The Mookse and the Gripes discussion

Taking the liberty of starting this thread (rather than posting this in another one) although I didn't know Kevin - who passed away earlier this week - as well as some of the members of the old forum, or those active in that corner of the book blogging community.
Those of you who subscribed to Kevin's blog have probably already seen Trevor's lovely tribute post to him on there:
https://kevinfromcanada.wordpress.com...

It was always good to see Kevin's interesting, forthright posts, and I particularly appreciated his commitment to posting both negative and positive reviews in the tradition of the newspaper field he had worked in before retirement. And because he wasn't shy of saying he disliked a book, it enhanced trust in the honesty of his favourable opinions. His reviews were good to read even when he had a more or less opposite view of a book, as they were very well-reasoned and often highlighted something I hadn't noticed.
I took note of his detailed manner of explaining why he did and didn't like aspects of a book, and of analysing not only the text but his own responses to it, and hope that I learned from it.
It had been worrying to see the very occasional posts from someone who clearly wanted to be blogging but was feeling too ill. Probably like other readers who knew of his circumstances only through what he wrote on the blog, I expected and hoped that he would turn a corner and return to writing regularly again. But sadly this was not to be. RIP.

Thanks for posting this here, Anto. Kevin had a lot of good online-lit-world friends, and it's been nice to reflect on all of the good times -- and to look forward to all of the great relationships still out there.