Vancouver (Sep 27/04) - Any writer will tell you the mail carrier is their best friend.

Richard Van Camp knows his postie's name and had to put an interview on hold when John arrived with the mail, anxious to see what Canada Post had brought him.

Richard Van Camp wrote the NWT chapter in a cross-Canada chain book. He set it in his hometown of Fort Smith. He used his chapter to set the dizzy protagonists on a more even keel. - NNSL file photo

"It's like every day is Christmas," said Van Camp.

The writer, originally from Fort Smith but currently living in Vancouver, is waiting for his copy of Write Across Canada to arrive.

Commissioned by the Ottawa International Writers' Festival, the book is a kind of e-mail chain letter that journeys east to west across Canada.

Writer Michael Winter begins the book with the protagonists Bruce and Olivia leaving Newfoundland in an old pick-up truck.

That chapter was e-mailed to the next writer who added the next chapter, and so on, chronicling the pair's trip across the country.

Each writer had 48 hours to add 600 words. In Van Camp's NWT chapter, the characters visit his home town.

"I love Fort Smith," said Van Camp.

"I was born there. I'll be buried there. I wanted to celebrate the beauty Fort Smith has to offer."

Lots to say

In his chapter, the characters meet the mayor, listen to the Slave River rapids, lounge outside the Mary Kaiser library and obtain copies of Leslie Leong's book Our Forgotten North, poetry by Jim Green, and a CD by The Electric Chair Skeletons.

In fact, Van Camp wrote three times more text than he was supposed to and was forced to cut his chapter down to size.

"I wasn't happy that I had to cut back because there was so much I wanted to say about Fort Smith," said Van Camp.

He also made sure to mention Mayor Peter Martselos' "pet fox."

"He has this fox who comes to him regularly," said Van Camp.

"It's a brown fox and its fur is laced with beautiful black. It has the most beautiful cinnamon eyes. And it just waits for him. It's really sweet."

Besides introducing the nation to Fort Smith, he had one other goal for his chapter. Writers of previous chapters had made Olivia pregnant, then unpregnant, then pregnant again, and while passing through Toronto, Bruce slapped Olivia twice.

"I was upset with that," he said. "Not only does she show up pregnant, but they've had this altercation. I wasn't satisfied with how that was dealt with. I thought it was really shameful that it had been put in there in the first place."

So Van Camp introduced the character of a medicine man who acts as a catalyst for Bruce to feel ashamed of what he's done, and determined to atone.

After Van Camp sent off his chapter, the book journeyed on to Victoria and he never did find out what happened to Bruce and Olivia. Hopefully his copy of the book will land in his mailbox soon.