“They Call Me Pinky”
Posted on June 23, 2008 Posted by John Scalzi 25 Comments
If you’re Canadian and have been looking for Zoe’s Tale on the Chapters Web site, but couldn’t find it, here’s the reason why. Note the spelling of the book’s title. Not quite correct, yet strangely compelling.
Update, 6/25/08: Fixed now. For those of you who missed it, it was listed as “Toe’s Tale,” not “Zoe’s Tale.”
If I am to be fed to Demon Cat please start with the Toe.
Either one is ok. That way the other one will have quite the tale to tale. Maybe someone will right a book about it. I wonder what it would be called?
Toe’s Tale, the riveting new young adult novel by John Scalvi, about a 17-year-old foot fetishist and her galaxy-spanning journey to save Humanity and lick alien boots…
I feel shame for my homeland…
Before I clicked on the link, I thought it was going to be Zoe’s Tail… which would probably change the genre as well.
I’ve seen this type of thing before on Chapters’ website. Makes me wonder who’s doing the data entry for them.
As usual, I blame the Canadiens. Or polar bears, who I think are now the 2nd largest ethnic group in Canada.
Ow.
Just fell off the bed cracking up.
Odds are some American dictated the title over the phone, and Canadians say “zed” not “zee”…so the Canadian person writing it down heard “tee” intead of “zee” because they are used to “zed”.
There’s a reason many of us call it Crapters.
D
Julia, you are joking? No one hears “tee” when you say “zee”. Then again, people hear “I have weapons of mass destruction” when you say “would you like some tea?,” so, perhaps, I am completely mistaken.
Zeph (or should I say Teph?), I’m not. Having lived amongst the Canadians for multiple years, and all. I’m not making it up.
And all you have to do is google “misheard lyrics” to prove yourself wrong, you know…
Canadians are used to hearing the last letter of the alphabet pronounced both as zed and as zee. It’s Americans that get confused when they hear someone say zed instead of zee. I used to do it intentionally when I worked phone tech support and talked to Americans.
Ah, that explains your other book The Last Colonic. You know, the sequel to Old Man’s Warts.
I was expecting “Zoe’s Tail” too, actually, gutter-brain that I am.
Either that, or mi’splaced apo’strophe’s, cla’s’sic greengrocer’s ‘style.
Julia @10:
Or mondagreens.
Jardine @11:
Just heard about Bare Naked Ladies’ newest project, an album geared toward younger listeners, and have vowed to learn the version of the Alphabet Song which I heard them describe in an interview on NPR. “A” is for aisle, “C” is for ctenophore, “P” is for pneumonia…
And, if I can actually wrap all five of my neurons around their phonetic-without-a-doubt alphabet and grok it in its fullness, I plan to use it in future tech support calls.
At last, I shall have REVENGE! BWAHAHAhahahaHA!
Shane @12:
Methinks that you may have forgotten The Coast Cicades.
Christopher, I did forget but I think you meant The Goats Engaged.
It’s only a small step from there to Tooheys’ Tale, and who wants to read a book about a drunken Space Australian?
No fair! Canada get the Foot Fetish special edition? I protest.
The classic science-fiction novel about a little piggy who went “wee, wee, wee” all the way home.
Oh wow. I hope this doesn’t cause potential readers to stub—I mean, snub your book.
This is why I search chapters by authour… The worst part is that I didn’t even notice the spelling error… I was only looking at the cover art when I was in the store. :)
Christopher @15: “Barenaked Ladies” (I wrote a letter to Chapters after I searched for that on their site, BTW… Stupid Google search term ads). The CD (Snacktime) is quite good. They skip a couple letters of the alphabet though (“i”, for one, can’t remember the others). 7 8 9 is a fun song too.
And on the CD, C is for Czar. The funny part is, S is for Saar (a lovely German river). They sound almost the same. :)
I for one look forwards to reading the Toast Brigades by the same author (John Scalvi – I met him once, you know…)
This is why I go to amazon.ca :)
I Love going into chapters but haven’t purchased anything online.
O Canada!!
People who bought Toe’s Tale also bought:
Asian to the Stars, John Scalvi’s riveting account of the Chinese space program