Duet Books – Page 2 – KEVIN CRAIG

The Inception Point – The First Thoughts for The Camino Club…

I just came across an article I wrote in 2014 for the WCDR Wordweaver. After reading it, I was surprised to see mention of my future novel, THE CAMINO CLUB. I didn’t know I had formed the idea for the novel so early. I mean, part of me did…but this article from June 11th 2014 definitely proves it! Wow. I really did carry that novel with me for a while. It released on October 6th, 2020, but I walked with it in my head in May, 2014 as I walked a portion of the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route across Spain.

The article, as it appeared in the WCDR Wordweaver in 2014. I loved the layout so much!!

Here’s the article:

✸ ✸ ✸ ✸ ✸ ✸

The Camino de Santiago – Walk Now, Write Later…

by Kevin Craig

Pilgrims have been walking the Camino de Santiago since medieval times. All the Camino routes lead to the Cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, where the remains of the apostle St. James are said to be buried.

I recently walked the Camino from Ponferrada to Santiago and grossly underestimated its power. Naively, I thought I would be able to write while on my journey. I even contemplated leading others through writing exercises. I strapped a brightly coloured journal to my backpack and planned to fill it with the wonder I was to encounter there.

On day one, prior to that first step, I sat in our hotel lobby and began to write. The entry was filled with the eager anticipation I had of taking those opening footsteps with my fellow peregrinos (pilgrims). The entry took up a quarter of a page. I made it short, as I was enamored with the oversized contraption filled with fresh oranges and colorful gadgetry in my periphery. I quickly learned it made orange juice. A Willy Wonky moment! I was in the Chocolate Factory.

I never opened my journal again.

I always talk about writers writing when they’re not writing. On the Camino, I lived this belief. I struck out on the path as a child, filled with wonder. After a glass of orange juice, made from a magical contraption, I knew immediately I was off to see the Wizard.

I’m now certain the Wizard of Oz is a parable for the Camino. I followed not the yellow brick road, but yellow arrows. I walked not with the lion and the Tin Man, but with my fellow peregrinos. We were all looking for something, and we all had unwavering faith we would find it once we arrived in the mystical city of Oz.

Like Dorothy, I met many people along the way. But I’m a writer. Whether I walked in solitary or in a group, I always clung to that kernel of need; I must write about this. I must share this experience in words.

On the day we walked up a steep mountain pass of jagged rocks and mud, I began to form my 2014 Muskoka Novel Marathon novel idea. While walking I thought, ‘a YA novel about a group of inner-city kids in trouble. They each have to choose—face the serious consequences of their actions or walk the Camino.’ The idea formed as I walked barefoot through mud and pine needles. I was giddy from the splashing, the cushion-y comfort of needles, and the powerful aroma of the eucalyptus forest surrounding me.

As the Camino is wont to do, it later gave me a timely present. Two Irish women walked up and started talking to me about barefoot walking. They had already met my fearless Camino mentor, Sue Kenney. After a few minutes, we got into what they were there for. They had brought a group of teens. They offered numerous insights into how those teens viewed the Camino. Novel research! Practically wrapped in a bow.

I walked some breathtakingly beautiful terrain. Some of it seemed impossible, but the Camino gives you what you need to finish the trip. And in the end, you walk into Oz (Santiago) and you wake up from your dream. You arrive at the Wizard’s castle (the cathedral) and you look around you. All the faces are familiar. They are all old friends from far away. And you stand in the square and you say, “I had a dream!” And you point and say, “You were in it! And you were in it! And you were there, too!”

✸ ✸ ✸ ✸ ✸ ✸

The novel I wrote about in the above article, THE CAMINO CLUB, is now available to read!

THE CAMINO CLUB (Duet Books/Chicago Review Press) – After getting in trouble with the law, six wayward teens are given an ultimatum: serve time in juvenile detention for their crimes, or walk the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route across Spain over the summer holidays with a pair of court-appointed counselor guides. When it becomes clear the long walk isn’t really all that much of an option, they set out on a journey that will either make or break who they are and who they are to become.

ARC Arrival! Book of Dreams is One Step Closer to its Release!

I received the ARC of Book of Dreams yesterday! For those who are not familiar with the acronym, an ARC is an Advanced Reader Copy. They print these prior to the final (final) (final) edits and before the finished novel goes to print…to send out copies for advance reviews/praise. Those reading the ARCs for this purpose realize that what they are holding is only a near finished copy. Usually they are told not to quote passages, as there is a possibility the words in the passage could change prior to the printing of the final version of the book.

The ARC is one of the next to last steps in the evolution of the Idea-to-Manuscript-to-Novel journey. It’s very exciting for the author to get to hold one in their hand…a realization of the kernel of idea brought to fruition. The ARC comes after a long arduous journey. By the time I get the ARC in my hands, I’ve probably read my manuscript 50, 60, 70 times. That might be a slight exaggeration(?) but it does not feel like one.

At any rate, it is HERE!

The ARC! **Book of Dreams** is on its way!

This book has had a long and sometimes treacherous journey! It began as nothing more than a TITLE at the onset of the 2014 Muskoka Novel Marathon(click here to learn more about the marathon). This weekend novel writing marathon, where Book of Dreams was born, was a full 8 years ago! During the 72 hour marathon, I wrote about 30,000 words of Book of Dreams. One attempts to finish an entire first draft at this marathon (and I have done so on occasion), but as I was writing in a new-to-me genre I was taking it slow and easy.

My manuscript received an Honorable Mention in that year’s marathon. I was well on my way! Then I shelved the book for several years while I worked on more pressing ideas. But the kids in this novel kept coming back to me. I had left them in a perilous situation and after a while I thought maybe they deserved to be written out of that corner they were in. So I dove back in. Books have so many different paths. Sometimes they come all at once and your fingers struggle to keep up with the flow of the book that takes place in your mind. And sometimes they die a slow death or ask to be left alone a while as they percolate.

Last year, I knew it was time to pick up Book of Dreams again. Its characters called to me continuously. So I listened. I finished their story.

And here we are. 8 years have passed since I wrote the title at the top of a blank page one. In just over a month the book I started with the ambiguous first sentence, “I’m trapped in my bedroom again, waiting impatiently for the screaming to end.” will be in bookstores and available for all to read. It’s a scary concept! Putting a book into the world, is putting a piece of yourself into the world. And once it’s out there, it is also no longer yours and there’s nothing you can do about it.

On October 6th, 2020, my first book with Duet Books landed into the world. The Camino Club went on to become the Silver Winner of the Independent Book Publishers Association’s Benjamin Franklin Award! It really has been a bit of the little engine that could. It had a nice momentum behind it and I loved seeing it pop up in the world. At the time of The Camino Club‘s release, Duet was the YA imprint of Interlude Press. Interlude has since sold to Chicago Review Press. Both Interlude and Duet are now LGBTQ imprints of CRP. Duet is YA and Interlude is ADULT. Book of Dreams is in extremely good hands! Almost two years apart, my second Duet Books will be out on September 13th, 2022! This date is ALSO my birthday, and I couldn’t think of a nicer birthday gift!

With my ARC in hand, and the final version of the novel already off to the printers, we are all set for the launch!

You can pre-order Book of Dreams wherever books are sold. I’ll leave a few links at the bottom of this post for easy clicking, but you can also order directly from your favourite independent bookstore.

BOOK OF DREAMS (Duet Books/Chicago Review Press, SEPTEMBER 13th, 2022) EBOOK NOW AVAILABLE FOR PREORDER!

Gaige’s curiosity gets the better of him when he discovers a bookstore on an abandoned street where no bookstore should be. He steps inside and is immediately enthralled by its antiquarian sights and smells. But one book in particular calls to him. It isn’t long before he gets a bad feeling about it, but it’s already too late. The store’s aged bookseller gives him no alternative: once he touches the book, it’s his—whether he wants it or not. It’s bought and paid for and there are no returns. The book leads Gaige on a horrific descent into the unknown. As he falls into the depths of its pages, he loses blocks of time, and his friends become trapped inside ancient cellars with seemingly no means of escape. Gaige soon learns that the ancient bookseller is a notorious serial killer from a previous century, and fears that he has fallen into a predicament from which he may not escape. When all seems lost, he finds the one person he can turn to for help—Mael, a sweet teen also trapped inside the book who didn’t fall for the bookseller’s tricks. Together, they race against time to protect Gaige from joining a long string of boys who vanished without a trace inside the Book of Dreams.

AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER WHEREVER BOOKS ARE SOLD! Also, put Book of Dreams on your Goodreads shelf!

Did Somebody Say Cake? Tarta de Santiago…

As part of my Camino de Santiago obsession, I brought home a bit of the Camino with me with the Tarta de Santiago! It’s a little almond cake available all along the Camino route. The original version has only 3 ingredients and is quite dense and squat. You can find that recipe online. Just search 3 ingredient Camino Cake, or something like that.

Stamps, collected on the Camino Frances, 2019.

I bring a lot of things home from my Caminos…

A Camino ring…with the shell, a symbol of the Camino…

I wanted to share the one CAKE I have made several times. It’s a bastardized version that still tastes a little like the memories I carry of the Camino…

Complete with the St. James Cross outlined with icing sugar!

With the recipe below, you can add slight flavour flourishes of choice to make delicate changes to the end product. Think orange zest, raspberry puree and something to that end. It’s a good recipe to tailor make your own final cake, according to your own personal taste.

Tarta de Santiago(ish)

Recipe

2 2/3 Cup Blanched Almonds*
4 Large Eggs
1 1/4 Cup Sugar
Unsalted Butter (1 Stick)(or 8 tablespoons)
3/4 Cup Flour
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
1/2 Cup Water
Zest of 1 Lemon
Powdered Sugar – for Cross Decorating

*Big Asterik Energy! Blanched Almonds. You can buy them blanched. If you didn’t, you can blanche them yourself. BIG alternative option…I buy almond flour at Costco. No blanching, no food processoring.

How to Make your Cake:

Almonds: How to blanche your almonds. Honey, the only Blanche I know is Blanche DuBois and she’s as blanchey blanche blanche as they come. It’s 2022, please don’t blanche your almonds. Either buy them blanched or do what I do. Use almond flour. Google tells me that you get approximately 1 ¼ cups of almond flour using 1 cup blanched almonds. You can do the math and use the appropriate amount of almond flour. Let’s do away with the food processor and make things easier. If you do choose to process your almonds, select FINE and grind them down. Then set it aside.
Heat the oven to 350° F and grease an 8 or 9 inch springform pan. Or, if you don’t have springform, use a regular pan like me.
In a mixing bowl, beat the eggs and sugar
Add butter (softened), flour, baking powder and water. Beat with an electric hand mixer (or with the strength of the two hands the good lawd gave ya) until well combined.
Slowly stir in and mix the almonds (at this point let’s just call it almond flour…I hope no one actually went through the business of preparing their own almonds!) Slowly stir in and mix the almond flour.
Add the lemon zest and blend in thoroughly. Here’s the part where you can substitute. Change the lemon zest to orange zest or another subtle flavour you would prefer to test-drive.
Pour batter into the prepared pan and bake for about 45 minutes (my mother would READ ME FOR FILTH and SLAY ME TO DEATH for using the word ABOUT in a recipe, I promise you that!) My oven runs a little on the cold side, so I keep an eye on it. Use a toothpick to test…insert in centre of the cake and if it comes out clean it’s ready.
Let cool (This is important if you want to add the St. James Cross flourish.)
Find a St. James Cross cutout online. You MUST make this with something heavier than paper if you want an easy go at it. Cut it out in a thin cardboard if possible. Place the cross in the middle of the cake and use a sifter to sprinkle icing sugar all over the top of the cake and the cutout. Very delicately remove the cutout and you should have the cross outlined in the centre of the cake. (You can also use anything your heart desires as a cutout if this is for an occasion.)

There you have it… something along the lines of a Tarta de Santiago. It’s NOT authentic, but it’s still a very nice cake. Not too sweet… just right.

No cross required. You can cover the top of the cake in almonds instead.

Michael and I, while on our 2019 Camino Frances Camino, with the lovely Angela of Albergue A Reboleira in Fonfría!

If you haven’t read my Camino novel, THE CAMINO CLUB, yet… it’s available wherever books are sold. It’s a young adult novel. If you’ve walked the Camino, this book will take you back to the beauty of that walk. If you haven’t walked the Camino, this book will make you place it onto your bucketlist!

Here’s a few links: