I’ve achieved literary immortality. Sadly, it had nothing to do with the four books I’ve written or any of my countless newspaper, magazine and blog columns. It was made possible by the woman sitting across from me, sipping an organic soy latte with honey. Margaret Atwood. Or Peggy Atwood. I’m not sure which one I like more. Margaret Atwood is why I wanted to write. I’ve read and reread all her books. I send Peggy emails about boy troubles. “My goodness, why don’t you just send him an email and be done with it?” she’ll write back. Or I’ll tell Peggy I was stung by a bee while pumping gas. Peggy responds with, “Oh dear. Public gas station? It may not have been a bee. Maybe a wasp? There are many kinds. May not have been a honeybee, if bee. Did you keep its tiny corpse?” Peggy will read my palm and always signs her emails with “Xm.” Not exactly the way people might imagine the woman described by many as “among the most brilliant writers of English.”

Two years ago, I bid $7,000 at a charity auction to have my name in Atwood’s next book. (I promised I wouldn’t buy shoes for two years.) Now, the book is out. Called The Year of The Flood, it is by far my favourite of all Atwood’s novels. When I send Atwood an email telling her I’m loving it, she writes back, “Well that’s very nice to hear . . . could NOT be because you’re in it!” All Atwood had told me before I got the book to read was that I “don’t die,” which is “always a good thing.” Continue…