Writers' Guild of Alberta Podcast: Recent Episodes
Writers' Guild of Alberta
May 2026 Controversy at Noon: Is an online presence vital for today's writers by Writers' Guild of Alberta
February 2026 Controversy at Noon: Are Children’s Writers the Ultimate Freedom Fighters? by Writers' Guild of Alberta
November 2025 Controversy at Noon: The Things They Never Told Me About Publishing by Writers' Guild of Alberta
Book banning across the country continues to concern the Canadian literary community, especially in Alberta where certain books are slated to be pulled from school shelves this Fall. What do these types of bans mean for writers and for readers, now and in the coming months? Years? What calls to action might help prevent the banning of books in the future? Join our panelists and experts as they explore the ramifications of banned books and more this August.The PanelistsGail de VosStoryteller, author, librarian and educator, Gail de Vos has been an active promoter of the oral tradition of literature in Alberta for over three decades. Gail teaches courses on storytelling as well as courses on Canadian Children’s Literature, Indigenous Literature for Young Readers, Comic Books and Graphic Novels at the University of Alberta in the Faculty of Library and Information Studies. Gail is the author of ten award winning resource books on storytelling and folklore in popular culture intended for educators working with students in Grade 6 and above as well as numerous guest chapters on comic books and graphic novels, storytelling, monsters, and folklore in popular culture for academic monographs. While her specialty is telling contemporary legends to young and not so young adults, she is equally at ease telling stories to young audiences. She is an active champion for intellectual freedom in her storytelling, writing, course material, and on social media.http://storytellerdevos.com/ Ira WellsIra Wells is a writer and associate professor of literature at Victoria College in the University of Toronto, and the President of PEN Canada. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Globe and Mail, Guardian, The New Republic, and many other venues. His most recent book is On Book Banning. He lives in Toronto with his wife and children.You can find him at Unacknowledged Legislation on Substack.Peter MidgleyPeter Midgley is the author of several books of poetry, children’s literature, non-fiction, and plays. He has received national and international recognition as a writer and editor. His latest book, let us not think of them as barbarians, is an elegy for Namibia, the country of his birth, and a meditation on the multiple legacies of colonialism. His scholarship includes investigations into the relationship between writing, publishing and ideology, and he has spoken internationally on the subjects of censorship and writing as resistance.https://www.midgley.ca/Malcolm AzaniaMalcolm Azania (Minister Faust) is an award-winning novelist, award-winning print journalist, radio host-producer, television host and associate producer, sketch comedy writer, video game writer, playwright, and poet. He has spoken and taught workshops widely.ministerfaust.com
The current trade war between the United States and Canada–including tariffs focused on the book and publishing industry– has people thinking about buying products made in Canada and supporting local companies that keep our money in Canada. With Canadians paying closer attention to how our money is spent, is there now a fresh opportunity to get the word out there about reading books authored by Canadian writers that are also published in Canada? Join our group of panelists as they consider the potential for upward trends in buying local, and the impact the current climate could have on the Canadian literary scene and publishing industry overall.Laura Rock Gaughan – PanelistLaura Rock Gaughan serves as the executive director of the Literary Press Group of Canada (LPG), a national arts service organization that supports Canadian-owned literary publishers and promotes the growth of Canadian literary culture through All Lit Up and many other projects. She’s also a writer, with fiction and essays published in Canadian, Irish, and US journals and anthologies. Her first book, MOTHERISH, is a short story collection published by Turnstone Press.Jay Millar – PanelistJay Millar is the co-owner and co-publisher of Bookhug Press, a Toronto-based independent literary publisher working at the forefront of contemporary book culture. He currently sits on the board of the Ontario Book Publishing Organization as Treasurer. Jay operates a secret bookstore called Apollinaire’s Bookshoppe, specializing in the books that no one wants to buy, and is the author of seven collections of poetry, the most recent of which is I Could Have Pretended to be Better than You: New and Selected Poems.Katie Lafreniere – PanelistKatie Lafreniere is an Assistant Professor of marketing at the University of Alberta. She has a MSc in management and PhD in business. She studies language and communication, both among consumers (e.g., product reviews) and between consumers and firms (e.g., how managers should respond to reviews). Her research has been featured in Harvard Business Review, CBC, and the Wall Street Journal.Hazel Millar – PanelistHazel Millar is the co-owner and co-publisher of Bookhug Press, a Canadian independent literary publisher working at the forefront of contemporary book culture. Hazel has been working in the publishing industry since 2009. In addition to her work at Bookhug Press, she is the Past Chair of the Board of the Literary Press Group of Canada and sits on several publishing-industry boards and advisory committees. She lives in Toronto with her husband, Jay Millar (aka the other half of Bookhug Press), their sons, and a cool, diva calico cat named Tess.
Please join us for a virtual conversation with Kit Dobson and David A. Robertson for Freedom to Read Week. The authors will discuss the importance of intellectual freedom, and share their own experiences with writing, teaching, and reading banned and/or challenged books.About the Speakers:David A. Robertson is the author of When We Were Alone (2017 Governor General’s Literary Award), The Barren Grounds (2020 Governor General’s Literary Award finalist), and Back Water, winner of the Alexander Kennedy Isbister Award for Non-Fiction and the Carol Shields Winnipeg Book Award. He is a member of Norway House Cree Nation and currently lives in Winnipeg.Kit Dobson is a professor in the Department of English at the University of Calgary. His book Field Notes on Listening was one of the CBC’s top non-fiction titles of 2022. His first novel, We Are Already Ghosts, was released in spring 2024. In the fall semester of the 2024-2025 academic year, he taught a course on banned and challenged books that will inform his comments for this discussion.
Expanding on our September Controversy @ Noon discussion, which focused on traditional publishing vs self-publishing, our December panel will address questions WGA members and fellow literary folks submitted on the topic. Panelists will also have the opportunity to share their views, insights, and experiences with self-publishing, traditional publishing, and/or hybrid publishing.Submitting Questions: Our December panel will be pre-recorded, but in an effort to keep things interactive, we would love for you to send any topic-related questions you have to Ashley Mann at ashley.mann@writersguild.ab.ca. We will have our panelists answer your questions – and more – during their discussion. We will be accepting one question/submission per person, and we will attempt to cover as many questions as possible during the panel discussion. Questions should be submitted no later than November 22, 2024Moderator: Barb HowardPanelists: Naomi K. Lewis, Charlene Carr, and Jaima FixsenAbout The PanelistsJaima FixsenJaima Fixsen is a USA Today and International best-selling author living and writing in Edmonton. Her novel, The Girl In His Shadow (co-authored under the pen name Audrey Blake), was selected as Libby’s 2022 Big Library Read, and has been translated into eight languages.Jaima studied Occupational Therapy at the University of Alberta, and her experiences learning anatomy and dissecting cadavers began her fascination with the history of medical science, which often figures in her stories. Her debut crime novel, The Specimen, released this year. Jaima still works in health care supporting children with disabilities and their families. She loves history, snow, reading, snow, mountains and snow. And Diet Coke.Website: http://jaimafixsen.com/Instagram: @byjaimafixsenBarb HowardBarb Howard has published five books and more than 50 short stories and essays in magazines, journals, and anthologies across Canada. She has been President of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta, Writer-in-Residence for the Calgary Public Library, editor of FreeFall Magazine, and a board member for Calgary Arts Development. Barb is currently a mentor in the Newcomer Arts Professional Program operated by the Immigrant Council for Arts Innovation.Website: www.barbhoward.caFacebook: @barb.howard.50115LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barb-howard-ab542120/Charlene CarrCharlene Carr studied literature at university, attaining both a BA and MA in English, including a study program at Oxford. She has independently published nine novels and her first agented novel, Hold My Girl, sold to HarperCollins Canada, Sourcebooks Landmark (US), Welbeck Publishing (UK) and Alma Littera (Lithuania). It was named one of the Best Books of 2023 by CBC Books, was an Amazon Editor’s Pick for Best Literature and Fiction, was shortlisted for both the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award and the Dartmouth Book Award, and has been optioned for adaptation to the screen. Charlene received grants from Arts Nova Scotia and Canada Council for the Arts to write and revise her most recent novel, We Rip The World Apart, and is working on her next book. She lives in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia with her husband and young daughters.Instagram: @charlenecarrauthorFacebook: @charlenecarrwritinglife (Charlene Carr – Writing Life)Naomi K. LewisNaomi K. Lewis writes fiction and nonfiction, and also works as an editor, currently at Freehand Books.Instagram: @na.oh.meeFacebook: Naomi K. LewisWebsite: https://www.naomiklewis.com/
Do newcomers and immigrants to Alberta face more pressure to write about current issues in their place of origin (eg, Gaza, Ukraine, Venezuela, etc.) than other writers? How do writers, especially immigrants and refugee writers, deal with the many giant global “distractions” enough to write about anything else? Should current events and related topics be prioritized by all writers in all genres? Why or why not? Join our panelists as they discuss the complexities of writing through a diasporic lens and more in November’s Controversy @ Noon panel.About The PanelistsKelly KaurKelly Kaur grew up in Singapore and lives in Calgary. She was recently awarded the 2024’s Top 25 Canadian Immigrant award. Kaur’s poem, “A Singaporean’s Love Affair,” landed on the moon on February 22, 2024, as part of the Lunar Codex — the first historic library of its kind, declared an Artemis Accords Heritage Site. Her novel, Letters to Singapore, which chronicles the experiences of a newcomer to Canada, will also be going to the moon on the Astrobotic Griffin/NASA VIPER mission in September 2025. Her creative works have been published around the world. Her poems were exhibited in North Dakota, United States, in a one year travelling exhibition that went to art galleries and museums, and other poems were even danced to by the Voices Dance Project in Ottawa who set her poetry to music and choreography. Kaur has a passion for human rights, and she is an editor and judge for the International Human Rights Art Movement, New York (IHRAM). She is an editor for their upcoming fourth quarterly magazine, December 2024: Indigenous Voices of Canada: Heart, Hope and Land. Other anthologies Kaur edited were Her Rights, Our Stories: An African Women’s Anthology and From Africa With Love: Voices of a Creative Continent. She has an upcoming children’s book, Howdy, I’m Singh Hari, the story of a pioneer Sikh rancher in Alberta. Kaur’s poetry collection, to be published by the University of Calgary Press, will be out in 2026.Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kelly.kaur.98Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kellykaur3/Mila Bongco-PhilipzigMila is a writer, visual artist, and community organizer. Her children’s books, poems, essays and podcasts have been published in Canada, USA, the Philippines and Germany. The diaspora of the global majority is a recurring theme in her writings. www.milabongco.comIG: @milabillabongFB: Mila Bongco
We’re pivoting a bit and looking to have some fun with our October Controversy @ Noon Panel; this may be our most controversial discussion to date! We want to know: Who is the greatest horror writer of all time? From the gothic pages of Stoker and Shelley, to King’s twisty endings or Rice’s description-laden vampire tales, who really takes the cake when it comes to making us squirm, scream, cry, or throw our pages across the room in unabated anger? There are too many writers to list here, but you catch our drift. What makes for excellent horror writing? Are there formulas and tropes we should follow as writers to successfully reach our audience, or is creating timeless horror an innate ability? What do we love to see in horror writing? What do we loathe? Join our panelists this October as they hunt down the nuances of great — and not so great — horror writing.Moderator: Susie MoloneyPanelists: Richard Van Camp, Jacqueline Baker, and Francine Cunningham
The publishing world has gone through tremendous change in recent years, especially post-pandemic. Even established authors who have found great success being traditionally published have aired their grievances about the hardships and uncertainty in the industry moving forward. Self-publishing has become a popular alternative for writers who want more control and autonomy when publishing their work, but it can be expensive and there still seems to be a level of ambiguity that plagues the process. Both avenues have their pros and cons, but what does it really entail to have your work traditionally published? To self-publish on your own? Is one better than the other, or are they simply different? Are works that are traditionally published valued more? If so, why? Which route might be best for you? Join our panelists this September as they delve into the often polarizing topic of traditional publishing vs self-publishing.
Marty Chan (Moderator): Marty Chan writes books for kids, theatre for adults, and social media posts for fun. The 2024 recipient of the WGA’s Golden Pen Award, Marty has written dramas, comedies, fantasy, and suspense. He works and lives in Edmonton with his wife Michelle and their two cats, Minnie and Hugo. For more information about Marty, visit martychan.com. Social handles:X: Marty_ChanBlue Sky: https://bsky.app/profile/martychan.bsky.socialThreads: @martychanwriterFacebook: MartyChanAuthorInstagram: martychanwriterJulie Sedivy (Panelist): Julie Sedivy is a writer and linguist whose love of language extends to many literary genres and whose work often intertwines aesthetic and scientific perspectives. Her publications include three books of nonfiction, a forthcoming children’s picture book (co-authored with Souad Shehab), a non-boring textbook on the psychology of language, and an edited volume of personal essays (co-edited with Rona Altrows). Her book Memory Speaks was shortlisted for the W.O. Mitchell City of Calgary Book Prize and the Eggleston Award for Nonfiction. She has published dozens of essays and articles in outlets such as Nautilus, The Literary Review of Canada, Scientific American, Discover, Politico, as well as in various anthologies. She occasionally writes and performs poetry as well. She is preparing to launch her scientific memoir, Linguaphile: A Life of Language Love, in October 2024. Farah Heron (Panelist): Farah Heron is a critically acclaimed romance author for adults and teens. Her books have been named as best books of the year by CBC books, USA Today, and NPR, and have been praised in Entertainment Weekly, Buzzfeed, and Teen Vogue. She writes contemporary romances and romantic comedies full of huge South Asian families, delectable food, and most importantly, brown people falling stupidly in love. Her adult books include ACCIDENTALLY ENGAGED, JANA GOES WILD, and JUST PLAYING HOUSE, and her young adult books include TAHIRA IN BLOOM and HOW TO WIN A BREAKUP. Farah lives in Toronto with her family. Social Handles:Instagram: farahheronauthorX: FarahHeronFacebook: FarahHeronAuthorConor Kerr (Panelist): Conor Kerr is a Métis/Ukrainian writer living in Edmonton. He is a member of the Métis Nation of Alberta. His Ukrainian family are settlers in Treaty 4 and 6 territories in Saskatchewan. He grew up in Saskatoon, Edmonton, and other prairie towns and cities. In 2022 he was named one of CBC’s Writers to Watch. He is the author of the poetry collections An Explosion of Feathers and Old Gods, which was shortlisted for the 2023 Governor General's Award and named one of the Best Poetry Books of 2023, as well as the novel Avenue of Champions, which was shortlisted for the Amazon Canada First Novel Award, longlisted for the 2022 Giller Prize and won the 2022 ReLIT award. He recently published his second novel Prairie Edge. Social Handles:Instagram: Millcreekcowboy
Folks in the writing world continue to talk about AI and how they are using – or not using – it as a tool, a test, or even a novelty party trick. The writing seems to be on the wall when it comes to the inevitability of AI and its use in everyday life, but have writers and readers had their say about how AI creates new works of art? Some groups of writers are speaking out against the use of their writing to train Large Language Models (LLMs) without recognition and compensation, but is that enough? Are writers and consumers of literature willing to say they are not interested in purchasing new stories and books that are written entirely by AI? Is there a strong enough case for Human Intelligence and Human Creativity or is there just no stopping technology?Join us for a spirited discussion of what we value as writers and as humans and the ways in which we can fight back.Panel includes: Alison McBain, Christine Taylor, Matthew Stepanic, and Travis Croken.Matthew Stepanic – ModeratorMatthew Stepanic (he/she/they) is a queer writer who lives and works on Treaty 6 territory in Edmonton. He edits and designs chapbooks for the recently launched Agatha Press. He is a co-author of Project Compass (Monto Books, 2017) and the author of Relying on that Body (Glass Buffalo, 2018). His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Queer Little Nightmares (Arsenal Pulp, 2022), Plenitude, FreeFall, and others.Social handles on Twitter & Instagram are: @mlstepanicAlison McBain- PanelistAlison McBain’s novels are the recipients of over 13 awards, including the Foreword INDIES. When not writing for herself, she’s a ghostwriter who has penned over two dozen books for clients, as well as an award-winning editor who has worked with both celebrity and NY Times-bestselling authors. She’s currently pursuing a project called “Author Versus AI,” where she’s writing a book a week over the course of a year, using NO AI at all (52 books total). When not writing, Ms. McBain is associate editor for the magazine ScribesMICRO and draws all over the walls of her house with the enthusiastic help of her kids. She lives near Edmonton in Alberta.Author Versus AI websiteAuthor websiteFacebookTwitterInstagramLinkedInYouTubeChristine Taylor – PanelistChristine Tsai Taylor is a writer, storytelling consultant, and diversity specialist. The biracial daughter of a Taiwanese mother and American father, Christine grew up in the US, Germany, Saudi Arabia, and Switzerland. She moved to Edmonton in July 2021 after seventeen years in The Netherlands. Her Substack newsletter is Wanderings.Travis Croken – PanelistTravis J. Croken lives in Ottawa, Canada and writes in a variety of genres. He is the National Co-Chair of the Canadian Authors Association, a member of the Ottawa Independent Writers, and Society for Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators. Croken hosts several writing programs including the Writer’s Chat, Scribe’s Journey Podcast, and After the… literary talk show. He owns Wax Seal Productions where he designs literary cocktails and helps authors reach their goals through coaching, editing, and other supports.Socials:Instagram: @thecalmscribeTwitter: @thecalmscribeTikTok: @thecalmscribe
As writers, we are told that rejection, a lot of rejection – most likely – is par for the course. Some of us cope by making light of the situation, framing rejection letters and showcasing them on an office wall or shelf. Others opt to go back to the drawing board, reframing their process, their work, or even their overall career plans. When is enough enough? Is there a point where we accept that something isn’t working and move on to the next project? Where is the line that separates resilience from naivety? Join our panelists as they discuss the complexities of dealing with rejection during our May Controversy @ Noon panel.About The PanelistsAli Bryan – ModeratorAli Bryan is an award-winning novelist and creative nonfiction writer who explores the what-ifs, the wtfs, and the wait-a-minutes of every day. Her work has been shortlisted for the Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour, nominated for the Pushcart Prize, longlisted for both the Commonwealth Short Story Prize and the Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing prize, and has been optioned for TV by Sony Pictures. Her sixth book, a YA contemporary novel, Takedown, was released in May. Born and raised in Halifax, she now lives in the foothills of the Canadian Rockies on Treaty 7 Territory. When not writing, she operates Parlay Manuscript Services with her business partner, Sandra McIntyre.Sandra SG Wong- PanelistSandra SG Wong writes fiction across genres. The cross-genre Lola Starke novels and Crescent City short stories have garnered finalist nominations for the Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence. The standalone thriller, IN THE DARK WE FORGET, was an Anthony Awards finalist and Canadian bestseller. In addition to being a speaker, mentor, and community organizer, Sandra is a Past President of Sisters in Crime, and an active member of Crime Writers of Color.Nisha Patel – PanelistNisha Patel (Nee-Sh-aww, Put-ell) (She/her) is a Poet Laureate Emeritus of the City of Edmonton and a Canadian Poetry Slam Champion. A queer and disabled artist, Nisha is a recipient of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee Medal and the Edmonton Artists’ Trust Fund Award. Her sophomore collection of poetry, A Fate Worse Than Death, engages in the necropolitics surrounding disability, and is out now with Arsenal Pulp Press.Lauren Seal – PanelistLauren Seal is a writer and former St. Albert Poet Laureate. She mentors the teen and young adult poets of SWYC, the Spoken Word Youth Choir, and performs in the adult incarnation of the group. Her debut novel-in-verse, Light Enough to Float, is forthcoming October 2024 with Rocky Pond Books, a Penguin-Randomhouse imprint.
This recording is from an online reading featuring finalists for the 2024 Alberta Literary Awards. Antoinette BekkerAstrid BlodgettKate BoormanJennifer Bowering DelisleNatasha DeenJulie SedivyJosée ThibeaultNote. The audio volume drops at the end of the recording during Astrid Blodgett's reading. Apologies for the inconvenience
Does bias exist in the literary world where age is concerned? Writing is hard enough in the first place, do writers also have to worry about the continued relationship with their publisher, agent, readers, and other writers in the industry as they get older? If so, in what ways? Additionally, are writers in certain genres prone to be more successful if they fall under a particular age group? Less successful? Our panelists will examine these questions and other age-related industry issues during our April Controversy @ Noon Panel.About The PanelistsNorma Dunning – ModeratorNorma Dunning (PhD) is a Padlei Inuk writer, professor and grandmother. Dr Dunning has published in poetry, prose, fiction and nonfiction.Kinauvit? (what’s your name?) a work of nonfiction shortlisted for the Shaughnessy Cohen prize for political writing in 2023 and Tainna (the unseen ones) received the Governor General’s Award in literary fiction in 2021. Annie Muktuk and Other Stories (2017) received the Danuta Gleed in 2018, as well as several other literary awards. Her books have been translated into French, Greek and Amharic. Aput! (snow), a children’s book, will be released in the fall of 2024. Dunning lives in Regina where she teaches at the First Nations University of Canada.FacebookRona Altrows – PanelistRona Altrows is a fiction writer, essayist, editor, and playwright. She believes literature plays a critical role in the fight for social justice. Her books of short fiction are A Run on Hose, Key in Lock, and At This Juncture, and her work has appeared in Queen’s Quarterly, The Prairie Journal, and many other magazines and e-zines in Canada and the US. She has edited or co-edited three anthologies, including You Look Good for Your Age, an exploration of women, aging, and ageism. Honours she has received include the W.O. Mitchell Book Prize, the Jon Whyte Memorial Essay Award, and two Independent Book Publishers awards.Website, BlueskySharon Butala – PanelistButala is the author of 22 books of both fiction and nonfiction and for nearly fifty years, at 83, has been writing and publishing with both major publishers and smaller companies. She has been agented since the eighties and has appeared at many festivals in Canada and the USA and made presentations in, besides Canada, the USA, Mexico, Ireland and the Czech Republic. Her many awards and prizes include the Marian Engel Award, the W.O. Mitchell/City of Calgary Award and the Glengarry Book Prize Award. She was recently shortlisted for the Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Her memoir, The Perfection of the Morning, was on the Canadian bestseller list for a year.WebsiteTololwa Mollel – PanelistEdmonton-based Tololwa M. Mollel writes books, plays, and stories for performance for all ages in English and Kiswahili, the national language of Tanzania where he was born. He has published 24 books for the young in both languages. Some of the books are translated into various African, Asian, and European languages. Tololwa also performs stories, solo or with other performers or artists. He has been spreading his passion for story, performance and writing to the young and old through story workshops, performances and presentations in Alberta schools and communities.Website
With book banning in Alberta and Canada seemingly on the rise, it’s left many wondering what this means for writers, for readers, and for the community at large. What are the ways in which censorship affects and/or impedes the literary world, and what can we do to maintain the creative freedom to read and to write what we choose to?
The ethics of writing on social issues can be a complicated topic of conversation for writers: What does it mean, really? Are certain issues off-limits for particular writers? What are the types of issues that fall under this very broad theme? How can we strive to write characters and narratives that feel meaningful, informed, and appropriate to the story we’re trying to tell? Join our group of panellists as they discuss the ethics of writing on social issues during our first Controversy @ Noon panel in 2024.About The PanellistsDr. Jenna Butler (she/her)www.jennabutler.comDr. Jenna Butler (she/her) is an award-winning poet, essayist, mentor, and editor.She is the author of three books of poetry, Seldom Seen Road, Wells, and Aphelion; a collection of ecological essays, A Profession of Hope: Farming on the Edge of the Grizzly Trail; and the Arctic travelogue Magnetic North: Sea Voyage to Svalbard. Her book, Revery: A Year of Bees, essays about beekeeping, climate grief, and trauma recovery, was a finalist for the 2021 Governor General’s Literary Award in Non-Fiction and a longlisted title for CBC Canada Reads 2023.Butler teaches creative writing at the University of Saskatchewan and serves as the Environmental Writing Fellow for the Spring Creek Project and Oregon Wild. She teaches for Calgary’s Alexandra Writers’ Centre as their outgoing Writer in Residence, focusing on ecological writing. Her work has its roots in the off-grid organic farm she runs with her husband in northern Treaty 6, Alberta.Natasha Deennatashadeen.comRecent works: The Spooky Sleuths series, Book three, Don’t Go Near the Water!Guyanese-Canadian NATASHA DEEN is a best-selling author, with novels for kids, teens, and adults, and she’s a recipient of the Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal. Her novel, In the Key of Nira Ghani, won the Amy Mather Teen Book Award and her most recent YA title, The Signs and Wonders of Tuna Rashad was a Globe & Mail‘s Top 100 Books for 2022. When she’s not writing, she teaches Introduction to Children’s Writing with the University of Toronto’s SCS and spends an inordinate amount of time trying to convince her pets that she’s the boss of the house. Uchechukwu Peter Umezurikewww.instagram.com/uche_peter_umez/Uchechukwu Peter Umezurike is the author of literary works such as there’s more (2023), Double Wahala, Double Trouble (2021), Wish Maker (2021), and a co-editor of Wreaths for a Wayfarer (2020).Rayanne Haines (she/her)www.rayannehaines.com/Rayanne Haines is an award-winning author, educator, and cultural producer. She is the creator and host of the literary podcast Crow Reads, is the President of the League of Canadian Poets, and teaches at MacEwan University. Her hybrid poetry collection, Tell the Birds Your Body is Not a Gun won the 2022 Stephan G. Stephansson Alberta Literary Award and was shortlisted for both the Robert Kroetch Award and the ReLit Award. She’s been published in the Globe and Mail, Minola Review, Fiddlehead, Prairie Fire and others. A CNF poetry and essay collection exploring grief, identity, and gendered trauma is forthcoming from Frontenac House September 2024Bibliography:1 - https://bookriot.com/mistreatment-of-women-in-game-of-thrones/2 - https://www.vulture.com/2019/02/kosoko-jackson-a-place-for-wolves.html#3 - https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/american-dirt-book-controversy/4 -https://lareviewofbooksorg/article/my-taco-laughs-at-you-on-death-threats-aimed-at-women-of-color-who-dont-fellate-white-supremacy/
We are thrilled to present the latest episode of the Canadian Literature Centre podcast. In this episode, also part of the “Air and Fire” series of readings and conversations this year, Hari Alluri, Alice Major, and Michelle Porter explore the literal and metaphorical significance of fire in a brilliant, wide-ranging reading and conversation.
As the presence of Artificial Intelligence evolves and its reach continues to expand, writers are forced to ask themselves: What does this mean for me and my work? The topic of AI is multi-faceted, and while AI promises endless possibilities for artists and writers alike, it also brings with it fear and uncertainty. What lines have been drawn between AI as a supplemental tool and AI as the career-crushing thief many believe it could be?
July 26, 2023 was supposed to be an outdoor event featuring writers Katherine Abbass, Meghan Eaker, and Colby Clair Stolson. The event was rained out but the writers were kind enough to jump on a Zoom to be recorded and shared with you now. Please enjoy.
Freedom to read can never be taken for granted. Even in Canada, a free country by world standards, books and magazines are banned at the border. Schools and libraries are regularly asked to remove books and magazines from their shelves. Few of these stories make headlines, but they affect the right of Canadians to decide for themselves what they choose to read. Our neighbours to the south seem to be banning another batch of books or covering up more library shelves and display cases every week.What effect does this have on artists, activists, and the librarians whose job it is to challenge us with new ideas and concepts, as well as put books containing those ideas into the hands of readers everyday?We’ll talk to people in the Alberta literary community about the importance of intellectual freedom and what the lasting legacy of banning books really is.
Farzana Doctor and Kelly Kaur talk about what goes into writing that first novel, and what comes next.
Carissa Halton and Michael Hingston talk about the important role that research plays in a writer's work.
A conversation between WGA's Virtual Writer-in-Residence Gail Anderson-Dargatz and Lisa Murphy Lamb recorded in May of this year. Gail also gives a brief reading of her work.
Micheline Maylor reads from her new book, The Bad Wife, followed by a conversation with Anne Sorbie. Sponsored by The University of Alberta Press.
Original recording date: October 20, 2021
Beth Sanders reads from her book, Nest City, followed by a Q&A with host Kelly Shepherd. Sponsored by Read Alberta
Original recording date: Oct 20, 2022
Ali Bryan reads from her new novel, The Hill, followed by a conversation with host Heidi Klaassen. Sponsored by Read Alberta.
Original recording date: Oct 13, 2021
Barb Howard reads from her new book, Happy Sands, followed by a conversation with Anne Logan.
Original recording date: October 6, 2021
Jennifer Bowering Delisle reads from her book, Deriving, followed by a conversation with host Katherine Abbass.
Original recording date: September 29, 2021
Robert Proudfoot reads from his new book, Come by Here, My Lord, followed by a conversation with host Leif Gregersen.
Original recording date: September 22, 2021
Pamela Medland reads from her book, Echo of Ash, followed by a conversation with David Martin.
Original recording date: September 15, 2021
Dan Martin reads from his new YA novel, An Orphan's Journey, followed by a Q&A from author Steven Sandor.
Original recording date: September 8, 2021
Sharon Butala reads from her new book, This Strange Visible Air: Essays on Aging and the Writing Life. The reading is followed by a conversation with host Alice Major.
This episode of the WGA Online Reading Series is sponsored by Read Alberta.
Original recording date: September 1, 2021
Onyinye Odih reads from her book, A Mother's Love, followed by a conversation with host Sue Farrell Holler.
Originally recorded on August 30, 2021
Neil Surkan reads from his new book, Unbecoming, followed by a Q&A with host Berend McKenzie.
Originally recorded on August 18, 2021
Karen Spafford-Fitz reads from her new book, Pickpocket, followed by a conversation with host Charlotte Cameron. Original recording date: Aug 11, 2021
Charlotte Cameron reads from her book, Love and Courage in Troubled Times, and talks to host Nancy Bell. Original recording date: Aug 4, 2021
Sophie reads from her new book, Walking Leonard, followed by questions and a conversation with host Lori Hahnel.
N.L. Blandford reads from her book, followed by questions and a conversation with host Susan Calder.
Leif reads from his book, followed by questions and a conversation with host Alexis Kienlen.
Original air date: July 7, 2021
Glenn Dixon talks about his novel Bootleg Stardust with fellow author Greg Rhyno. Glenn also plays music written and recorded for the book.
Catch Jael Richardson and Téa Mutonji in conversation on Episode 8 of the CLC Brown Bag Lunch Podcast!
Jael Richardson is the author of The Stone Thrower: A Daughter’s Lesson, a Father’s Life, a memoir based on her relationship with her father, CFL quarterback Chuck Ealey. The Stone Thrower was adapted into a children’s book in 2016 and was shortlisted for a Canadian picture book award. Richardson is a book columnist and guest host on CBC’s q. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Guelph and lives in Brampton, Ontario where she founded and serves as the Executive Director for the Festival of Literary Diversity (FOLD). Her debut novel, Gutter Child is a dystopian story of courage and resilience and arrives January 2021 with HarperCollins Canada.
Born in Congo-Kinshasa, Téa Mutonji is a poet and fiction writer. Her debut collection, Shut Up You’re Pretty, is the first title from Vivek Shraya’s imprint, VS. Books. It was shortlisted for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize (2019), and won the Edmund White Debut Fiction Award (2020) and the Trillium Book Award (2020). Mutonji is the recipient of the Jill Davis Fellowship at NYU.
Author Alison Clarke (she/her) has been creating magical worlds as soon as she could put pen (or brush) to paper. She was awarded 2016 Writer of the Year by Diversity Magazine for The Sisterhood, Book One of her middle grade fantasy trilogy; has been featured in the Edmonton Journal; her latest book, Phillis, was featured on a CBC Book List; and she is the 2021 Writer in Residence for the Alexandra Writers' Centre Society. Alison takes Gio and Renée through her beginnings as a writer; how the themes in her work emerge organically from her interest in diverse mythology, cultures, and the power of the collective; how crucial it is for people of colour to see themselves represented in media; and why it's so important to listen to your own voice when it comes to your creative work. You can find Alison online on Twitter and Instagram, and more of her work at RealmofWyrniverdon.com. Like the show? Check out patreon.com/listen2mepod to learn more about how you can support the show, and connect with Gio at giografik.com and Renée at reneewrought.com.
F.K. Aldon : Question the Status Quo Author and YouTuber F.K. Aldon is a Jill of All Trades: she writes ✍🏾, she reads tarot 🔮, she podcasts 🎙️, she paints nails 💅🏾. Gio and Renée speak with Fadima about her motivation and process for writing her debut, nonfiction book The Single Friend; the ethics of starting her YouTube tarot channel Scorpio Stiletto Tarot; the social commentary that informs her channel Unfiltered & and her podcast Weird Millennials; and her foray into writing articles for vocal.media. Detours include listener feedback (finally!!), Listen 2 Me's new suite of sound effects (thanks, Gio!), and whatever the fuck is up with Geminis ♊. Follow F.K. Aldon on Instagram, subscribe to her YouTube channels and check out Weird Millenials on Spotify, Google or Apple Podcasts. Find more of Gio at giografik.com; Renée at reneewrought.com; and check out the Listen 2 Me Patreon for early episodes and sweet bonuses! ✨
Episode Title: Emily Campbell : Write For Writing's Sake 🖋️
Emily Campbell (she/her) is a writer, a poet, the founder of The New Cambrians book club/writing group, and has published with The Bolo Tie Collective, The Anti-Languorous Project and the inaugural issue of Lida Literary Mag. Joining Gio and Renée, Emily talks about the evolution of her writing; decoupling her writing career from "making it" as a Big Name Author and making it fun to write again; gatekeeping in the writing and publishing community; the gratifying experience of creating a writing community of her own and so much more. 🚧 Detours include erotic fanfiction, being pigeon-holed as "the art kid" in grade school, and the burnout inherent in hustle culture. You can check out L2M on Patreon at patreon.com/listen2mepod and find us on social media @listen2mepod (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook). Find more of Gio's work at giografik.com and social media @giografik and Renée at reneewrought.com and on all social media @reneewrought.
Writers assemble! Liselle Sambury (she/her) is a young adult author writing stories about "messy Black girls in fantasy situations" and is dropping her debut book, Blood Like Magic, in June 2021. She joins Renée and Gio to talk about how she got started in writing, how she established herself on AuthorTube, and how she got her very first book deal. This episode also includes Liselle's tips on writing craft and busting through writer's block; favourite tropes in YA novels; and her process for bringing Blood Like Magic from draft to published manuscript. Find more of Liselle's work at lisellesambury.ca and follow her on social media @lisellesambury. Follow & Support Listen 2 Me: Patreon | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook Find Gio at giografik.com and @giografik Find Renée at reneewrought.com and @reneewrought Instagram | Twitter | Facebook
Get ready to level up! Have you ever wondered what it takes to write your own video game? Let Davis G. See (he/him) tell you, as he walks Gio and Renée through the path that led him to freelance writing, creating interactive fiction, and becoming one of Edmonton Public Library's featured writers. Topics include how to build your client base as a freelancer, gay poetry binders, why queer representation in everything is important, and what to do when writer's block gets you down. CW: Mention of cock (not the animal), erotic Kingdom Hearts fan fiction, and Davis' game Post-Apocalyptic Gay Sex Simulator v0.1. You can find Davis' games at davisgsee.itch.io, more of his writing on Patreon @davisgsee and follow him on Twitter @davisgsee for updates!
How magical! This week Renée and Gio sit down with the kind and talented Jessica Renwick (she/her), award-winning author of the fantasy middle-grade Starfell series. The first two books, The Book of Chaos and The Guitar of Mayhem, are out now. Her short story “The Witch’s Staff” will appear in the forthcoming anthology book Magical Girls from Celticpress Publishing. We talk writing characters we can see ourselves in, the adventures of self-publishing, and the importance of writing with diversity. Bonus topics include branching into editing, how to harness ideas and turn them into something substantial, and Gio's horse girl history. You can find more of Jessica's work at jessicarenwickauthor.com and across social media @jessicarenwickauthor.
The WGA is proud to partner with the Listen 2 Me podcast. Listen 2 Me is a podcast for creatives, by creatives. Your hosts, Gio and Renée, two lifelong friends and queer creatives, talk about the very real highs and lows of making art while staying grounded.
Episode 14 - Kelly Small:Have you ever wondered how to keep your sanity as a career creative in today’s cutthroat capitalist economy? This episode is all about how to consciously elevate your pursuit of creative success and sustainability. Gio and Renee have the incomparable pleasure of speaking to Kelly Small (they/them), the author of The Conscious Creative. Kelly left their marketing management position at a big Toronto agency and embarked on a years-long journey that led them through the ups and downs of an existential career crisis, returning to school, stress and illness, culminating in their creation of the incredible resource that is The Conscious Creative.
This is audio recorded from the live reading with finalists for the Alberta Literary Awards. Readers, in order of appearance:
Omar Mouallem
Natalie Meisner
Bertrand Bickersteth
Gabe Calderon
Kat Cameron
Ellen Chorley
Jannie Edwards
Will Ferguson
Alexandra Latos
Amy Leblanc
Harnarayan Singh
Kim Smith
Stephanie Tamagi
1:49:53 - Debby Waldman
This is audio recorded during the live reading with finalists from the Alberta Literary Awards. Readers, in order of appearance:
Katie Bickell
Timothy Caulfield
Tyler Enfield
Lee Kvern
Annette Lapointe
Clem Martini
Peter Midgley
Beth Sanders
Barbara Scott
Gina Starblanket & Dallas Hunt
Joan Marie Galat shares three of her books for children, followed by a conversation with Onyinye Odih, and audience Q&A via YouTube chat.
Original air date, Oct. 29, 2020
Lori Hahnel reads from her new book of stories, Vermin, followed by a conversation with fellow short story writer Lee Kvern, and audience Q&A via YouTube chat.
Original air date Oct. 27, 2020
Alison Clarke will read from her new poetry book, Phillis, followed by a conversation with Brandon Wint, and an audience Q&A via YouTube chat.
NOTE There is a brief technical interruption at the 5:56 minute mark. Our apologies for the disruption.
Original air date: Oct. 15
Katrina Rosen reads from her memoir, With You by Bike, followed by a conversation with Helen Rolfe, and audience Q&A via YouTube chat.
Original air date: Sept 28
Dianne Palovcik reads from her new novel, In Trouble, and speaks with Joan Marie Galat about the book and her writing life. This is a pre-recorded interview and no Q&A is included.
Alexis Kienlen talks to Anne Logan about her new novel, Mad Cow. Original air date September 10, 2020
Dolly Dennis reads from her new novel, The Complex Arms, and chats with author Jennifer Quist about her publishing journey, with an audience Q&A afterwards.
Original air date September 3, 2020
Author Annette Lapointe reads from her latest book, And This is The Cure, followed by a Q&A led by Sue Farrell Holler.
Annette Lapointe has lived in rural Saskatchewan, Quebec City, St John’s, Saskatoon, Winnipeg (where she earned her PhD), and South Korea. She now lives in Treaty 8 territory, on the traditional lands of the Beaver people, and teaches at Grande Prairie Regional College. In her copious free time, she edits The Waggle magazine. She has previously published two acclaimed novels (Stolen and Whitetail Shooting Gallery), and a short story collection (You Are Not Needed Now). Her latest novel is And This is the Cure.
Original air date August 20
Cathie Bartlett reads from her new novel, Destination Prairie, and chats with her friend and fellow writer Jane Ross.
Le 17 mars 2021, écoutez un nouvel épisode des midis littéraires du CLC avec l'écrivaine renommée, Virginia Pésémapéo Bordeleau !
Née en Jamésie, au nord-ouest du Québec, Bordeleau est une artiste multidisciplinaire eeyou qui œuvre depuis 40 ans. En 2006, elle obtient le prix d’excellence en région remis par le Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec en plus de la mention de Télé-Québec du prix littéraire de l’Abitibi-Témiscamingue pour son recueil de poésie, De rouge et de blanc, et en 2012, elle est lauréate pour le Prix littéraire de l’Abitibi-Témiscamingue. Depuis 2007, elle a publié 3 romans, 3 recueils de poésie, un livre de contes, un essai et un livre d’art. Elle obtient le prix de l’artiste de l’année en Abitibi-Témiscamingue remis par le Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec en 2020.
Son dernier livre, Ourse bleue – Piciskanâw mask iskwew (2020), est une rétrospective poétique de sa carrière artistique qui inclut des histoires, réflexions et anecdotes. D’après le Musée d’art de Rouyn-Noranda, le recueil, accompagné d’une exposition au MA, Musée d’art en Abitibi-Témiscamingue, « trace le parcours artistique et personnel d’une artiste importante en Abitibi-Témiscamingue et au Canada, et la force considérable qu’elle a su déployer en s’imposant comme femme artiste eeyou dans le milieu culturel. Il est possible de mieux cerner la réalité autochtone telle qu’elle a été vécue au siècle dernier, période de grands bouleversements pour les premiers habitants du territoire ».
Dans cet épisode, Virginia Pésémapéo Bordeleau nous engage du début avec une lecture passionnée de son recueil percutant paru en 2018, Poésie en marche pour Sindy. Cette collection fait référence à Sindy Ruperhouse, une femme de la Première Nation Abitibiwinni de Pikogan, qui est disparue depuis avril 2014, et [je cite] « exprime [l’indignation de l’auteure] et nous fait part de ses questionnements sur le mépris et la haine dont les femmes autochtones sont l’objet, en particulier, mais également toutes les femmes ». Elle nous emporte par après sur un parcours personnel du deuil jusqu’à l’espoir avec une lecture de son texte, Je te veux vivant, aussi paru en 2018.
Edmonton poet Kat Cameron will read from her latest collection, Ghosts Still Linger, followed by a Q&A led by fellow Edmonton poet Paul Pearson.
Kat Cameron lives in Edmonton on Treaty 6 territory. Her poetry collections include Ghosts Still Linger, published by the University of Alberta Press in 2020, and Strange Labyrinth. Her short story collection The Eater of Dreams was shortlisted for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award. Her short story “Dancing the Requiem” won Prairie Fire’s 2018 fiction contest. She teaches creative writing at Concordia University of Edmonton.
The books Kat mentions are: Guillotine by Eduardo C. Corral. Graywolf Press, 2020 Endlings by Joanna Lilley. Turnstone Press, 2020
Original Air Date: August 11
Edmonton playwright, novelist, and screenwriter Katherine Koller will read from her collection of short stories, Winning Chance, followed by a Q&A led by Fort McMurray author Dorothy Bentley.
Katherine Koller writes for stage, screen and page. Her first plays, Cowboy Boots and a Corsage and Magpie, were for CBC radio. Her full-length stage plays include her Alberta LandWorks Trilogy: Coal Valley, The Seed Savers and Alberta Playwriting Competition winner, Last Chance Leduc. Her opera, The Handless Maiden, received a recital reading in Vancouver and Hope Soup, for radio, was recorded at the Edmonton Fringe. Her web series, about Edmonton youth changing their world, is at sustainablemeyeg.ca. Art Lessons, her novel, was a finalist for the Edmonton Book Prize and the Alberta Readers’ Choice Award. A Finalist in the High Plains Book Awards, Winning Chance is her recent collection of short stories. Katherine co-produces Script Salon, a monthly play reading series, and Edmonton Script Salon Podcasts. She has taught at the University of Alberta and Maskwacis Cultural College, and served as Canadian Authors Association Writer-in-Residence for two years. Katherinekoller.ca
Edmonton poet Paul Pearson reads from his debut poetry book Lunatic Engine, followed by a Q&A led by Edmonton playwright and novelist Katherine Koller.
Pre-order Lunatic Engine here: https://www.turnstonepress.com/books/poetry/lunatic-engine.html
Paul Pearson is the co-founding editor and chapbook designer for the Olive Reading Series. His poems have appeared in Descant and Event, and the anthology Writing the Land: Alberta Through Its Poets from House of Blue Skies. Raised in a mining town in the mountainous back-country of southeastern British Columbia, Paul has since relocated to Edmonton where he lives and writes with his wife and two children. Lunatic Engine is his debut collection. https://lunaticengine.com/
Calgary poet and longtime active WGA member Bob Stallworthy will read from his poetry book Impact Statement, followed by a Q&A led by Edmonton poet, fiction writer, and journalist Alexis Kienlen.
Bob Stallworthy has been active in the Alberta writing community since he began writing full-time and professionally in 1985. He is a member of the Writers’ Union of Canada and the Writers’ Guild of Alberta. As well as publishing magazine articles and book reviews, he has four books of poetry previously published: Under the Sky Speaking (Snowapple Press, 1998), From a Call Box (Frontenac House, 2001), Optics (Frontenac House, 2004), and Things that Matter Now (Frontenac House, 2009). His work has been anthologized by Copp Clark Pitman and by McGraw-Hill Ryerson. His poetry has been shortlisted for The City of Calgary W.O. Mitchell Book Prize twice and the Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry once.
As the first Coordinator of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta’s Calgary region office, he established and ran this office (1991- 1996). While running the office he was co-organizer of the first Poet’s Stroll in Calgary, co-chair of the Freedom of Expression Committee in Calgary, and was one of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta representatives on the Steering Committee of Wordfest. Over his 35 year career he has given over 250 workshops and readings around Alberta. He is co-recipient of the Calgary Freedom of Expression Award (2002), a Lifetime member of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta (1988), and the recipient of the Golden Pen Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Writers’ Guild of Alberta (2019).
He has been a Patient/Family Advisor with the Kidney Health, Strategic Clinical Network, Alberta Health Services since 2016. He is a full-time caregiver for his wife who suffered traumatic kidney failure in 2013.
Fort McMurray author Dorothy Bentley introduces her children’s poetry picture book Summer North Coming, followed by a Q&A led by Calgary writer Barbori Garnet.
Dorothy Bentley has been writing poetry sporadically since elementary school, but only recently began submitting it to contests, literary magazines. and publishers. Summer North Coming, published by Fitzhenry & Whiteside in September 2019, was a winner in the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo annual “Words in Motion” contest. F&W published the sequel, Winter North Coming, in the same hardcover edition. More of her poetry has appeared in NorthWord, A Literary Journal of the North, Ambrosia Literary Review, and elsewhere, plus forthcoming in the (M)othering Anthology to be released by Innana Press. Original Recording Date July 21, 2020
St. Albert author D.A. VandenBrink reads from his supernatural thriller The Crimson Dimension, followed by a Q&A led by WGA Summer Programs Assistant and WordsWorth Creative Team member Sadie MacGillivray.
Buy The Crimson Dimension here: https://www.davandenbrink.com/books
D.A. (Doug) VandenBrink is a local author living in St. Albert. He’s a husband, father, and grandfather who works for an Edmonton land development company. He started writing speculative fiction over a decade ago as a hobby, and made the leap to publish his debut novel, The Crimson Dimension, in March of this year. His novel is available online, as well as being carried locally by Indigo West Edmonton Mall and Audreys Books. Response has been great, having received many positive reviews. Original air date July 17, 2020
Spruce Grove poet Lynn Gale reads from her new poetry collection l’opacité, followed by a Q&A led by WGA Board Vice President and Write Well Press founder Leanne Myggland-Carter.
Lynn Gale lives in Spruce Grove, Alberta with her husband of 30+ years and spends her days working as the payroll supervisor for the City of Spruce Grove. In July 2017 she started her own business, Windsong Writing and Wellness, offering freelance writing, writing workshops, and wellness classes that blend yoga with writing. Her evenings are filled with writing and teaching yoga. She is working on a juvenile fiction novel, a picture book, and a romance (three separate works, not all in one!). Her publication credits include pieces in Other Voices (2011), Chicken Soup for the Soul: It’s Christmas! (2013), Parkland Poets Outlying Voices Anthology Vols 11 and 111, Edmonton Stroll of Poets Anthology (2020), and Calgary.short-edition.com (2020). Lynn also loves memoir and life stories, kayaking, reading young adult fiction, and a good cup of chai tea!
Original air date July 14
Calgary author Judith Clark reads from her YA novel Under the Radar, followed by a Q&A led by fellow Calgary YA author Janet Gurtler. This is a prerecorded event that premiered on Wednesday, July 15.
Judith Clark is a playwright, novelist, and indexer. After receiving a Master in Library and Information Science (MLIS), she worked as a children’s and young adult services librarian, before taking on several roles with a library automation company. Her past writing credits include two plays: American Woman, performed in Sage Theatre’s IGNITE! Festival (2006); and Code Burgundy, commissioned by the Petro-Canada Stage One New One-Act Play Development Series (2007). Under the Radar is her first young-adult novel. When she isn’t writing and indexing, she explores rural Alberta, reads compulsively, bakes applet arts, dreams of sailing on a tall ship, and wishes that she had a horse.
Anishinaabe author Karen Pheasant-Neganigwane will read from her children’s nonfiction book Powwow: A Celebration through Song and Dance, followed by a Q&A led by fellow children’s nonfiction author Joan Marie Galat. Viewers will have the chance to send questions during the event.
Karen Pheasant-Neganigwane is an Anishinaabe dancer, educator, writer, artist and orator from Wiikwemkoong on Manitoulin Island, Ontario. Her grandparents, maternal and paternal, come from Wiikwemkoong. Her parents are residential school survivors. Karen is an Assistant Professor at Mount Royal University in the Treaty Seven region. She is cross-appointed to the Department of General Education, Office of Teaching and Learning, and the Department of Humanities–Indigenous Studies. She is also in completion of a PhD in Educational Policy Studies/Indigenous Peoples Education with the University of Alberta. Karen lives in Calgary.
Calgary author Doreen Vanderstoop will read from her literary dystopian novel, Watershed, followed by a Q&A led by WGA Treasurer Susan Carpenter.
Doreen Vanderstoop is a Calgary-based writer whose short fiction has appeared in Prairie Fire Magazine and online at Montreal Serai, prairiejournal.org, epiphmag.com, and Alexandra Writers’ Centre, among others. Doreen’s debut novel, Watershed, was published by Freehand Books and released on May 2, 2020. She also sings, plays guitar, and performs stories of all kinds in the ancient oral tradition for audiences of all ages at schools, libraries, seniors’ homes, festivals, conferences, and other special events. Doreen is President of Storytelling Alberta and its Calgary Chapter and a member of Storytellers of Canada/Conteurs du Canada. Original air date June 30, 2020
In our first installment of our 2020 online reading series, Amy LeBlanc reads from her debut poetry collection, I Know Something You Don’t Know. Amy LeBlanc is an MA student in English Literature and creative writing at the University of Calgary and non-fiction editor at filling Station magazine. Amy’s debut poetry collection, I know something you don’t know, was published with Gordon Hill Press in March 2020. Her novella Unlocking will be published by University of Calgary Press in their Brave and Brilliant Series in 2021. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Room, PRISM International, and the Literary Review of Canada among others. She is a recipient of the 2020 Lieutenant Governor of Alberta Emerging Artist Award. Host: Ellen Kartz Original air date June 18, 2020
Louise Bernice Halfe, whose Cree name is Sky Dancer, is married with two adult children and three grandsons. Raised on the Saddle Lake Reserve in Alberta, she attended Blue Quills Residential School before earning a Bachelor of Social Work from the University of Regina. She completed two years of Nechi Training in St. Albert’s Nechi Institute: Centre of Indigenous Learning, where she has also facilitated the program. Halfe has been awarded honorary degrees from Wilfred Laurier University, the University of Saskatchewan, and Mount Royal University. As well as serving as Saskatchewan’s Poet Laureate for two years, she’s been a keynote speaker at numerous conferences. In this podcast, Halfe reads to us from her four books, Bear Bones and Feathers, Blue Marrow, The Crooked Good, and Burning In This Midnight Dream. All have received numerous accolades and awards, and will be reprinted next year by Brick Books and Kegedonce Press. A collection of selected poems, Sôhkêyihta (which means “have courage” or “be strong”), was published by Wilfred Laurier in 2018, and an eagerly awaited new collection, awâsis -- kinky and dishevelled will be released on April 1st, 2021, by Brick Books.
Halfe’s poetry earned her a Lifetime Achievement Award from the League of Canadian Poets, and last year, she received the 2020 Cheryl and Henry Kloppenburg Award for Literary Excellence. The jury of the Latner Writers’ Trust Poetry Prize describe her literary impact in the following way: “Halfe’s poetics refuse the hierarchies of colonial literary critique, instead affirming the equality of the contemporary, the ancestral, and the mythological; holding a multiplicity of cosmologies and quotidian realities as relevant and urgent…” Thus, they go on, “Her work cannot be assimilated in the canon of contemporary Canadian literature; instead, it must be ingested, transforming our collective literature on a cellular level, reimagining our identities, languages, and memories as denizens of Turtle Island.”
Shannon Webb-Campbell is a mixed Indigenous (Mi’kmaq) settler poet, writer, and critic. Her books include: Still No Word (Breakwater 2015), the recipient of Eagle Canada’s Out in Print Award, I Am A Body of Land (Bookhug 2019), and Lunar Tides (forthcoming with Bookhug in 2022). Shannon holds a MFA in Creative Writing from University of British Columbia, and a MA in English Literature at Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, and is a doctoral student at the University of New Brunswick in the Department of English. She is the editor of Visual Arts News Magazine.
Committed to reparation, self-education, and healing, Webb-Campbell writes out of a deep sense of responsibility to Indigenous communities. Her collection I am a Body of Land, is, as Carol Rose Daniels puts it, “forces readers out of polite conversation and into a realm where despair and hard truths are being told, being heard and finding the emotional strength to learn from it, find our way out and embrace our beauty as Indigenous women.” In Susan Musgrave’s words, this is “Poetry awake with the winds from the Four Directions, poetry that crosses borders, margins, treaties, yellow tape warning: Police Line. Do Not Cross. Poetry whose traditional territory, through colonization, has become trauma and shame. Unceded poetry. Read. Respect. Weep.”
In this podcast, which includes readings from her forthcoming collection, Lunar Tides, Webb-Campbell’s poems range across theory, the legacies of colonialism, kinship, and Indigenous resurgence. Her words follow the rhythms of the body, the water, the cycles of the moon, and long and deep familial relationships amid the profound grief of losing her mother. You can hear, too, her eloquent review of her recommended pandemic reading: Shalan Joudry’s Waking Ground.
J.R. Carpenter is a UK-based artist, writer, performer, and researcher working across performance, print, and digital media. Born in Nova Scotia, she lived in Montreal for many years before emigrating to the United Kingdom in 2009. Her pioneering web-based works have been presented in museums, galleries, and festivals around the world. She is a winner of the CBC Quebec Writing Competition, the QWF Carte Blanche Quebec Award, Expozine Alternative Press Award, the Dot Award for Digital Literature, and the New Media Writing Prize. Her debut poetry collection, An Ocean of Static, was highly commended for the Forward Prizes 2018. Her latest collection, This is a Picture of Wind, is based on a web-app by the same name and was included in The Guardian’s “Best poetry books of 2020.” She is a Fellow of the Eccles Centre For North American Studies at the British Library and the Moore Institute at NUI Galway. She delivered this podcast reading for the CLC as the 2020-21 Writer-in-Residence at University of Alberta.
The WGA is proud to partner with the Canadian Literature Centre on their Brown Bag Lunch podcasts. The Brown Bag Lunch readings were always a popular in-person event and now they have moved online. The first episode features Rebecca Thomas. Original air date: November 18, 2020.
Canadian Literature Centre's Brown Bag Lunch reading series. Canisia Lubrin reads from her various collections. Original air date: October 28 2020
The WGA is proud to partner with the Canadian Literature Centre on their Brown Bag Lunch podcasts. The Brown Bag Lunch readings were always a popular in-person event and now they have moved online. The first episode features Jen Sookfong Lee. Original air date: September 18, 2020.
Co-Hosts Rayanne Haines and Matthew Stepanic parlent avec Pierrette Requier, author of DETAILS FROM THE EDGE OF THE VILLAGE (Frontenac House, 2009) and Edmonton's 6th Poet Laureate. As we sip a Merlot by Bartier Bros. paired with Pierrette's poetry, we discuss bilingualism, motherhood, and the upcoming braided poetry event: SHE, THE RIVER.
Joshua Littlechild is a member of the Ermineskin Cree Nation at Maskwacis. His heritage is of Cree and Sioux ancestry. In this episode discuss Storytelling practices from different cultures and the Cultural Protocol that surrounds knowledge keeping and transferring.
In our last episode for this season, we dive into our reflections of the project. Specifically, we discuss thoughts going forward, improvements, what we actually learned. We also discuss the importance of paying for work and acknowledge the information given to us from our amazing guests.
This episode we sit down with Dr. Chris Andersen, the current Dean of the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta. We chat about publishing books and articles as an academic; what a career in the academy means for many first generation Indigenous scholars, and creative non-fiction publishing.
Our conversation this week is with Brittany Johnson, a Métis Ph.d student from the University of Alberta’s department of English and Film Studies. She also performs burlesque under the stage name of Fanny LuPhine; and we talk about the ways that burlesque can be one way that stories are told. We also discuss endometriosis, poetry, creative writing, horror movies and country music.
This episode we got the chance to speak with Marilyn Dumont, a Cree/Métis poet from North Eastern Alberta. She has written many works, notably: A Really Good Brown Girl, The Pemmican Eaters, and That Tongued Belonging. Marilyn also teaches creative writing in Native Studies and English at the University of Alberta. We discuss the writing process, what it’s like to have memories captured in writings, and a lot more!
Here is our conversation with award-winning author Norma Dunning about her book Annie Muktuk and Other Stories
Please note that this was our first time using Skype for recording, so we hope that the quality of the conversation can help to make up for the quality of the audio.
An Interview with Chelsea Vowel and Molly Swain, hosts of Métis in Space to chat about storytelling in the podcasting medium.
What is predatory publishing and what does it have to do with cultural appropriation? It’s just us for this episode as we delve into this topic.
An interview with Gabrielle LaMontagne about her newest project: a Michif picture book about Lac Ste. Anne!
An interview with Tammy Ball about the book she is currently writing which tells her story of growing up Métis in St. Ambroise, Manitoba.
An Interview with Ambrose Cardinal about his project Nanâtawihiwên, a zine dedicated to Indigenous healing centred around the Medicine Wheel.
The WGA is proud to present masinahikan iskwêwak – Book Women Podcast hosted by Tanya Ball, Kayla Lar-son, and Sheila Laroque. This podcast is by and for Indigenous peoples who have an interest in editing, publishing, and writing Indigenous stories. The hope is to inspire Indigenous peoples to share their stories in whatever medium that they enjoy. Episode 1 introduces you to the hosts. https://bookwomenpodcast.ca/
Rayanne Haines and Matthew Stepanic talk with Mary Pinkoski, Edmonton's fifth Poet Laureate and the 2019 Metro Federation Regional Writer in Residence. As they sip the Glenora Breakfast Blend tea from Acquired Taste Tea Company paired with Mary's own bold poetry, they discuss oddly inspiring motivational posters, the value of museums, and the power of the spoken word.
This episode of Let's Get Lit features poet Jenna Butler. Jenna Butler is the author of three critically acclaimed books of poetry, Seldom Seen Road, Wells, and Aphelion; an award-winning collection of ecological essays, A Profession of Hope: Farming on the Edge the of Grizzly Trail; and a new travelogue, Magnetic North: Sea Voyage to Svalbard.
The Writers' Guild of Alberta is happy to present Let's Get Lit: A Drunk Poetry Podcast. Edmonton poets Rayanne Haines and Matthew Stepanic talk with guest poet Lisa Martin about her poetry and wine pairing. Lisa's latest book is Believing is Not the Same as Being Saved. Published by University of Alberta Press. It was shortlisted for an Alberta Literary Award for poetry as well as the Edmonton Book Prize.
Who are we? Why are we here? What is happening in the world? Join the 2016 Borderlines Writers Circle participants as they share why they became writers, their influences, and why writing matters in today's world.
Sutina Chou traveled across Canada to collect ways that Canadian identity has impacted Canadian literature, and vice versa. Through interviews with authors, she hoped to contribute more first-hand data to the existing academic literature surrounding the link between literature and identity in a Canadian context. Discover what WGA members had to say in August 2016. This podcast was produced by Michael Macguire and Julie Robinson for the Writers' Guild of Alberta.
Sutina Chou traveled across Canada to collect ways that Canadian identity has impacted Canadian literature, and vice versa. Through interviews with authors, she hoped to contribute more first-hand data to the existing academic literature surrounding the link between literature and identity in a Canadian context. Discover what WGA members had to say in August 2016. This podcast was produced by Michael Macguire and Julie Robinson for the Writers' Guild of Alberta.