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AFTERWORDS
LITERARY FESTIVAL
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FESTIVAL AUTHORS
AL-SOLAYLEE
KAMAL AL-SOLAYLEE
Kamal Al-Solaylee is the author of the bestseller Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes, winner of the 2013 Toronto Book Award and a finalist for the CBC’s Canada Reads and the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction. His second book, Brown: What Being Brown in the World Today Means (to Everyone) won the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing and was finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Awards for Nonfiction. He’s a two-time nominee for the National Magazine Awards, winning a Gold Medal in 2019 for columns. His third book of nonfiction, Return: Why We go Back to Where We Come From, was published in 2021. He holds a PhD in English and is the director of the School of Journalism, Writing, and Media at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.
ALLABY
PATRICK ALLABY
Patrick Allaby has published two graphic novels about type 1 diabetes with Conundrum Press, Martin Peter (2019), and The Water Lover (2021). His work manifests itself in print and on stage, where he has been performing hand-drawn slideshows since 2016. He has a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Waterloo (2019) and currently lives in Sackville, NB.
ANAND
MADHUR ANAND
Madhur Anand's debut book of prose This Red Line Goes Straight to Your Heart (2020) won the Governor General’s Literary Award for Nonfiction. Her debut collection of poems A New Index for Predicting Catastrophes (2015) was a finalist for the Trillium Book Award for Poetry, named one of 10 all-time “trailblazing” poetry collections by the CBC and received a starred review in Publisher’s Weekly. Her second collection of poems Parasitic Oscillations (2022) was published to international acclaim and named the “top pick” for Spring poetry by the CBC. She is a professor of ecology and sustainability at the University of Guelph, where she was appointed the inaugural Director of the Guelph Institute for Environmental Research.
BERGEN
DAVID BERGEN
David Bergen’s work has been nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Award, the Impac Dublin Literary Award, and a Pushcart Prize. In 2005 Bergen won the Giller Prize for his novel The Time in Between. Here the Dark, a collection of short stories and a novella, was short-listed for the Giller Prize in 2020. His latest novel, Out of Mind, was published by Goose Lane in 2021.
CATHERINE BUSH
Catherine Bush is the author of five novels. Her work has been critically acclaimed, published internationally and shortlisted for literary awards. Blaze Island (2020) was a Globe and Mail Best Book, also a Best Book of the Year from the Writers’ Trust of Canada and 49th Shelf. Accusation (2013) was one of NOW magazine’s Best Ten Books of 2013, an Amazon.ca Best Book and a Canada Reads Top 40 pick. Minus Time (1993), her first novel, was shortlisted for the Books in Canada/SmithBooks First Novel Award and the City of Toronto Book Award. Her second novel, The Rules of Engagement (2000) was a national bestseller and chosen as a New York Times Notable Book and one of the Globe and Mail’s Best Books of the Year. Her third novel, Claire’s Head (2004), was shortlisted for Ontario’s Trillium Award and was a Globe and Mail Best Book of the Year.
BUSH
BYGGDIN
K.R. BYGGDIN
K.R. Byggdin grew up on the Prairies and now lives on the East Coast. Their writing has received support from the Canada Council for the Arts and has appeared in anthologies and journals across Canada, the UK, and New Zealand. They are an alum of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia’s Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program and the Banff Centre’s Emerging Writers Intensive and recently completed studies in English and Creative Writing at Dalhousie University. Wonder World is their first novel.
CABENA
DANIEL CABENA
Canadian countertenor Daniel Cabena is highly regarded in both Canada and Europe for prize-winning performances ranging from baroque to contemporary repertoire. Daniel holds an Honours Bachelor of Music from Wilfrid Laurier University and a Doctorate of Music from l’Université de Montreá l. He was the 2012 recipient of the Virginia Parker Prize by the Canada Council for the Arts and recently completed a Master in Specialized Early Music Performance at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, Switzerland.
CORR SCOTT
BRIANA CORR SCOTT
Briana Corr Scott is an illustrator and author who lives in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. She tells stories about the beauty of the natural world by creating hand-painted botanical illustrations, paper doll kits, and picture books. Briana grew up in New England and moved to Nova Scotia in 2006, following her graduation from the Massachusetts College of art and design in Boston. All of her stories and pictures are inspired by experiences of drawing in nature, and she loves to make art about the overlooked details of the Atlantic coast. She builds entire worlds from these nature sketches and combines them with inspiration from folk and fairy tales to create her picture books. She is the author and illustrator of She Dreams of Sable Island (2019), The Book of Selkie (2020), Wildflower (2021), and Mermaid Lullaby (2022). Her latest picture book, The Twelve days of Christmas, will be released this fall.
CRONIN
MOLLIE CRONIN
Mollie Cronin is a cartoonist, illustrator, writer, and curator from Kjipuktuk (Halifax, NS). In 2015 she received a BA in Art History from NSCAD University before accidentally becoming a cartoonist that same year. Her comics and fat-positive illustrations have been featured on the hit Hulu show Shrill, illustrated Sofie Hagen’s 2019 book Happy Fat, and have been made into clothing, tattoos, and a newspaper comic strip called Art Brat Comics. Cronin currently teaches comics classes in NSCAD’s extended studies program and is writing her first graphic novel about a fat punk girl living in a swamp.
GIBSON
CHANTAL GIBSON
Chantal Gibson is an award-winning writer-artist-educator living on the ancestral lands of the Coast Salish Peoples. Working in the overlap between literary and visual art, her work confronts colonialism head on, imagining the BIPOC voices silenced in the spaces and omissions left by cultural and institutional erasure. Her visual art has been exhibited across Canada, including the ROM, the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and the Senate of Canada. Her debut book of poetry, How She Read (Caitlin Press, 2019) explores the representation of Black women in Canadian history, art, literature. It won the 2020 Pat Lowther Memorial Award and the 2020 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and was shortlisted for the 2020 Griffin Poetry Prize. Her follow-up collection, with/holding (Caitlin Press) a 2021 CBC Best Book, is a graphic response to the year 2020, bringing a critical lens to the representation and reproduction of Blackness across digital media.
HARVEY
KATHERINE ALEXANDRA HARVEY
Katherine Alexandra Harvey is an author and poet from St. John's, Newfoundland. She is the Executive Director of ReLit Group, and the Founder and Editor of ReLit Magazine. She has been nominated for the Governor General’s History Award, the Carter V. Cooper Short Fiction Award, and the Writer's Alliance Fresh Fish Award. Her work has appeared in The Malahat Review, Exile Quarterly, Quill and Quire, Riddle Fence, The Newfoundland Quarterly, and more. Quiet Time is Harvey's first novel.
HATHAWAY
LUKE HATHAWAY
Luke Hathaway is a trans poet who teaches English and Creative Writing at Saint Mary’s University in Kjipuktuk/Halifax. He has been before now at some time boy and girl, bush, bird, and a mute fish in the sea. His book Years, Months, and Days was named a best book of 2018 in The New York Times. He mentors new librettists as a faculty member in the Amadeus Choir’s Choral Composition Lab, and makes music with Daniel Cabena as part of the metamorphosing ensemble ANIMA.
HILL
LAWRENCE HILL
Lawrence Hill is the award-winning author of eleven books of fiction and nonfiction, including The Book of Negroes and The Illegal. In 2022, HarperCollins Canada published Hill’s latest novel Beatrice and Croc Harry. Hill has volunteered with Crossroads International, The Black Loyalist Heritage Society, and The Ontario Black History Society. A professor of creative writing at the University of Guelph, he also teaches and visits with book clubs in federal penitentiaries. Hill is writing new novel about the thousands of African-American soldiers who helped build the Alaska Highway in northern British Columbia and Yukon during World War Two.
HUEBERT
DAVID HUEBERT
A settler writer, educator, and critic from Kjipuktuk (Halifax), David Huebert (he/him) teaches literature and creative writing at The University of New Brunswick. David’s fiction debut, Peninsula Sinking, won a Dartmouth Book Award and was runner-up for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award. His latest book, Chemical Valley (Biblioasis 2021), won the Alistair MacLeod Prize for Short Fiction and was shortlisted for the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award. David lives in Fredericton with his partner, two children, and a fluffy white cat named Moby Dick.
KAUFMAN
ANDREW KAUFMAN
Andrew Kaufman was born in Wingham, Ontario, making him the second-most-famous Canadian writer to come from Wingham (after Alice Munro, of course). He is the author of international bestseller All My Friends are Superheroes, The Waterproof Bible, ReLit Award-winner The Tiny Wife, and Born Weird, which was named a Best Book of the Year by The Globe and Mail and was shortlisted for the Leacock award for humor. He lives and writes in Toronto.
LESLIE
MEGAN LESLIE
Megan Leslie was honoured to be the Member of Parliament for Halifax for two terms, serving in Housing, Health and Environment critic portfolios, as well as Deputy Leader of the Official Opposition. She is now the President & CEO of WWF-Canada. Megan is the proud recipient of an Honourary Degree from Mount Saint Vincent University as well as the Arum Award from Dalhousie University. She lives in Ottawa but calls Halifax home.
LUCAS
CHAD LUCAS
Chad Lucas is the author of the middle grade novels Let the Monster Out (2022) and Thanks a Lot, Universe (2021), which won the Ann Connor Brimer Award for Atlantic Canadian Children's Literature and was named a best book of 2021 by the New York Public Libraries, the School Library Journal, and the ALA Rainbow Booklist. He lives with his family in Nova Scotia.
MACLEOD
ALEXANDER MACLEOD
Alexander MacLeod was born in Inverness, Cape Breton, and raised in Windsor, Ontario. His first collection, Light Lifting, was a national bestseller, won an Atlantic Book Award, and was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, the Thomas Head Raddall Fiction Award, and the Commonwealth Book Prize. In 2019, he won an O. Henry Award for his short story “Lagomorph,” which is included in his forthcoming new collection, Animal Person. MacLeod lives in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and teaches at Saint Mary's University in Halifax.
MCCLUSKEY
ELAINE MCCLUSKEY
Elaine McCluskey writes about the people you might find in the corners of life. Rafael Has Pretty Eyes is her fourth short-story collection; she has also published two novels. All are set in the Maritimes. McCluskey’s stories have appeared in anthologies and literary journals including Room, The Dalhousie Review, The Antigonish Review, and The Fiddlehead. One story was a Journey Prize finalist, others prize winners. McCluskey has worked as a journalist, a book editor, and a university lecturer. She lives in Dartmouth, N.S.
MELANSON
FABIEN MELANSON
À Halifax, Fabien Melanson porte plusieurs chapeaux dans le domaine de la télévision. Il a premièrement écrit Petit Pico pour paraître comme livre-accessoire dans un court métrage qu’il réalisa en 2011. Petit Pico plut tellement ses propres enfants, qu’il a poursuivi la publication de ce texte avec Éditions Bouton d’Or Acadie! En 2015, Fabien produit et réalisa son premier documentaire, En Français S.V.P., qui lui remporta le Prix Grand-Pré 2016 de Arts Nova Scotia. Fabien est originaire de Cap-Pelé, Nouveau-Brunswick.
MIAN
SARAH MIAN
Sarah Mian's debut novel, When the Saints, won the Jim Connors Book Award, the Margaret & John Savage First Book Award, and was a finalist for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. She co-wrote the screen adaptation for Lady Hammond Entertainment and is now working on her second novel, The World in Awful Sleep.
LISA MOORE
Lisa Moore is a writer of short stories and novels from St. John’s. She has won the Commonwealth Fiction Prize, CBC’s Canada Reads, and the Writers’ Trust Engel Findley Award and received nominations for the Man Booker Prize, Scotiabank Giller Prize, and Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Her third novel, Caught, was adapted into a CBC television series. Moore often sets her stories in Newfoundland, where she was born, raised, and lives with her family.
MOORE
NICO
NICO
Nicole Poirier is originally from Chéticamp, Nova Scotia. Her love for children brought her at l’Université de Moncton, where she graduated in 1992 with a Bachelor of Education, Preschool-Elementary. Since then, she had the pleasure of always working with children either as a kindergarten teacher, resource, literacy teacher or with Famille et Petite enfance. She has three published french children`s books with Bouton d’or Acadie, and her 4th one will hopefully soon make its appearance on bookshelves.
PARRIS
AMANDA PARRIS
Amanda Parris is an award winning writer, producer and tv/radio host for the CBC. Her play Other Side of the Game was awarded the 2019 Governor General Literary Award for Drama. Her latest theatrical work The Death News won the 2022 Canadian Screen Award for Best Writing, Web Program or Series. Amanda is also the creator, executive producer and showrunner of the critically acclaimed digital series Revenge of the Black Best Friend which launched on CBC Gem in 2022. The series was an official selection at the Canneseries Festival where it made its international premiere. She is also the creator of Black Light, an award-winning column for CBC Arts, that showcases, explores and critically engages art and popular culture created by Black people. In 2022, Amanda received the inaugural Changemaker Award from the Canadian Screen Awards for her efforts to call out systemic racism in the Canadian media community.
JUANITA PETERS
Juanita Peters has performed in over 30 films and television series, including Sex & Violence, Forgive Me, Splinters, Hobo With a Shotgun, Cloudburst and the Emmy-nominated Homeless to Harvard. Juanita’s director credits include the CBC Television series Diggstown and Studio Black and, in 2021, she directed the feature film Rebirth 8:37. For more than 15 years, Juanita served as a journalist and news anchor in the Maritimes and hosted four seasons of the CBC documentary series Doc Side.
PETERS
PUGSLEY
ALEX PUGSLEY
As a screenwriter and story editor, Alex Pugsley has worked on over 185 produced episodes of television, writing for performers such as Lauren Ash, Scott Thompson, Mark McKinney, Dan Aykroyd, and Michael Cera, and for such series as Hudson & Rex, The Eleventh Hour, Life With Derek, Heartland, G-Spot, I Was a Sixth Grade Alien, and The Gavin Crawford Show. Recently, he wrote and directed the feature film Dirty Singles which won for him the Irving Avrich Emerging Filmmaker Award at TIFF. Following the publication of his first novel, Aubrey McKee, he was named one of CBC’s 2020 Writers to Watch. His first story collection, Shimmer, has just been published by Biblioasis.
QUON
ANNA QUON
Anna Quon is a Kjipuktuk (Halifax) poet, novelist, writing workshop facilitator and poem-film maker. She has written three novels: Migration Songs, Low and Where the Silver River Ends, all released by Invisible Publishing. In 2021, Anna was a juror for the brand new Maxine Tynes Nova Scotia Poetry Book Prize. Her poetry has appeared in Room Magazine, Understorey magazine, Nova Scotia Advocate, and anthologies of the League Of Canadian Poets, among others. Her first professionally published poetry chapbook Body Parts was released by Gaspereau Press in the Spring of 2021. Where the Silver River Ends makes a trilogy of her first two unrelated novels, and was listed by CBC Books as one of “20 books we can't wait to read in March 2022”.
RICE
WAUBGESHIG RICE
Waubgeshig Rice is an author and journalist from Wasauksing First Nation. He has written three fiction titles, and his short stories and essays have been published in numerous anthologies. His most recent novel, Moon of the Crusted Snow, was published in 2018 and became a national bestseller. He graduated from the journalism program at Toronto Metropolitan University in 2002, and spent most of his journalism career with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a video journalist and radio host. He left CBC in 2020 to focus on his literary career. He lives in Sudbury, Ontario with his wife and two sons.
RICHARDS
LYNETTE RICHARDS
Lynette has been cartooning her whole life. She chose Stained Glass as her professional medium because it is both a trade and an art that has used sequential narration for over 1000 years! Lynette owns and operates Rose Window Stained Glass in beautiful Terence Bay NS. She is a Craft Nova Scotia Master Artisan.
ROACHE
TRINA ROACHE
Trina Roache is a proud member of the Glooscap First Nation and an award-winning Mi’kmaw video journalist. She’s worked in radio and TV for CBC, APTN National News, and APTN Investigates. She’s covered stories in the unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq, Wolostoqey, and Pestomuhkati Nations, from politics to policing to land protection. Her work has earned regional and national awards from Amnesty International Canada, the Canadian Association of Journalists, Native American Journalists Association, and the Canadian Screen Awards. Trina brings a Mi’kmaw perspective and years of experience in visual storytelling to her position on faculty as the Rogers Chair in Journalism at the University of King’s College.
ROBINSON
KIM STANLEY ROBINSON
Kim Stanley Robinson is an American writer of science fiction. He has published twenty-two novels and numerous short stories but is best known for his Mars trilogy. His work has been translated into 24 languages.
SOLOY
LAUREN SOLOY
Lauren Soloy is the author and illustrator of When Emily was Small (Tundra Books, 2020), Etty Darwin and the Four Pebble Problem (Tundra Books, 2021) and I’s the B’y (Greystone Books, 2022). She has lived on both coasts of Canada, always within reach of the sea. She currently lives in a 140-year-old house in the wilds of Nova Scotia with her librarian husband, two curious children, an ever-expanding collection of books, two hives of bees, and one cat.
WENTE
JESSE WENTE
Jesse Wente is a husband and father, as well as a writer, broadcaster, speaker and arts administrator. Born and raised in Toronto, his family comes from Chicago and Genaabaajing Anishinaabek and he is a member of the Serpent River First Nation. Jesse is best known for more than two decades spent as a columnist for CBC Radio’s Metro Morning. In 2018, Jesse was named the founding director of the Indigenous Screen Office and in summer 2020 he was appointed Chair of the Canada Council for the Arts. Jesse received the Arbor Award from the University of Toronto in 2021 for his volunteer contributions and was recently appointed a Senior Fellow of Massey College. His first book Unreconciled: Family, Truth and Indigenous Resistance is a national bestseller and was picked as one of best books of 2021 by Chapters-Indigo, Apple Books and The Globe and Mail. Jesse has also recently been nominated for the Kobo Emerging Writers Prize in Non-Fiction.
JODY WILSON-RAYBOULD
Jody Wilson-Raybould, author of the memoir "Indian" In the Cabinet, was the Member of Parliament for Vancouver Granville from 2015 to 2021 and served as the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, the Minister of Veterans Affairs, and the Associate Minister of National Defence. She was a 2021 Balsillie Prize for Public Policy finalist for “Indian” in the Cabinet. A member of the We Wai Kai Nation, Wilson-Raybould is a descendant of the Musgamagw Tsawataineuk and Laich-Kwil-Tach peoples, which are part of the Kwakwaka’wakw and also known as the Kwak’wala-speaking peoples. Her traditional name, Puglaas, means “woman born to noble people.”
WILSON-RAYBOULD
Anchor 1
FESTIVAL AUTHORS
AL-SOLAYLEE
KAMAL AL-SOLAYLEE
Kamal Al-Solaylee is the author of the bestseller Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes, winner of the 2013 Toronto Book Award and a finalist for the CBC’s Canada Reads and the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction. His second book, Brown: What Being Brown in the World Today Means (to Everyone) won the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing and was finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Awards for Nonfiction. He’s a two-time nominee for the National Magazine Awards, winning a Gold Medal in 2019 for columns. His third book of nonfiction, Return: Why We go Back to Where We Come From, was published in 2021. He holds a PhD in English and is the director of the School of Journalism, Writing, and Media at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.
ALLABY
PATRICK ALLABY
Patrick Allaby has published two graphic novels about type 1 diabetes with Conundrum Press, Martin Peter (2019), and The Water Lover (2021). His work manifests itself in print and on stage, where he has been performing hand-drawn slideshows since 2016. He has a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Waterloo (2019) and currently lives in Sackville, NB.
BERGEN
DAVID BERGEN
David Bergen’s work has been nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Award, the Impac Dublin Literary Award, and a Pushcart Prize. In 2005 Bergen won the Giller Prize for his novel The Time in Between. Here the Dark, a collection of short stories and a novella, was short-listed for the Giller Prize in 2020. His latest novel, Out of Mind, was published by Goose Lane in 2021.
CATHERINE BUSH
Catherine Bush is the author of five novels. Her work has been critically acclaimed, published internationally and shortlisted for literary awards. Blaze Island (2020) was a Globe and Mail Best Book, also a Best Book of the Year from the Writers’ Trust of Canada and 49th Shelf. Accusation (2013) was one of NOW magazine’s Best Ten Books of 2013, an Amazon.ca Best Book and a Canada Reads Top 40 pick. Minus Time (1993), her first novel, was shortlisted for the Books in Canada/SmithBooks First Novel Award and the City of Toronto Book Award. Her second novel, The Rules of Engagement (2000) was a national bestseller and chosen as a New York Times Notable Book and one of the Globe and Mail’s Best Books of the Year. Her third novel, Claire’s Head (2004), was shortlisted for Ontario’s Trillium Award and was a Globe and Mail Best Book of the Year.
BUSH
BYGGDIN
K.R. BYGGDIN
K.R. Byggdin grew up on the Prairies and now lives on the East Coast. Their writing has received support from the Canada Council for the Arts and has appeared in anthologies and journals across Canada, the UK, and New Zealand. They are an alum of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia’s Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program and the Banff Centre’s Emerging Writers Intensive and recently completed studies in English and Creative Writing at Dalhousie University. Wonder World is their first novel.
CABENA
DANIEL CABENA
Canadian countertenor Daniel Cabena is highly regarded in both Canada and Europe for prize-winning performances ranging from baroque to contemporary repertoire. Daniel holds an Honours Bachelor of Music from Wilfrid Laurier University and a Doctorate of Music from l’Université de Montreá l. He was the 2012 recipient of the Virginia Parker Prize by the Canada Council for the Arts and recently completed a Master in Specialized Early Music Performance at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, Switzerland.
CORR SCOTT
BRIANA CORR SCOTT
Briana Corr Scott is an illustrator and author who lives in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. She tells stories about the beauty of the natural world by creating hand-painted botanical illustrations, paper doll kits, and picture books. Briana grew up in New England and moved to Nova Scotia in 2006, following her graduation from the Massachusetts College of art and design in Boston. All of her stories and pictures are inspired by experiences of drawing in nature, and she loves to make art about the overlooked details of the Atlantic coast. She builds entire worlds from these nature sketches and combines them with inspiration from folk and fairy tales to create her picture books. She is the author and illustrator of She Dreams of Sable Island (2019), The Book of Selkie (2020), Wildflower (2021), and Mermaid Lullaby (2022). Her latest picture book, The Twelve days of Christmas, will be released this fall.
CRONIN
MOLLIE CRONIN
Mollie Cronin is a cartoonist, illustrator, writer, and curator from Kjipuktuk (Halifax, NS). In 2015 she received a BA in Art History from NSCAD University before accidentally becoming a cartoonist that same year. Her comics and fat-positive illustrations have been featured on the hit Hulu show Shrill, illustrated Sofie Hagen’s 2019 book Happy Fat, and have been made into clothing, tattoos, and a newspaper comic strip called Art Brat Comics. Cronin currently teaches comics classes in NSCAD’s extended studies program and is writing her first graphic novel about a fat punk girl living in a swamp.
GIBSON
CHANTAL GIBSON
Chantal Gibson is an award-winning writer-artist-educator living on the ancestral lands of the Coast Salish Peoples. Working in the overlap between literary and visual art, her work confronts colonialism head on, imagining the BIPOC voices silenced in the spaces and omissions left by cultural and institutional erasure. Her visual art has been exhibited across Canada, including the ROM, the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia and the Senate of Canada. Her debut book of poetry, How She Read (Caitlin Press, 2019) explores the representation of Black women in Canadian history, art, literature. It won the 2020 Pat Lowther Memorial Award and the 2020 Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and was shortlisted for the 2020 Griffin Poetry Prize. Her follow-up collection, with/holding (Caitlin Press) a 2021 CBC Best Book, is a graphic response to the year 2020, bringing a critical lens to the representation and reproduction of Blackness across digital media.
HARVEY
KATHERINE ALEXANDRA HARVEY
Katherine Alexandra Harvey is an author and poet from St. John's, Newfoundland. She is the Executive Director of ReLit Group, and the Founder and Editor of ReLit Magazine. She has been nominated for the Governor General’s History Award, the Carter V. Cooper Short Fiction Award, and the Writer's Alliance Fresh Fish Award. Her work has appeared in The Malahat Review, Exile Quarterly, Quill and Quire, Riddle Fence, The Newfoundland Quarterly, and more. Quiet Time is Harvey's first novel.
HATHAWAY
LUKE HATHAWAY
Luke Hathaway is a trans poet who teaches English and Creative Writing at Saint Mary’s University in Kjipuktuk/Halifax. He has been before now at some time boy and girl, bush, bird, and a mute fish in the sea. His book Years, Months, and Days was named a best book of 2018 in The New York Times. He mentors new librettists as a faculty member in the Amadeus Choir’s Choral Composition Lab, and makes music with Daniel Cabena as part of the metamorphosing ensemble ANIMA.
HILL
LAWRENCE HILL
Lawrence Hill is the award-winning author of eleven books of fiction and nonfiction, including The Book of Negroes and The Illegal. In 2022, HarperCollins Canada published Hill’s latest novel Beatrice and Croc Harry. Hill has volunteered with Crossroads International, The Black Loyalist Heritage Society, and The Ontario Black History Society. A professor of creative writing at the University of Guelph, he also teaches and visits with book clubs in federal penitentiaries. Hill is writing new novel about the thousands of African-American soldiers who helped build the Alaska Highway in northern British Columbia and Yukon during World War Two.
HUEBERT
DAVID HUEBERT
A settler writer, educator, and critic from Kjipuktuk (Halifax), David Huebert (he/him) teaches literature and creative writing at The University of New Brunswick. David’s fiction debut, Peninsula Sinking, won a Dartmouth Book Award and was runner-up for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award. His latest book, Chemical Valley (Biblioasis 2021), won the Alistair MacLeod Prize for Short Fiction and was shortlisted for the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award. David lives in Fredericton with his partner, two children, and a fluffy white cat named Moby Dick.
KAUFMAN
ANDREW KAUFMAN
Andrew Kaufman was born in Wingham, Ontario, making him the second-most-famous Canadian writer to come from Wingham (after Alice Munro, of course). He is the author of international bestseller All My Friends are Superheroes, The Waterproof Bible, ReLit Award-winner The Tiny Wife, and Born Weird, which was named a Best Book of the Year by The Globe and Mail and was shortlisted for the Leacock award for humor. He lives and writes in Toronto.
LESLIE
MEGAN LESLIE
Megan Leslie was honoured to be the Member of Parliament for Halifax for two terms, serving in Housing, Health and Environment critic portfolios, as well as Deputy Leader of the Official Opposition. She is now the President & CEO of WWF-Canada. Megan is the proud recipient of an Honourary Degree from Mount Saint Vincent University as well as the Arum Award from Dalhousie University. She lives in Ottawa but calls Halifax home.
LUCAS
CHAD LUCAS
Chad Lucas is the author of the middle grade novels Let the Monster Out (2022) and Thanks a Lot, Universe (2021), which won the Ann Connor Brimer Award for Atlantic Canadian Children's Literature and was named a best book of 2021 by the New York Public Libraries, the School Library Journal, and the ALA Rainbow Booklist. He lives with his family in Nova Scotia.
MACLEOD
ALEXANDER MACLEOD
Alexander MacLeod was born in Inverness, Cape Breton, and raised in Windsor, Ontario. His first collection, Light Lifting, was a national bestseller, won an Atlantic Book Award, and was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, the Thomas Head Raddall Fiction Award, and the Commonwealth Book Prize. In 2019, he won an O. Henry Award for his short story “Lagomorph,” which is included in his forthcoming new collection, Animal Person. MacLeod lives in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and teaches at Saint Mary's University in Halifax.
MCCLUSKEY
ELAINE MCCLUSKEY
Elaine McCluskey writes about the people you might find in the corners of life. Rafael Has Pretty Eyes is her fourth short-story collection; she has also published two novels. All are set in the Maritimes. McCluskey’s stories have appeared in anthologies and literary journals including Room, The Dalhousie Review, The Antigonish Review, and The Fiddlehead. One story was a Journey Prize finalist, others prize winners. McCluskey has worked as a journalist, a book editor, and a university lecturer. She lives in Dartmouth, N.S.
MELANSON
FABIEN MELANSON
À Halifax, Fabien Melanson porte plusieurs chapeaux dans le domaine de la télévision. Il a premièrement écrit Petit Pico pour paraître comme livre-accessoire dans un court métrage qu’il réalisa en 2011. Petit Pico plut tellement ses propres enfants, qu’il a poursuivi la publication de ce texte avec Éditions Bouton d’Or Acadie! En 2015, Fabien produit et réalisa son premier documentaire, En Français S.V.P., qui lui remporta le Prix Grand-Pré 2016 de Arts Nova Scotia. Fabien est originaire de Cap-Pelé, Nouveau-Brunswick.
MIAN
SARAH MIAN
Sarah Mian's debut novel, When the Saints, won the Jim Connors Book Award, the Margaret & John Savage First Book Award, and was a finalist for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. She co-wrote the screen adaptation for Lady Hammond Entertainment and is now working on her second novel, The World in Awful Sleep.
LISA MOORE
Lisa Moore is a writer of short stories and novels from St. John’s. She has won the Commonwealth Fiction Prize, CBC’s Canada Reads, and the Writers’ Trust Engel Findley Award and received nominations for the Man Booker Prize, Scotiabank Giller Prize, and Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Her third novel, Caught, was adapted into a CBC television series. Moore often sets her stories in Newfoundland, where she was born, raised, and lives with her family.
MOORE
NICO
NICO
Nicole Poirier is originally from Chéticamp, Nova Scotia. Her love for children brought her at l’Université de Moncton, where she graduated in 1992 with a Bachelor of Education, Preschool-Elementary. Since then, she had the pleasure of always working with children either as a kindergarten teacher, resource, literacy teacher or with Famille et Petite enfance. She has three published french children`s books with Bouton d’or Acadie, and her 4th one will hopefully soon make its appearance on bookshelves.
PARRIS
AMANDA PARRIS
Amanda Parris is an award winning writer, producer and tv/radio host for the CBC. Her play Other Side of the Game was awarded the 2019 Governor General Literary Award for Drama. Her latest theatrical work The Death News won the 2022 Canadian Screen Award for Best Writing, Web Program or Series. Amanda is also the creator, executive producer and showrunner of the critically acclaimed digital series Revenge of the Black Best Friend which launched on CBC Gem in 2022. The series was an official selection at the Canneseries Festival where it made its international premiere. She is also the creator of Black Light, an award-winning column for CBC Arts, that showcases, explores and critically engages art and popular culture created by Black people. In 2022, Amanda received the inaugural Changemaker Award from the Canadian Screen Awards for her efforts to call out systemic racism in the Canadian media community.
JUANITA PETERS
Juanita Peters has performed in over 30 films and television series, including Sex & Violence, Forgive Me, Splinters, Hobo With a Shotgun, Cloudburst and the Emmy-nominated Homeless to Harvard. Juanita’s director credits include the CBC Television series Diggstown and Studio Black and, in 2021, she directed the feature film Rebirth 8:37. For more than 15 years, Juanita served as a journalist and news anchor in the Maritimes and hosted four seasons of the CBC documentary series Doc Side.
PETERS
PUGSLEY
ALEX PUGSLEY
As a screenwriter and story editor, Alex Pugsley has worked on over 185 produced episodes of television, writing for performers such as Lauren Ash, Scott Thompson, Mark McKinney, Dan Aykroyd, and Michael Cera, and for such series as Hudson & Rex, The Eleventh Hour, Life With Derek, Heartland, G-Spot, I Was a Sixth Grade Alien, and The Gavin Crawford Show. Recently, he wrote and directed the feature film Dirty Singles which won for him the Irving Avrich Emerging Filmmaker Award at TIFF. Following the publication of his first novel, Aubrey McKee, he was named one of CBC’s 2020 Writers to Watch. His first story collection, Shimmer, has just been published by Biblioasis.
QUON
ANNA QUON
Anna Quon is a Kjipuktuk (Halifax) poet, novelist, writing workshop facilitator and poem-film maker. She has written three novels: Migration Songs, Low and Where the Silver River Ends, all released by Invisible Publishing. In 2021, Anna was a juror for the brand new Maxine Tynes Nova Scotia Poetry Book Prize. Her poetry has appeared in Room Magazine, Understorey magazine, Nova Scotia Advocate, and anthologies of the League Of Canadian Poets, among others. Her first professionally published poetry chapbook Body Parts was released by Gaspereau Press in the Spring of 2021. Where the Silver River Ends makes a trilogy of her first two unrelated novels, and was listed by CBC Books as one of “20 books we can't wait to read in March 2022”.
RICE
WAUBGESHIG RICE
Waubgeshig Rice is an author and journalist from Wasauksing First Nation. He has written three fiction titles, and his short stories and essays have been published in numerous anthologies. His most recent novel, Moon of the Crusted Snow, was published in 2018 and became a national bestseller. He graduated from the journalism program at Toronto Metropolitan University in 2002, and spent most of his journalism career with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a video journalist and radio host. He left CBC in 2020 to focus on his literary career. He lives in Sudbury, Ontario with his wife and two sons.
RICHARDS
LYNETTE RICHARDS
Lynette has been cartooning her whole life. She chose Stained Glass as her professional medium because it is both a trade and an art that has used sequential narration for over 1000 years! Lynette owns and operates Rose Window Stained Glass in beautiful Terence Bay NS. She is a Craft Nova Scotia Master Artisan.
ROACHE
TRINA ROACHE
Trina Roache is a proud member of the Glooscap First Nation and an award-winning Mi’kmaw video journalist. She’s worked in radio and TV for CBC, APTN National News, and APTN Investigates. She’s covered stories in the unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq, Wolostoqey, and Pestomuhkati Nations, from politics to policing to land protection. Her work has earned regional and national awards from Amnesty International Canada, the Canadian Association of Journalists, Native American Journalists Association, and the Canadian Screen Awards. Trina brings a Mi’kmaw perspective and years of experience in visual storytelling to her position on faculty as the Rogers Chair in Journalism at the University of King’s College.
ROBINSON
KIM STANLEY ROBINSON
Kim Stanley Robinson is an American writer of science fiction. He has published twenty-two novels and numerous short stories but is best known for his Mars trilogy. His work has been translated into 24 languages.
SOLOY
LAUREN SOLOY
Lauren Soloy is the author and illustrator of When Emily was Small (Tundra Books, 2020), Etty Darwin and the Four Pebble Problem (Tundra Books, 2021) and I’s the B’y (Greystone Books, 2022). She has lived on both coasts of Canada, always within reach of the sea. She currently lives in a 140-year-old house in the wilds of Nova Scotia with her librarian husband, two curious children, an ever-expanding collection of books, two hives of bees, and one cat.
WENTE
JESSE WENTE
Jesse Wente is a husband and father, as well as a writer, broadcaster, speaker and arts administrator. Born and raised in Toronto, his family comes from Chicago and Genaabaajing Anishinaabek and he is a member of the Serpent River First Nation. Jesse is best known for more than two decades spent as a columnist for CBC Radio’s Metro Morning. In 2018, Jesse was named the founding director of the Indigenous Screen Office and in summer 2020 he was appointed Chair of the Canada Council for the Arts. Jesse received the Arbor Award from the University of Toronto in 2021 for his volunteer contributions and was recently appointed a Senior Fellow of Massey College. His first book Unreconciled: Family, Truth and Indigenous Resistance is a national bestseller and was picked as one of best books of 2021 by Chapters-Indigo, Apple Books and The Globe and Mail. Jesse has also recently been nominated for the Kobo Emerging Writers Prize in Non-Fiction.
JODY WILSON-RAYBOULD
Jody Wilson-Raybould, author of the memoir "Indian" In the Cabinet, was the Member of Parliament for Vancouver Granville from 2015 to 2021 and served as the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, the Minister of Veterans Affairs, and the Associate Minister of National Defence. She was a 2021 Balsillie Prize for Public Policy finalist for “Indian” in the Cabinet. A member of the We Wai Kai Nation, Wilson-Raybould is a descendant of the Musgamagw Tsawataineuk and Laich-Kwil-Tach peoples, which are part of the Kwakwaka’wakw and also known as the Kwak’wala-speaking peoples. Her traditional name, Puglaas, means “woman born to noble people.”
WILSON-RAYBOULD
FESTIVAL AUTHORS
AL-SOLAYLEE