Nancy Lafleur read from her latest book, Confessions of a Coyote: as told by Stella Coyote on Feb. 23 at the Alex Robertson Public Library.
The reading brought gales of laughter from the audience as they learned something of Stella Coyote and heard her words. This book was actually published under a different title some years before, but, Lafleur decided to change publishers and go back to a self-publishing.
“They’re more accessible; they’re more affordable; and I have control over that,” Lafleur said in an interview with the Northern Advocate.
Lafleur said she likes to write and usually has anywhere from four to 10 short stories on the go and “once in a while, one will just take off.”
This book is written in a different style from her earlier book, Finding Lost, which was a creative autobiography. She remembered being inspired by a good writer, the name of which and author she doesn’t remember, but “I was thinking how brave he was to kind of vent into that way of writing, where you’re using profanity, you’re using like sex and chaos and laughter and life and just whatever.”
Confessions is written in a different style.
“I’m not suing my own voice, I’m using Stella’s,” Lafleur explained. “(I’m) using her voice to navigate through the storyline.
“It was a fun book. It was really a fun book to write because it allowed me to just release to chaos, like it allowed my imagination. I have no boundaries with it and whatever story wanted to come out, just came. Whatever Stella was going to do; she was going to do it, you know. That’s cool.”
Stella first emerges in Finding Lost. She’s the last character in the book, where she’s seen on a bus ride.
“She kind of then grew from [there] … I was thinking I could really do something with this, you know, I can build her character … (and) imagine her adventures…. She’s my alter ego,” Lafleur said.
“I don’t know if I would be as brave as Stella. I’d be tough as her, I think. … I describe her as being a coyote cause when we look at coyote, they’re survivors. They’re not the prettiest things to look at but they’re stealthy, they’re smart, they’re witty, they’re cunning and they survive. That’s where I got her name, Stella Coyote, … her wilderness is the cities. It’s the land of the people around her, you know, and so she survives. Like is able to navigate through society and survive.”
And the response to the book?
“I’ve had a few people get back to me after reading. They said it’s hilarious … it kinda brings out the laughter in our chaos.”
