Meet Me in Mississauga — My Fighting Family Book Signing May 10

Writing to invite you all to a book signing at Indigo Erin Mills on May 10. It’s a Saturday and I’ll be there till they kick me out, selling books, signing books, and chatting with readers about whatever interests us both.

What we’re reading.

The writing process.

AmeriCanadian relations.

I’m your guy.

Now if you’re reading this post in the context of previous entries about book events, and thinking, “Man… Morgan seems busy this spring,” you don’t know how right you are.

If you’ve been following on this website, then you know I’m confirmed for the Festival of Literary Diversity in Brampton on May 2-3. I’m at The Great Readception on Friday night, and Saturday morning is a panel discussion and book signing.

My followers on on Instagram,  know I’ve issued a save-the-date for May 9. I know where I’ll be and who I’m working with on that event. Just waiting on the green light from the venue/bookseller to publish the details. But if you can make it downtown, and you’re into growing-up-Black-in-Canada memoirs from washed up football uncles, you’ll want to pull up.

Otherwise, come see me in the west end the next morning as I bring My Fighting Family back to its original hometown. Mississauga isn’t just the giant suburb that separates Toronto from Oakville, and Lake Ontario from the rest of Peel Region. It’s the best city in the GTA, period.

If you don’t believe me, just ask The Famous Actor, who posed in front of the Marilyn Monroe Towers for the cover photo gracing his latest album. He might run to Mississauga when he needs a cheque balanced, but I bring my book to Mississauga because it’s home.

*For the record… John River did the Marilyn Monroe shot first, and he did it better. If you’re from Mississauga, then you know Hope City II is, was, and will always be the anthem…*

So when I tell booksellers in Mississauga that my book belongs in the local authors section, I’m not exaggerating. My Fighting Family is rooted in Mississauga, just like Osmow’s or the Bread & Honey Festival or The Great Train Derailment of 1979.

I grew up on Falconer Drive in Streetsville, a stone’s throw from the Meadowvale border. Before I warmed the bench for Northwestern’s football team, I played for the sad-sack Woodlands Rams. And before that, I learned the sport from the ground up in the Mississauga Football League, as this scene from my memoir illustrates.

But you know what I already missed when I started college ball?

City league Saturdays. Crisp October mornings in the sun at, say, John Fraser Secondary School, with my dad watching from the edge of the track. Sometimes my uncle Ken showed up, with his bald head and goatee and shades, and a toothpick dangling like an unlit Kool from the corner of his mouth. IN big-time football you didn’t hear the play-by-play commentary. With uncle Ken, you had real time analysis, in a West Side of Chicago blaccent that cut through the catter.

When I crushed some running back:

“Maybe next time, padna!”

When they’d send another runner my way, and I’d squash him, too:

“Gone ‘head and try the other side. Ain’t nothin happenin’ for you over here, brother.”

When I took on some oversized fullback and dumped him on his butt:

“My nephew wearin’ yo’ big ass out!”

And my dad, silent but present. Projecting his pride with that posture and half-smile.

That passage happened at John Fraser, a high school that’s walking distance from both my uncle’s house, and Indigo Erin Mills. I’m about the most local author they’re likely to find, so I’m beyond excited to introduce my book to readers there.

By now, the regulars here know the drill.

If you have the book, come through and get it signed.

But the goal is to sell books, so please stop by and get one from the author himself. I’d be honoured to scribble in it, in your choice of black, gold, or purple Sharpie.

You have a six week head start, so write it in your calendar and set your alarm because you’re invited.

And by “you,” as always, I mean *you.*

See you in May, if not sooner.

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