1. The Art of the Interior Monologue*
I’m standing at my publisher’s table in the vendors room at CanCon in Ottawa. I’m wearing my laid-back author face, a time-honoured expression that goes well with tweed jackets, elbow patches, and briarwood pipes, when a potential book buyer materializes mere footsteps away. I wait and I watch as she browses the literary offerings. My restraint is a case study in nonchalance, until I catch her fleeting glance at my novel. It is all the invitation I need.
“Perhaps you’d be interested in my book,” I say, drawing her attention back to HOLLYWOOD NORTH: A NOVEL IN SIX REELS.
My patter dips into the book’s primary setting, Trenton, Ontario, its secret history, and my personal connection. I cover off the accidents and crimes, the silent movie studio, and several of the other true-life events that inspired the story. She is curious, but not convinced. I falter as a wave of self-doubt inundates my fragile psyche. Perhaps my approach would be more effective on a used car lot, as one author friend had recently intimated.
With a pathetic crack in my voice, I invite her to look under the hood, check out the upholstery, take the book for a test drive. She hesitates, shrugs, and concedes. Slowly, she flips through the pages …
“Wow! This is a work of art,” she declares, and promptly forks over her hard-earned cash, as I readjust my T-shirt, my jeans, and my laid-back author face.
*This applies only to the original ChiZine print edition of the novel, both paperback and hardcover. The new Open Road Media edition of the book is pretty nice, but not as elaborate as the original.
1a. Kudos to Shapiro
Once again, many thanks to the brilliant Jared Shapiro and his inspired interior design (of the original 
ChiZine print editions). Jared’s contributions add to the story in ways large and small. As author Paul Di Filippo noted in his much-appreciated LocusMag review: “…all kudos must be given to the graphic designer on this novel, Jared Shapiro, for the striking multimedia approach to the text, with insertion of many embellishments and illustrations that perfectly complement Gus’s tale.” (On the unimaginable off chance you have yet to buy and read my novel, Gus is the protagonist and narrator of the story. Again, Jared’s remarkable design work only appears in the original ChiZine version of the novel—that’s the version pictured at the outset of this entry.)
2. A Highly Questionable Question
The one question I’ve been asked more than any other, especially by readers who know Trenton, Ontario, is if any of the characters in HOLLYWOOD NORTH are based on real people. The answer is an emphatic no. “This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.”
I will own up, however, to the place that inspired the Marquee Café which plays a pivotal role in the book. It is, indeed, modeled after my parents’ restaurant, the Theatre Bar, which once stood next door to the Odeon in Trenton.
While the movie house still stands, the Odeon has long since been renamed the Centre. It should also be noted that it wasn’t always the only show in town.
2a. Screen War on Main Street!
For years, two movie theaters competed within the same block and on opposite sides of the street, until circa 1960, when the Century was shut down. It was a sad day for many, the preteen me among them.
After all, the Century was where I got to see the feature-length version of Disney’s Davy Crockett on the big screen. This was also where I saw On The Waterfront with my dad at a weekday matinee. I’m not sure why my father thought it was a good idea to take the 5-year-old me to that particular movie, but I am glad he did.
Best I can tell, it was the moment I fell in love with movies and Eva Marie Saint.
As for the Libling family diner, where my sisters and I spent countless hours, poring over homework, helping out, and killing time, it vanished in the late 1970s, when the space at 122 Dundas Street West was renovated out of existence to make room for the multiplex that is today’s Centre.
2b. The Best Show in Town and Only a Dime
The main thing you need to know is that the Theatre Bar was not a bar in the popular sense. It was a bar only in the strait-laced Ontario sense of the era, which produced endless hours of glee for regular customers, who’d hang out in anticipation of the naive newbies who’d stray through the door.
This was in the days before Highway 401 connected Montreal and Toronto, when the stop-and-slow of Highway 2 was the only way to go, and Trenton’s downtown was a going concern. And smack on Highway 2 in downtown Trenton is where you’d find the Theatre Bar.
For the price of a cup of coffee, it offered countless thrills. No local entertainment venue delivered greater value. And it always went down the same way.
2c. A Man Walks into a Bar and Asks for a Beer
A thirsty out-of-towner would amble in. He’d plop himself onto a stool at the counter or a chair at a table. My mother would approach, welcome him with pen, pad, and generous smile. The unwary sap would request his beverage of choice. My mother would break the news. And hilarity would flow.
“Huh? You kidding me? I can’t get a beer? An O’Keefe’s, a Labatt’s?”
Mom would take it in her stride, offer a compassionate shake of the head.
“But the sign outside—it says bar, right?”
“Just not that sort of bar.”
“Isn’t that false advertising?”
“How about a bite to eat?”
“Well, jeez, I guess, seeing as how I’m already here … Sure. Gimme a Coke, a burger, and an order of fries.”
“I’m sorry, we don’t serve French fries.”
“What!? What do you mean you don’t serve French fries?”
“We don’t make them,” my mother would say, which was my father’s cue. From his station at the grill, he would sigh his long-simmering displeasure at the fact, his exhaled editorial punctuated with a primal snarl. Despite her slight 5’1″, Mom was no shrinking violet. She would return immediate fire, her glare so fierce it would have kayoed a grizzly.
Meanwhile, the hapless stranger would slide right over the edge, blinking and twitching befuddlement as he belatedly surveyed the interior of the wacko joint he’d stumbled into.
2d. The Diner from Hell
And what a wondrous sight to behold the Theatre Bar was!
An air conditioner the size of an elephant casket. Mismatched shelves and display cases. Coolers and freezers. Bins of penny candies and racks of salty snacks. Cubbyholes stacked with packs of cigarettes and cigars. And observing the sucker’s every move, the grinning band of Theatre Bar regulars.
A sputter-fest is what it was. “Jesus H. Christ! What is this place? What are you running here? You call yourself a bar, but you don’t got any beer. You call yourself a restaurant, but you don’t got any French fries. Now I look over there and you’re selling ashtrays and transistor radios and Sen-sen and bicarbonate, and god-knows-what-else. Holy cow! Is that a Japanese fan? And look at that—you got more soda pop and ice cream here than the damn A&P. And Kik Cola! Jesus. You’ve really got Kik Cola? What next? What next?”
“Well,” my mother would suggest, “the lunchtime special is quite nice. It’s tuna fish on toast.”
“Huh?”
“It’s like chicken à la king, but without the chicken.”
I suppose I could end this here, but then the obvious question would remain…
2e. So Why Didn’t the Theatre Bar Serve French Fries?
When my parents first took over the restaurant, French fries were part of the menu. The item was, however, an ongoing source of friction. More than once I was awakened in the middle of the night by my parents’ savage debate on the subject. I will never forget my mother’s plaintive cry: “How many times do I have to tell you? I am sick of smelling like a potato.”
My father, on the other hand, didn’t mind. Smelling like a potato was good for business. Before too long, my mother issued an ultimatum. Either she would continue to smell like a potato or she would continue to bake pies for the restaurant. “But not both.”
The pies won out. If you were lucky enough to have ever sampled my mom’s apple or lemon meringue pies, you would know why. Her crust, oh man, that crust! At once crispy and chewy and flaky and buttery and … Trust me, a wedge of any of her pies would more than compensate for the elusive alcohol and fries.
3. Live and In Person at the Scene of the Crime
Should you be in or around Trenton, Ontario area on Wednesday, November 6, 2019, I’ll be risking life and limb with an appearance at Trenton Town Hall 1861, Home of the Trent Port Historical Society. Why the trepidation? I appeared at the Quinte West Public Library back in June and the warm reception remains a highlight of my so-called book tour. But the event was held before the novel was available and locals had yet to digest the contents. With this in mind, I have requested from security that all vegetables, fruits, tar, and feathers be confiscated at the door.
Anyhow, the location is 55 King Street and the show gets underway at 6:30 p.m. I’ll be reading from HOLLYWOOD NORTH, equivocating in a Q&A, signing books, and schmoozing. On a side note, the Trenton Town Hall 1861 Facebook page is responsible for several of the photos featured in this blog. Should you be active on Facebook, their page is worth checking out.
On a side note, for readers in the area, the novel is in stock at Lighthouse Books in Brighton, Chapters in Belleville and both Indigo and Novel Idea in Kingston.
4. The Baffling “Autumn Leaves/Marshmallow” Conundrum
As we were walking the dog the other evening, the autumn leaves accumulating underfoot, I mentioned to my wife, Pat, that when I was a kid in Trenton, we’d rake the leaves to curbside and then set them on fire. Sometimes, we’d grab a stick and roast marshmallows, too. “Didn’t that cause a lot of fires?” she asked.
I had to think for a moment. “Yeah. Probably. But the marshmallows were so good.”
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It never ceases to amaze me how I seem to want to hang on to every word you write…you seem to give life to everything you put on a blank sheet of paper…whether it is a soon to be published novel or a blog…you are a brilliant writer Michael…and having known your parents and tasted your mother’s amazing pies…you actually transported me back in time….to a wonderful time and place…sampling Molly’s pies and watching her face light up when you told her how amazingly delicious they were…..thanks for the memories..hope you have wonderful success in Trenton next month…I have no doubt you will..
I don’t know what I am salivating for more….our Mother’s incredible pies….or the marshmallows…..the mountain of raked leaves reached so high…sitting here all these years later I can close my eyes and smell that wonderful smell of them burning….