D.R. MacDonald’s latest novel, Lauchlin of the Bad Heart (HarperCollins), revolves around a Cape Breton ex-boxer whose youthful dreams of glory in the ring were dashed by the discovery that he had a dangerously weak heart. Now in his 50s and still living with his mother, Lauchlin is a charismatic womanizer who spends his time seducing married women in lieu of establishing a real relationship. That is, until he meets Tena, the blind wife of his friend Clement. But getting closer to her ends up embroiling him in a sinister plot.
In this interview with Shelagh Rogers on CBC’s Sounds Like Canada, the award-winning fiction writer talks about the golden days of boxing in Cape Breton in the '50s and '60s which produced many notable fighters. Though MacDonald left the island before he could begin his own training, he recalls feeding his love of boxing by listening to matches on the radio with his father.
For more than 30 years, MacDonald has lived in California, where he teaches creative writing at Stanford University. But he returns to his family home on Cape Breton every summer, because it’s the only place that feeds his literary imagination and inspires his writing.
Read the exclusive Words At Large interview with D.R .MacDonald about Lauchlin of the Bad Heart here.
Originally aired November 2, 2007 on Sounds Like Canada. [runs 18:17]
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