I have a confession to make. You might say that I’m a book designer who is in a committed relationship with the printed book, but I find no shame in experiencing a casual rendezvous with eBooks. Don’t judge.

In the past, I would lug home manuscripts like an old burro to mine for that perfect cover concept, that is, until I was introduced to an eReader. So now I no longer throw my massive paper girth around apologetically on buses, planes and trains. The eReader’s portability is flattering to any body shape – slimming and stylish. When I stand on a crowded platform, people seemingly steal envious glimpses at the little device held in my hands. It shouts, “Hey big fella, what do you think of my large reading list?” And it tickles me to think of curious onlookers wanting to know what my jacketless read is. For these reasons, I am liberated by the eReader.

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I just sorted a pile of M&Ms by color, which took about five seconds (sadly, I only had about two dozen M&Ms left, as I’m trying to improve my diet, which means that I’m no longer keeping a giant bag of chocolate in the drawer of my desk. Also, as a side note, I’m eating M&Ms because you can’t buy Smarties in the USA). I color coded my candy because I’ve already alphabetized the more than 1,000 books I’ve got in my office, and because the other alternatives for procrastination - folding laundry, cleaning my workbench in the garage - seem even less appealing than doing my work. The problem is that I have too much guilt to do something I’d enjoy, to just go read a novel or head out to see a matinee. Because I’m supposed to be working - finishing my next novel, polishing up a short story, and working on some new stuff - but don’t really want to actually do any work, I’m stuck in a sort of limbo, where I’m not actually getting anything done but I’m not really having fun either.

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Beautifully written, hauntingly told, Touch is a New Face of Fiction novel that in its storytelling and recounting of a multi-generational family story brings to mind Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude - and in its evocation of the mythic wilderness, Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road.

Touch will be available wherever books and eBooks are sold on April 12, 2011, but we’ve got a sneak peek for you:

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Writing is a lonely sport. During the day, when my daughters are in school and my wife is at work, I sometimes feel like I’ve simply been forgotten, that at any moment they will come bursting back through the door to take me with them. The house has its own rhythm when my family is home, but when it’s just me, it’s as if something is absent, the hum of the refrigerator not enough to compensate for what is missing. The thing is, there’s something about that odd sort of loneliness that I like. I’ve spent plenty of time writing in coffee shops with headphones on to block out the noise, but mostly, nowadays, writing full time, I work from home. I think it helps that I play music when I’m writing, that the keyboard for my computer clicks furiously as I type, that I hear the words in my head, but I know for sure that it helps that I’ve got a dog curled up at my feet.

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Do you love to discover new voices and fresh fiction? Well, look no further than the New Face of Fiction program, now in its 15th year. The NFOF is devoted to bringing spectacular first-time Canadian writers to readers everywhere. Each year Knopf Canada and Random House Canada editors get to choose a handful of books written by new authors that they feel really passionate about, and whose work exhibits an exceptional quality of writing and remarkable storytelling ability. While each book is quintessentially ‘Canadian’ in its own unique way, the program pushes the boundaries and parameters of CanLit to showcase a true diversity of writing styles and settings; everything from a tale of true love set amidst the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, to a heartbreaking but optimistic journey through the underground railroad, to the words and ways of an outspoken Acadian midwife. (Can you guess which books I’m referring to? Follow the links to see if you know these famous stories.)

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