Steven McCarthy, frontman of The ElastoCitizens), a would–be rock star who feeds on young fans’ adoration. Jim leads her into an intoxicating world of hard-partying musicians, while at school, Claire takes Henry under her wing. She reinvents her dorky friend as the mysterious rebel, throwing Henry’s life into hilarious turmoil. As Claire dances across the surface of these relationships, she eventually learns hard lessons about the difference between sex, intimacy, and friendship.
Picture Day has won a string of awards since it debuted at last year's Toronto International Film Festival -- but it has been locked up in distribution wrangles since then. Finally, it's available on DVD and as a download in the USA and Canada at least.
I've known Kate since she was 15 and I was 17, and I've been admiring her work for more than 25 years. It is such a pleasure to be able to recommend her film to you and to share the secret of her wild talent with the rest of the world.
Picture Day [Amazon]
Picture Day [Official Site]
Cory Doctorow at 7:00 am • •
Gawker's John Cook has finally gotten in touch with the guy who offered to sell him a video of Toronto Mayor Rob "Laughable Bumblefuck" Ford smoking crack. Bad news: the guy says the video is "gone":
But I have heard independently from others familiar with the goings-on in Toronto that leaders in its Somali community have determined who the owner is and brought intense pressure to bear on him and his family. Toronto's "Little Mogadishu" neighborhood is located in the ward Rob Ford represented when he was a city councillor; though he is a conservative and a racist buffoon, I am told he has long-standing connections to Somali power brokers there.
Which brings us to this past Friday, when the intermediary called to tell me that he had finally heard from the owner. And his message was: "It's gone. Leave me alone." It was, the intermediary told me, a short conversation.
"It's gone" could mean many things. It might mean that the video has been destroyed. It might mean that it has been handed over to Ford or his allies. It might mean that he intends to sell or give it to a Canadian media outlet. It might mean that the Toronto Police Department has seized it and plans to use it as evidence in a criminal investigation. It might mean that it has been transferred to the custody of Somali community leaders for safekeeping. It might be a lie. The intermediary doesn't know. Neither do I.
The Rob Ford Crack Video Might Be "Gone"
Cory Doctorow at 2:46 pm • •
Here's some great news! It's the 25th anniversary of Barenaked Ladies' first album, Gordon, and they're celebrating with a new record: Grinning Streak , which comes out today. They did a
Reddit AMA yesterday to promote it, and they're headed out on tour.
I've been watching the band since they were playing the Scarborough Town Centre plaza and promoting a self-titled, single-sided cassette that their moms sold in the crowd, and I've enjoyed all the music they've created since.
Grinning Streak
Cory Doctorow at 7:57 am • •
I'm very fond of Gypsophilia's brand of klezmer-infused jazz, and so I'm very excited to learn that they've got a new release. Ross from Gypsophilia sez:
"Horska" is our newest release and is many things: a 7" vinyl
single with a dub remix, a 6 song digital EP, and a brand new stop
motion animation music video.
We recorded the tracks for “Horska” at Montreal’s Hotel2Tango with
noted producer Howard Bilerman (of Arcade Fire fame). The single,
composed by guitarist Alec Frith, plays with superimposing a Jewish
hora over a ska riddim – hence the title. The 7" includes a dub
reggae-style remix as a b-side. The other tracks on the EP range
from the nostalgic-sounding “Bir Hakeim” and “Stikm,” which
showcase Matt Myer on (mostly muted) horn, to the at-times frenzied
Klezmer-influenced piece “Corentin Cariou” and the melancholy “Oh
my Oma,” featuring Gina Burgess’ plaintive violin.
As a partner to the song a stop-motion animation was created by
Halifax artist Sydney Smith and filmmaker Jason Levangie in the
style of their beautiful 2011 video "Agricola & Sarah". This time around
Gypsophilia's music is set to a vignette about a bumbling inventor
(a likeness of our bass player Adam Fine) trying to get his
mechanical flying machine off the ground.
The Gypsophilias have made the dub remix available as a free download for Boing Boing readers for a limited time
Cory Doctorow at 12:22 pm • •
Andrew sez, "Sometimes I write silly emails to companies when I actually have a mundane request. Usually, they either ignore me or reply with boring customer-service talk (We apologize for... Thank you for shopping with...').
Recently I got a piece of mail from Canadian pharmacy chain Shoppers Drug Mart that was addressed to someone who doesn't live here anymore. I had fun with the email I sent them, and their response (can be viewed in the link) was pure gold!"
This really is rather good. Andrew's letter asked Shopper's if the letter had possibly been addressed to a future tenant at his address, fallen through a time-hole. Shopper's responded with a list of products from the future that he could look for in its circulars to determine whether this was the case:
1) Now at Shoppers Drug Mart: Everexis
Cure any disease instantly with Everexis! Great for headaches, colds, cancer and more! With no known side effects, nothing can possibly go wrong!
2) 20X The Points on Meat Products
Got the Everexis munchies? Fill your strange and unspeakable hunger and get 20X The Points!
3) 20% Off Everexis Antidote
Everexis left you slow, lumbering, and quick to anger? Take the Everexis antidote. It hasn't been fully tested, but it certainly can't make things any worse!
4) Hide in a Shoppers Drug Mart Refugee Shelter
With over 1,200 locations still standing across Canada, Shoppers Drug Mart is the ideal place to hold up and hide from the hoard. Ration Nativa Cheese Puffs and Life Brand Vitamins while you wait for rescue! Blood samples will be required for admittance.
5) Wheat, Glorious Wheat
Exclusively at Shoppers Drug Mart! Rebuild society with wheat, a traditional non-synthetic foodstuff from the before-times. Act fast, as quantities are extremely limited.
to: customerservice@shoppersdrugmart.ca
Cory Doctorow at 5:11 pm • •
Doctor Henry Morgentaler, who pioneered safe, legal abortion in Canada at great personal risk and cost, died today at 90. Canada is a better place for the work he did. Here's a photo of me and Morgentaler when I was 4 1/2 years old.
To his supporters, he was nothing less than a hero. "Canadian women owe Dr. Morgentaler a tremendous debt of gratitude for standing up for their lives and health at great personal sacrifice and risk," said Vicki Saporta, president of the National Abortion Federation.
"He survived numerous threats on his life, a clinic bombing and aggressive protests. Yet, he was not deterred," she said.
Judy Rebick, a former head of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women, worked with Morgentaler in the 1980s on the effort to legalize abortion.
"I think every women in the country has lost a major ally," she told CBC News. "He changed all of our lives by standing up against the abortion laws and eventually winning in the Supreme Court."
Morgentaler death rekindles abortion divide
Cory Doctorow at 10:21 am • •
If you're outside of Canada, you might not have heard about the expenses scandal rocking the government. A Conservative senator with a reputation as a killer Party fundraiser named Mike Duffy, appointed by the Prime Minister, was caught claiming $90,000 in fraudulent expenses from the government. Before the auditor could conclude a probe into Duffy's actions, Duffy repaid the sum and took the position that he was no longer obliged to cooperate with the audit. Then it emerged that the Prime Minister's chief of staff, Nigel Wright, had written a personal cheque for $90,000 to Duffy, allowing him to escape the probe and to continue to support PM Harper's policies in the Senate.
Now comes this: a grilling of the PM by the leader of the opposition, the NDP's Thomas Mulcair. It's a textbook example of how the opposition should call the government to question. As Joey DeVilla puts it:
NDP leader Thomas Mulcair did an excellent job grilling the Prime Minister by dealing with him as one would deal with a petulant adolescent who’s been caught lifting the scotch from the liquor cabinet: ask short, simple questions, and if the answers aren’t satisfactory, ask again. The video below shows the outcome: Mulcair does a killer job as our weaselly Prime Minister dodges, weaves, misdirects, and like that petulant adolescent, wishes he could tell Mommy and Daddy to “eff off”, but for all his vainglorious claims to being the boss of himself, can’t.
In Which Thomas Mulcair Takes the Prime Minister Behind the Shed for a Much-Needed Spanking
Cory Doctorow at 3:09 pm • •
Michael Geist writes,
The Internet is buzzing over a new report from the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property that recommends using spyware and ransomware to combat online infringement. The recommendations are shocking as they represent next-generation digital locks that could lock down computers and even "retrieve" files from personal computers:
"Software can be written that will allow only authorized users to open files containing valuable information. If an unauthorized person accesses the information, a range of actions might then occur. For example, the file could be rendered inaccessible and the unauthorized user's computer could be locked down, with instructions on how to contact law enforcement to get the password needed to unlock the account."
While many of the recommendations sound outrageous, it is worth noting that earlier this year Canadian business groups led by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce recommended that the Canadian government introduce a regulation that would permit the use of spyware for these kinds of purposes.
The proposed regulation would remove the need for express consent for:
"a program that is installed by or on behalf of a person to prevent, detect, investigate, or terminate activities that the person reasonably believes (i) present a risk or threatens the security, privacy, or unauthorized or fraudulent use, of a computer system, telecommunications facility, or network, or (ii) involves the contravention of any law of Canada, of a province or municipality of Canada or of a foreign state;"
This provision would effectively legalize spyware in Canada on behalf of these industry groups. The potential scope of coverage is breathtaking: a software program secretly installed by an entertainment software company designed to detect or investigate alleged copyright infringement would be covered by this exception. This exception could potentially cover programs designed to block access to certain websites (preventing the contravention of a law as would have been the case with SOPA), attempts to access wireless networks without authorization, or even keylogger programs tracking unsuspecting users (detection and investigation).
The Canadian Link to Copyright Enforcement Spyware Tools
Cory Doctorow at 2:00 pm • •
(
Click to embiggen)
If you've been finding it hard to get your head around all the scandals, awfulness and pure shitshowery of Toronto mayor Rob "Laughable Bumblefuck" Ford, look no futher: Hilary Sargent has composed a handy reference in infographic form.
