It’s a mash of sex and the capital city in Barbara Sibbald’s romantic self-help novel, The Book of Love, which will be released as an ebook this month.
Sibbald, a graduate of Carleton’s journalism program, said her novel is a combination of fiction and researched self-help.
“As for the sex part, I’m just interested in sex. You know, who isn’t?” she laughed.
Sibbald said she’s been writing fiction for 20 years. She said she was too busy finishing her journalism degree to take on creative writing any earlier.
As the editor of humanities and analysis at the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Sibbald said she ties in her job with her literary work by combining fiction and analysis.
“I’m kind of schizophrenic like that with these two things going on,” she said. Although she added they both serve the same purpose, ”They are trying to make sense of the world.”
A main focus of Sibbald’s writing, she said, is relationships and she has always written a lot about them.
“It interests me the most as a writer and arguably as a person,” Sibbald said.
What Sibbald said concerns her about relationships is that women and probably men both have fantastical expectations.
“It is about coming to a realistic place and a realistic idea about what your love relationship should be,” she said.
In her previous book, Regarding Wanda, Sibbald said Wanda’s character had to face up to some personal realities, realizing maybe she’s invested too much in the concept of love.
Her novel The Book of Love, on the other hand, is a melding of the two sides in her life, fiction and non-fiction, Sibbald said.
“I did primary research for the non-fiction portion of the novel. I interviewed a lot of people and found that both parts were a lot of fun to write,” Sibbald said.
Sibbald said she used The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy as a model.
“You have the novel of the characters, but then they use the Hitchhiker’s Guide to negotiate their way through life,” Sibbald said. “The Book of Love helps navigate these three characters through life.”
Sibbald said she has another book in the works, which will be more broad than The Book of Love.
“It is considering a family and their community,” she said. “I’m hoping that I can have something started in the not too distant future.”
Whether it comes to romance, erotica, pornography or sexual literature, Sibbald said the difference comes down to the story within the novel.
“I enjoy a good story as much as the next person,” Sibbald said.
“I think we are hard-wired for narrative. We need stories, we connect through stories, so that is important.”
