How About This presents James Fisher

Today we feature the founder and editor of The Miramichi Reader, James Fisher

Welcome to Atlantic Canada Mondays, a regular feature of How About This where we interview interesting residents of the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador. Today we’re interviewing James Fisher, founder and editor of The Miramichi Reader, a Canadian website of book reviews. James lives in Miramichi, New Brunswick.

James Fisher, framed by full bookshelves

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What is your day job, James?

I work as a Medical Radiation/MRI Technologist at the Miramichi Regional Hospital [Miramichi is a small city in New Brunswick].

Are you originally from Miramichi? If not, where are you from and how did you wind up in Miramichi?

No, I am originally from Ontario. I was born and raised in Kingston, and after graduating in 1986 with a certificate in medical radiation technology, I went to Toronto for employment. My wife Diane and I lived there until 2008, when we moved to NB.

Website header and tagline from The Miramichi Reader

What led you to create The Miramichi Reader? And how did you develop the tagline Canada’s Best-Regarded Source For The Finest In New Literary Releases

TMR came out of a suggestion by a radiologist at the hospital who is also an avid reader. He liked my reviews on Goodreads and suggested I publish them on my own site. Having past experiences with creating websites, I decided to follow through and The Miramichi Reader was born in 2015.

As an aside, I called it the “Reader” as a jab at the then Irving-owned newspaper, the Miramichi Leader. I could have called it The Miramichi Review, but I thought it was too close to The Malahat Review, a literary journal I very much respect.

The tagline was suggested by Karen Schauber, author and she is also the editor of our sister site, Miramichi Flash. She believes in aiming high.

And why not? Author Bruce Meyer recently called TMR “the best reviews venue in Canada.”

Do you have a favorite literary genre? Any particular favourites within the genre?

Non-fiction, particularly history and true crime.

So hard to pick a favourite, Mark. I recently read a book entitled “The Mr. Big Sting” which examined the history of this invention by the RCMP to get confessions from suspects regarding unsolved murders. Very insightful.

I would also like to mention Bill Arnott’s “Gone Viking” books (there are two now) which is adventure travel at it’s best.

How about writing? Do you write fiction, non-fiction or do you restrict yourself to book reviews?

I strictly write book reviews, Mark. I have no illusions about doing any kind of creative writing. It’s like when I tried to learn guitar. I would rather listen to music than create it.

Would you recommend Miramichi (and, by extension, NB) as a good place to live or not and why?

I love living here in Miramichi. And the Acadian Peninsula is amazing. I haven’t explored much of the Saint John River valley area, but New Brunswick is great. Our health care system may be our biggest issue, but there are many good people within the system, and I do hear a lot of positive reports from patients, especially those with an early diagnosis of cancer. Treatment is swift.

How’s the salmon from the Miramichi river system? Is it all it’s cracked up to be?

Vegan! Next question!

What’s one thing you wish other people understood about New Brunswick?

Flag of the province of New Brunswick

There’s more than the Fundy Coast and Flowerpot Island! There are beautiful spaces in every corner of this province. They may not always be convenient to get to, due to the size of NB and our minimal highway system, but they are there.

Pretend you wake up one morning and the Internet has been destroyed. What’s the first thing that you do?

Reboot my router, just to be sure. Then, be thankful I’m a reader.

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Thanks to James!