Drive-By Saviours Book Launch
Chris Benjamin, author of Eco-Innovators: Sustainability in Atlantic Canada, will be in Charlottetown for the PEI launch of his novel Drive-By Saviours, a 2011 Canada Reads choice that was long-listed for the 2011 ReLit Awards.
Joining Benjamin will be Hugh MacDonald, PEI’s Poet Laureate, David Helwig, whose latest book is called Killing McGee, Jeff Bursey, author of the satirical Verbatim: A Novel (The Review of Contemporary Fiction calls it “a tour de force”), and PEI poet Yvette Doucette.
Drive-By Saviours is set in Indonesia and Canada, and brings together two characters and two cultures. Bumi is fleeing persecution from Indonesia, ruled over, at the time of the novel, by the dictator Suharto. Mark is a social worker and grant-writer in Toronto who is slowly burning out, and wondering what to do to make his life worthwhile. Over the course of their growing friendship Mark helps Bumi understand the OCD that has helped drive him from his family, his friends, and his country, while Bumi’s condition re-awakens the desire in Mark to reach out to his estranged sister.
Time: Wednesday, January 11th @ 7p
Location: UPEI Faculty Lounge
Admission: Free