Writers' Council Profiles

BIOGRAPHY
A.J.B. (John) Johnston is the author or co-author of books and museum exhibits, as well as articles in scholarly journals, magazines and newspapers. He was made a chevalier of France’s Ordre des Palmes Académiques in recognition of his body of work on Louisbourg and other French colonial topics. The best known of his history books is Endgame 1758, which won a Clio award from the Canadian Historical Assocation and was short-listed for the Dartmouth Book Award.

His two latest books, his 20th and 21st, will appear in 2020. First up will be Kings of Friday Night: The Lincolns (Nimbus). Then it will be Ancient World, New World: Skmaqn—Port-la-Joye—Fort Amherst (Acorn), co-authored with Jesse Francis.

In 2018, John released The Hat, a YA novel that offers a 21st-century take on the Acadian Deportation, and Something True, which was inspired by the real-life adventures of Katharine McLennan in late 19th and early 20th-century Cape Breton and in France during the First World War.

In 2017, he was Writer-in-Residence at the Center for the Writing Arts in Fairhope, Alabama. Back in 2016, John participated as a mentor to emerging writer Linda MacLean in the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program. From mid-April to mid-May 2017 he combined with Sal Sawler and Norma Jean MacPhee to offer sessions for the WFNS entitled “So You Want to be Published” in Halifax, Antigonish, Wolfville, Sydney and Yarmouth.

John has written three novels in the Thomas Pichon series: Thomas, A Secret Life in 2012; The Maze in 2114 and Crossings in 2015.

Back in 2013, Ni’n na L’nu: The Mi’kmaq of Prince Edward Island (Acorn), won three awards: “best-published Atlantic Book”, best PEI Non-Fiction, and a PEI Heritage Award. The French version of the book, Ni’n na L’nu: Les Mi’kmaq de l’Ile-de-Prince-Édouard, is now available from La Grand Marée (Tracadie Sheila, NB).

Released in 2015 was Grand Pré, Landscape for the World (Nimbus), co-written with Ronnie-Gilles LeBlanc.

Most of his books are available as e-books.

John writes exhibits as well, including the “Vanguard: 150 Years of Remarkable Nova Scotians” for the Nova Scotia Museum and the ground floor of the Black Cultural Centre. The award-winning travelling exhibition Ni’n na L’nu: The Mi’kmaq of Prince Edward Island opened at the Confederation Centre in Charlottetown and then travelled to the Museum of Canadian History in Gatienau, Quebec and other subsequent venues. More recently, John developed the storyline and texts for the revitalization of the Colchester Historeum in Truro. That exhibit opened officially in early 2016.

More information on John can be found at ajbjohnston.com and on Facebook at A J B Johnston, Writer. John is on Twitter at @ajbjohnston and on Instagram at AJBJohnston.

John donates his papers to the Beaton Institute of the Cape Breton University.

BIOGRAPHY
I am a poet and novelist originally from the UK, now a Canadian resident. I’ve published four novels and a poetry collection and bunch of other things. I’ve won a number of literary awards, including being shortlisted for the Booker Prize. I’ve taught creative writing at workshops and universities in Britain, Canada, and elsewhere.

BIOGRAPHY
Adele Megann is a Newfoundlander based in Halifax. Her short fiction has been published in many Canadian and US periodicals and anthologies. She has won several awards–including the 1995 Bronwen Wallace Memorial Award–and has given over thirty readings and interviews.

Over the years, Adele has been involved in the writing community by organizing readings, and teaching creative writing. Adele lived many years in Calgary, where she was part of the Pack of Liars writing workshop, and was a fiction editor of Dandelion magazine.

After moving to Nova Scotia in 1999, Adele participated in Writers in the Schools throughout the province. She performed at Playwrights in Performance Cabarets. She has written curriculum guides for Exodus Theatre Society, and coordinated their school matinees. In addition to the literary publication credits listed here, she has also contributed several articles to an Irish magazine called Set Dancing News, and does some corporate writing.

Adele’s day jobs usually involve teaching. She has taught diverse subjects–including music, drama and literacy–to children and adults, including those with disabilities. She sings, and plays several instruments, usually in the context of traditional Irish music. She lives with an assortment of humans and animals.

BIOGRAPHY
Alice Burdick lives and writes poetry in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia and co-owned the former Lexicon Books in Lunenburg. Alice moved to Halifax in 2002 from Toronto, Ontario, where she was born and raised. She has also lived in Espanola, Vancouver, and on the Sechelt Peninsula in BC.

Burdick has been involved with the small press community in Canada since the early 1990’s, when she was co-editor, with Victor Coleman, of The Eternal Network. This very small ongoing imprint produced chapbooks, including several of her own works, such as Signs Like This, Fun Venue, and Voice of Interpreter. Her work has been published by other small presses in Canada, including: Proper Tales Press (a Time, My Lump in the Bed: Love Poems for George W. Bush); Letters Press (Covered); and BookThug (The Human About Us). It also has appeared in various magazines, such as Hava LeHaba (from Tel Aviv, Israel), Event Magazine, Canadian Poetries, Two Serious Ladies (from the US), Dig, What!magazine, subTerrain, fhole, This Magazine, and Who Torched Rancho Diablo? From 1992-1995, Alice was assistant coordinator of the Toronto Small Press Fair. She has also done numerous readings over the years in many different venues, including the Ottawa International Writers Festival, The Scream in High Park in Toronto, and the Halifax Word on the Street.

Alice’s fourth collection of poetry, Book of Short Sentences, came out in the spring of 2016 from Mansfield Press. Her last book, Holler, was released in April 2012, following Flutter, which came out in Fall 2008 (both Mansfield Press). Two collaborative poems have shown up in Our Days In Vaudeville by Stuart Ross and 29 Collaborators (Mansfield Press, Fall 2013). Her poems have appeared in Shift & Switch: New Canadian Poetry (The Mercury Press, Fall 2005), Surreal Estate: 13 Canadian Poets Under the Influence, An Anthology of Surrealist Canadian Poetry (The Mercury Press, Fall 2004), and in Pissing Ice: An Anthology of ‘New’ Canadian Poets, (BookThug, 2004, as well as other anthologies. Her first perfect-bound book was Simple Master, published in 2002 by Pedlar Press.

”Deportment”, a book of selected poems from the early 1990s onward, was released by Wilfrid Laurier University Press in the autumn of 2018. Her essays have appeared in three recent anthologies: “Home” from MacIntyre Purcell, 2018, “Gush” from Frontenac House, 2018, and “Locations of Grief” from Wolsak & Wynn, 2020.

Her poem ”Terms and Conditions” was shortlisted for the first Lemon Hound Poetry Prize in 2014.

Read more about Alice Burdick in interviews conducted by Alex Porco on Open Book Toronto and on Lemon Hound and in gallery form here. You can watch and listen to Alice read some poems on a beach here.

BIOGRAPHY
Alice Walsh writes fiction and nonfiction for adults and children. Her short stories and articles have been published in newspapers, magazines and literary journals. She is the author of thirteen books, many of which have been nominated for or won awards. A number of her books have been listed as Best Books for Children and Teens in Canada.  Her YA novel Pomiuk; Prince of the North (Dundurn 2005) won the Ann Connor Brimer award.

Alice graduated from St. Mary’s University with degrees in criminology and English, and from Acadia with a master’s in Children’s Literature. She has worked as a preschool teacher, volunteer probation officer, creative writing instructor, and hospital ward clerk.

 

BIOGRAPHY
Alison DeLory is a writer, editor, publisher, teacher, and consultant in Halifax.

She’s the author of an adult novel called Making it Home (Vagrant/Nimbus Publishing, 2019); two children’s chapter books called Lunar Lifter (Bryler Publications, 2012) and Scotia Sinker (Sketch Publishing, 2015), and a story in the YA creative non-fiction anthology Becoming Fierce: Teen Stories IRL (Fierce Ink, 2014).

Alison has written news, feature stories and essays for publications including The Globe and Mail, Chicago Tribune, Chatelaine, Today’s Parent, Ryerson Magazine, Dalhousie Magazine, Medical Post, Halifax Magazine, and Canadian Traveler.

Alison was a finalist twice in the Atlantic Writing Competition and won prizes for her blog and poetry at Mount Saint Vincent University. She served as a judge for the 2017 Evelyn Richardson Non-Fiction Award and as a reader for the 2016 CBC Creative Nonfiction Prize. She’s been a presenting author twice at Word on the Street Halifax (2015 and 2019).

She has two degrees from Mount Saint Vincent University including a masters of public relations, and was editor of the alumni magazine Folia Montana there for four years. Her third degree is from Ryerson University in journalism.

Alison has been a part-time instructor at Mount Saint Vincent University in communication studies since 2013. She’s also taught at the Nova Scotia Community College and taught workshops through the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS). She participated in the WFNS Writers In The Schools program from 2009 to 2017, bringing writing workshops into more than 50 classrooms province-wide. Alison has served as council member at the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) since 2009.

Alison enjoys working with emerging authors on their manuscripts, and also performs substantive, structural and copy-editing for various clients including creative writers, business writers, and academics.

She is currently the Associate Director of Communications for the University of King’s College where she writes content for print and digital publications, and is editor of the alumni newsletter and Tidings Magazine.

 

BIOGRAPHY
Alison Smith is the author of three books of poetry and one chapbook from Gaspereau Press. Her most recent collection, This Kind of Thinking Does No Good, was awarded the 2019 J.M. Abraham Award for Atlantic Poetry and was shortlisted for the 2020 Nova Scotia Masterworks Arts Award. She has written for radio, the stage, and has taught poetry workshops in prison, schools and other community settings. Alison lives in Lunenburg County, Nova Scotia.

BIOGRAPHY
Allison LaSorda’s writing has been nominated for National Magazine Awards and the CBC Poetry Prize, and selected as a Notable Essay in Best American Essays 2021. A recipient of scholarships from the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity and the Vermont Studio Center residencies, she is a contributing editor at Brick, A Literary Journal. Her work has appeared in Literary Hub, The New Quarterly, The Malahat Review, Scientific American, The Walrus, CNQ, The Globe and Mail, Southern Humanities Review, Hazlitt, and other venues. Allison lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

BIOGRAPHY
Allison is a freelance writer. Since 2003, she has worked from her home in Prospect.

While studying journalism at Ryerson University, she spent a summer working as a reporter for The Rural Voice, a farming magazine based in Blyth, Ont. She happily travelled the countryside talking to farmers and hearing stories about the latest breed of cattle and amazing new varieties of corn and cauliflower.

From Blyth, she moved on to work as a reporter at several daily newspapers in Ontario, including The Brantford Expositor and The Standard in St. Catharines. After landing a summer internship at The Globe and Mail in Toronto, she stayed for another two years writing and editing for the paper’s website.

In 2003, she returned to Nova Scotia, the place she had fallen in love with as an English and Russian student at the University of King’s College a decade earlier.

Her work has been published in newspapers and magazines. She has also written seven non-fiction books.

Her first book 250 Years of Progress: Halifax Regional Fire and Emergency was published by Nimbus in 2005. Her second book, Rum-Running was published by Nimbus in 2009. It was the first book in a series called Stories of Our Past.

In 2015, The Roar of the Sea, a book ghostwritten by Allison, was published by Boulder Publications. Her book, “The Saddest Ship Afloat”- The Tragedy of the MS St. Louis was published by Nimbus in 2016.

Broken Pieces, a children’s non-fiction book about the Halifax Explosion, appeared in bookstores just before Dec. 6, 2017, the 100th anniversary of the explosion. Broken Pieces was nominated for a 2019 Silver Birch Award by the Ontario Library Association and a 2019-2020 Hackmatack Children’s Choice Book Award.

Allison also works as a writing coach with journalism students at the University of King’s College.

BIOGRAPHY
Allison Maher is a former manager of marketing for a company that invented “spy gear”. She now resides on a small farm in rural Nova Scotia.

I, The Spy is her first juvenile novel.  I the Spy has been short listed for a Red Cedar Reader’s Choice Awared and is listed on Kayak Magazine’s Recommended Reading List.

Her second novel. Time Flies When You’re Chasing Spies, was short listed for a Hackmatack Award.

www.allisonmaher.com

BIOGRAPHY
Allison Watson is the author of Transplanted: My cystic fibrosis double lung transplant story. She was born with cystic fibrosis and grew up in New Brunswick. After undergoing a double lung transplant and subsequently getting post-transplant lymphoproliferative disorder, she hopes her days of medical turmoil are in her past. Allison has a BSc in biology and recreational therapy from Dalhousie University. She loves board games, reading, and hiking.

BIOGRAPHY
Amanda Peters is a writer of Mi’kmaw and settler ancestry. She is the winner of the 2021 Indigenous Voices Award (IVA) for unpublished prose and a participant in the 2021 Writers Trust Rising Stars program. Her debut novel The Berry Pickers has been shortlisted for the 2023 Writers Trust of Canada Atwood Gibson Award, the 2023 Barnes and Noble Discovery Prize, the 2023 Carnegie Medal of Honour for Fiction and the 2024 Forest of Reading Evergreen Award from the Ontario Library Association. Her work has appeared in the Antigonish Review, Grain Magazine, The Alaska Quarterly Review, the Dalhousie Review, and fillingStation Magazine. Her short story collection Waiting for the Long Night Moon will be published in the summer of 2024. Amanda has a certificate in creative writing from the University of Toronto and she is a graduate of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe New Mexico. Amanda teaches in the Department of English and Theatre at Acadia University. She lives and writes in the Annapolis Valley Nova Scotia with her fur babies Holly and Pook.  

BIOGRAPHY
As a writer of fiction, essays, musical theatre, radio documentaries and dramas, Ami is a dedicated artist who brings creativity and passion to her work. With over 15 years of experience in musical theater she has scored several productions, including The Clouds, Mother Courage, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest.

She believes that the power and magic of a good story can only come through the strength of the characters, plot and place. Her work has been described as “a balance of stories – observation and internal musings, matter of factness and fancy.” Her radio documentary for the CBC, Daughter of Family G won an Excellence in Journalism Award at the 2003 Atlantic Journalism Awards and her novel, Given, was awarded second place in the 27th annual Atlantic Writing Competition.

Born in Indiana, Ami currently lives in an old farm house in Scots Bay, Nova Scotia. She’s an avid blogger and is an active member of PEN Canada as well as an Associate Editor of Fiction for The Antigonish Review.

Her first novel, The Birth House was published by Knopf Canada in 2006 as their New Face of Fiction’s 10th anniversary title (publication by Luitingh Sijthoff – Holland, and Wilhelm Goldmann Verlag -Random House Germany to follow).

BIOGRAPHY
Amy Spurway was born and raised in Cape Breton. She holds a Bachelor’s  degree in English from UNB and a degree in Radio and Television Arts from Ryerson University. She lives in Dartmouth with her husband and three daughters.

BIOGRAPHY
Andre Fenton is an award-winning African Nova Scotian author, spoken-word artist, screenwriter and arts educator. He is a recipient of the Emerging Artist Recognition Award at the 2022 Creative Nova Scotia Awards, and is the author of three young adult fiction novels. Worthy of Love was the bronze recipient in The Coast’s 2018 Best of Awards, and ANNAKA, that was Digitally Lit’s 2022 recipient of the Community & Place Award. Andre is also the author of The Summer Between Us, that won Gold in The Coast’s 2022 Best of Awards. Andre has facilitated writing and performance workshops at over 50 schools across Nova Scotia, and has represented Halifax at seven national poetry festivals across Canada. He is currently screenwriting the film adaptation of his novel ANNAKA that is being produced by Fine Devils Films. Andre is represented by Meridian Artists, and based in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

BIOGRAPHY

Andrea Miller is the author of Awakening My Heart: Essays, Articles, and Interviews on the Buddhist Life (Pottersfield Press), My First Book of Canadian Birds (Nimbus Publishing), and The Day the Buddha Woke Up (Wisdom Publications). She’s also the deputy editor and a staff writer at Lion’s Roar magazine (formerly called the Shambhala Sun) and the editor of three anthologies for Shambhala Publications, including Buddha’s Daughters: Teachings from Women Who Are Shaping Buddhism in the West.

Miller has an MFA in creative writing from the University of British Columbia, a Bachelor of Journalism from the University of King’s College, and a Bachelor of Arts in English literature from Dalhousie University. Her writing has appeared in The Best Women’s Travel Writing series, the Best Buddhist Writing series, The Chronicle Herald, The Globe and Mail, Saltscapes, The Antigonish Review, Prairie Fire, and a wide range of other publications. Miller lives in Halifax with her husband and two children.

BIOGRAPHY
Andrew Wetmore was born in Digby, spent many years away, and now lives in Clementsport. He was a development officer in the early days of the WFNS, working on the Dramatists’ Coop project to improve the quality and increase the visibility of plays written in Nova Scotia.

As a playwright and screenwriter, Wetmore has written over 60 scripts, many of which have had productions across Canada and the US.

Since 2019, Wetmore has been the editor at Moose House Publications, which publishes books written in, or about, rural Nova Scotia.

BIOGRAPHY
Andria Hill-Lehr is a freelance writer and author of two non-fiction books: Mona Parsons: From Privilege to Prison, from Nova Scotia to Nazi Europe (Nimbus Publishing 2017) and A Mother’s Road to Kandahar (Pottersfield 2008). She is an entertaining public speaker who enjoys storytelling.

BIOGRAPHY
Andy Tolson has been a boy magician, drummer, propmaker, photojournalist, and a filmmaker. He lives in the Annapolis Valley, Nova Scotia, in a big old house with his family and two cats named Olive and Ottoline. How to Kidnap a Mermaid is his debut middle-grade fantasy, and the sequel will be released in Fall 2025.

BIOGRAPHY
Andy Verboom is publisher of Collusion Books, co-founding editor of long con magazine, and author of six poetry chapbooks, most recently DBL (knife fork book, 2020).

His poetry has won Frog Hollow’s Chapbook Contest and Descant’s Winston Collins Prize, been shortlisted for CV2’s Young Buck Prize and Arc’s Poem of the Year, and appeared in CAROUSEL, Prism, The Puritan, Vallum, and elsewhere.

BIOGRAPHY

Angela Mombourquette is the adult non-fiction editor at Nimbus Publishing, a freelance writer, and the author of 25 Years of 22 Minutes: An Unauthorized Oral History of This Hour Has 22 Minutes. She is also the co-author, with Len Wagg, of We Rise Again: More Stories of Hope and Resilience from Nova Scotia during the Covid-19 Pandemic. Both books were published by Nimbus. She has a Master of Journalism from the University of King’s College and has worked as a sessional instructor in the undergraduate journalism program there.

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BIOGRAPHY
Angus MacCaull has writing in Prelude, CV2, filling Station, The Lindenwood Review, Hamilton Review of Books, and Ricepaper Magazine. He is also the author of three picture books for children. A longtime resident of Nova Scotia, he now lives with his young family in Toronto.

He is currently working on Ghost Tones, a memoir about mental health, music, and loss. The book tracks the various therapies, mindfulness practices, and drugs he took over a ten-year period after being told at sixteen that he could be one of the best clarinetists in the world—but then losing music due to tinnitus.

BIOGRAPHY

Middle -aged, mixed-race and Mad, Kjipuktuk (Halifax) writer Anna Quon got a late start as a novelist and poet. And though she’s travelled as far as Russia and the Czech Republic to work on her writing, she’s still not sure she’s got the hang of it.

Happily, her novel fist novel Migration Songs found a home with Invisible Publishing and was released in the Fall of 2009. Her second novel, Low, followed in 2013; and in 2022, Invisible published her third novel Where the Silver River End, making a trilogy with her first two unrelated stories by bringing their main characters together in Bratislava, Slovakia

As well as working with traditional publishers, Anna enjoys making her own poetry books and has self-published an adult colouring book, Kindness. in 20017. She also loves to make short animated films of her poetry, including in 2020 her climate grief poem, Polar Bear, thanks to a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts . Her first professionally published chapbook of poetry Body Parts was released in the Spring of 2021 by Gaspereau Press.

Before she decided to call herself a writer, Anna held a number of different jobs, including day care teacher, fundraiser/ outreach coordinator for a shelter for victims of family violence, volunteer coordinator of a disability organization, and communications assistant for a provincial not-for-profit. She currently facilitates a writers’ group and an arts-related guest speaker series for local mental health organizations. Anna hopes the jobs title of novelist, poet, filmmaker  and writing workshop facilitator will stick longer than any of them.

For samples of her writing check out her blog, https://annaquon.wordpress.com/

Find examples of her visual art at https://ekeandutterarts.ca/ and check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YP_kjrslJbw&t=66s

for an example of one of her poem films.

BIOGRAPHY
Picture Books, MG Non-Fiction and Fiction, YA fiction.

Anne divides her time writing and teaching between Toronto Island and the LaHave River, Nova Scotia.

BIOGRAPHY
Anne C. Kelly has loved to read and write for as long as she can remember. Her first publication was a class newspaper which she wrote with a friend in Grade four. She especially enjoys reading historical fiction and books about characters who discover who they really are after going through challenges in life.

 

Anne is an English teacher at heart. She taught English-as-an-Additional-Language (EAL) to adult newcomers to Canada for over twenty years. She loves learning about different cultures and traditions. She always says that she learned more from her students than they ever learned from her!

 

Anne’s first novel, Jacques’ Escape, was published by Trap Door Books in June 2019.  Jacques’ Escape, which tells the story of a fourteen-year-old Acadian boy who is deported with his family to Massachusetts in 1755, is a middle reader for children aged 9-12. It was shortlisted for the 2020-21 Hackmatack Children’s Choice Book Award.

BIOGRAPHY
Anne Lévesque’s poetry, fiction and essays have appeared in Canadian and international journals and anthologies. Her novel ‘Lucy Cloud’ was published in 2018. She lives on the west coast of Unama’ki – Cape Breton Island.

BIOGRAPHY
Anne Louise MacDonald was born with a passion for horses and a vivid imagination. She retired in 2015 from a lifetime of working with animals. Her days are now spent enjoying her two horses and her raggedy black dog, painting, creating driftwood sculptures … and writing.

She had three well received picture books published early on. Then her first YA novel, The Ghost Horse of Meadow Green, became an international best seller and is printed in five languages. Seeing Red is a companion book, second in her ‘Hug a Horse Farm’ series, which continued with horses, kids with real-life problems and a bit of the paranormal.  She also published the non-fiction self-illustrated My Natural Horses.

Over the years she has presented writing workshops for children and adults, and participated in many writing festivals and conference presentations. She is currently entertaining one on one writers retreats at her hobby farm in beautiful Antigonish County.

 

BIOGRAPHY
An author, developmental book editor and partner publisher, Anne can be found working on her latest novel, mentoring other authors, publishing books or leading writing workshops. Anne’s first book, @Home in Dubai – Getting Connected Online and on the Ground, was traditionally published in the UK by Summertime Publishing (2011) and re-released by Springtime Books. Her first novel, Mental Pause launched on International Women’s Day, March 8, 2013, and won an Independent Publisher Book Award (IPPY). Her next novel, Deep Deceit, launched March 8, 2015 and is the first in a planned series called Deep Mysteries. Deep Freeze is scheduled for release March 2025. While living as an expat in Dubai and then Thailand, she was a content creator and a regular contributor to the Wall St. Journal Expat Blog and Global Living Magazine. In 2015, she also published a collection of expat and travel stories called Swimming with the Elephants and Other Adventures. Upon her return to Canada in 2016, after 23 years of expat life, she established OC Publishing in Halifax, NS.

BIOGRAPHY
Anne Simpson has been a writer-in-residence at the University of British Columbia, the Saskatoon Public Library, the Medical Humanities Program at Dalhousie University, and the University of New Brunswick, among others. She has also been a faculty member at the Banff Centre.

She writes novels, poetry, and essays. Four of her ten books have been Globe & Mail Best Books. Her short fiction has been awarded the Journey Prize, while her third novel, Speechless, won the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award. Her second poetry collection, Loop, was awarded the Griffin Poetry Prize. She has also written two books of essays. The Marram Grass: Poetry and Otherness explores poetry, art, and empathy, while Experiments in Distant Influence: Notes and Poems looks at friendship, courage, and community.

BIOGRAPHY
Annick MacAskill is a writer and translator based in Halifax. Her poems have appeared in literary journals and anthologies across Canada and abroad, including Best Canadian Poetry, The Stinging Fly, Canadian Notes & Queries, the Literary Review of Canada, Grain Magazine, Prism International, The Fiddlehead, Room Magazine, Plenitude, Arc Poetry Magazine, Lemon Hound, and Versal. Her first full-length poetry collection, No Meeting Without Body (Gaspereau Press, 2018), was nominated for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award and shortlisted for the J. M. Abraham Poetry Award. Her second collection will be published by Gaspereau in the spring of 2020.

MacAskill’s poetry has also been longlisted for the CBC’s Canada Writes Poetry Prize, longlisted for The Fiddlehead‘s Ralph Gustafson Prize, and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She is a member of Room Magazine‘s editorial collective.

BIOGRAPHY
After a long career teaching at Acadia University and writing sociology, social thought, and criminology, Tony has pivoted to fiction. His debut novel, About Face: A Mystery was released on September 1st by Moose House Publications in Annapolis Royal.

Tony was born in Halifax’s Hydrostone district and raised on Lawrencetown Beach. He graduated from Graham Creighton High School in Cherry Brook NS and Dalhousie University, Halifax, and has a PhD in social and political science from the University of Cambridge. He is Professor Emeritus at Acadia.

Among other projects, he has researched small-town and rural policing in the Annapolis Valley.

BIOGRAPHY
Always in the mood for a good scare, B.R. Myers spent most of her teen years behind the covers of Lois Duncan, Ray Bradbury, and Stephen King. She is the author of the Mary Higgins Clark Award winning novel, A Dreadful Splendour, as well as numerous books for teens. Her YA novels have been chosen by the School Library Journal and the CCBC as top picks. Before she became a full time writer, she was a registered nurse for thirty-two years. A member of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, she lives in Halifax with her family—and there is still a stack of books on her bedside table.

BIOGRAPHY
My background is in journalism, political communications, and teaching. I have over a decade of experience teaching creative non-fiction in the Department of Communications at Mount Saint Vincent University. Currently I am a panelist on CBC Halifax radio’s longest running political panel “The Spinsters.”

I write non-fiction and fiction, primarily cozy mysteries set in Nova Scotia. I work with a US-based publisher who thinks this province is “exotic.”

I have extensive experience working as a developmental editor with a wide variety of new and emerging authors across many genres. I have learned so much from other writers. With my own experience teaching writing and in the traditional publishing industry, I enjoy helping other authors bring out the best in their own work.

BIOGRAPHY
Basma Kavanagh is a poet, visual artist, and letterpress printer who lives and works in Nova Scotia, in Mi’kma’ki. She produces artist’s books under the imprint Rabbit Square Books. She has published two collections of poetry, Distillō (Gaspereau, 2012), and Niche (Frontenac, 2015), which won the 2016 Lansdowne Prize for Poetry, and was a finalist for the 2019 NS Masterworks Arts Award. The book-length poem, Ruba’iyat for the Time of Apricots (Frontenac 2018), was shortlisted for the 2019 J.M. Abraham Poetry award, and won the Book Publishers Association of Alberta’s Robert Kroetsch Award for Poetry Book of the Year. Basma has taught workshops and courses on poetry, printmaking, bookbinding, and letterpress, and has formally and informally mentored emerging artists and writers. She has been an artist in residence at the Penland School of Crafts, the Banff Centre, and the Minnesota Center for Book Arts.

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Originally from Dartmouth, Beth Ann completed a science degree at Dalhousie University. She works as an online ESL Teacher and coaches youth soccer in the summer. Beth Ann is passionate about the environment and enjoys being active. Early morning runs, bike rides, paddles, and yoga are her favourite things. She lives on the South Shore of Nova Scotia with her husband, two sons, and their dog, Gordie.   

BIOGRAPHY
Bethany Lake is a playwright, novelist, and freelancer from Nova Scotia. As a playwright, she has had three of her plays produced in Halifax. Her play, No Animal, has been published in The Furious Gazelle, a literary magazine based in New York City.

She is a regular contributor to Rue Morgue magazine, where she has conducted interviews with artists such as Mark Soper (1987’s Blood Rage) and Damien Leone (Terrifier, Terrifier 2). Bethany’s work has also appeared in The Big Takeover, PRISM international, and Write magazine.

Her recently completed novel, Walk On (publisher TBD), began its development in the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program.

Bethany received a Bachelor of Arts in Theatre Studies from Dalhousie University before continuing her playwriting education at Tarragon Theatre in Toronto, ON.

BIOGRAPHY

Binnie Brennan is the author of three books of fiction, Like Any Other Monday (Gaspereau Press),  A Certain Grace and Harbour View (Quattro Books).

Co-winner of the 2009 Quattro Books’ Ken Klonsky Novella Contest, Binnie has also been published in several literary journals. Her novella, Harbour View, was published in the fall of 2009; in 2010 it was shortlisted for an Atlantic Book Award and longlisted for a ReLit Award. Her short story collection, A Certain Grace, was published in 2012. Binnie is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers, where she was mentored by M.G. Vassanji and Alistair MacLeod.

In 2007 Binnie’s story A Spider’s Tale was adapted for the stage in Halifax, where it received critical and popular acclaim. Since 1989 Binnie has enjoyed a career playing the viola with Symphony Nova Scotia. She lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

 

 

 

BIOGRAPHY

Blanca Baquero’s origins are Spanish and French. Born in Chicago in 1944 and raised in New York, her family moved to Canada in 1959, making Montreal their new home.

Blanca has been writing for the past fifteen years. Her poetry has been published (in both the English and French languages) in a number of literary magazines, university works, and anthologies in Canada and in the United States. In 2001, the Canadian Authors Association chose two of her poems (Repletus and Child’s Play) to be published in their anthology. In 2001 she was the winner of the literary contest organized by the Salon du Livre de la Côte Nord in the province of Quebec.

For the past seven years the poet has been studying a Japanese form of poetry known as Haïku. In 2002, 2004, and 2005 several of her haïkus were published in Quebec by Les Éditions David of Ottawa. Additional highlights include: honourable mention in the Betty Drevniok Award 2005 organized by Haïku Canada; the publication of two of her haïku in Belgium in 2006; and third place winner in a haïku contest organized in Paris, France by l’Association française haïku.

Blanca is a member of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, The Quebec Writers’ Federation, the League of Canadian Poets, Haïku Canada, Haïku Society of America, and the Association Française de haïku (France).

The writer moved to Nova Scotia in November 2002 and lives on the North Mountain near Canning where she is continually inspired by the pastoral beauty of the Annapolis Valley for her poetry and haïku.

Née à Chicago d’une mère québécoise et d’un père espagnol, Blanca Baquero réside au Canada depuis 1958. Poète anglophone depuis quinze ans, plusieurs de ses poèmes ont été publiés dans des revues littéraires, des anthologies, et des ouvrages universitaires.

En 1997, elle est déménagée à Sept-Iles au Québec. Déterminée à s’intégrer à la population francophone, elle s’est jointe à des ateliers d’écriture en français. Grâce à ces ateliers, elle est tombée amoureuse du haïku. En 2002, 2004 et 2005, elle été publiée par Les Éditions David d’Ottawa dans les recueils dirigé par Francine Chicoine intitulés Dire le nord, Dire la faune et Dire la flore. Haïku Canada lui a décerné une mention honorable dans le concours Betty Drevniok 2005. En 2007, elle a gagné le troisième prix du concours organisé à Paris par l’Association française de haïku.

Blanca Baquero est membre de la Nova Scotia Writers Federation, de la League of Canadian Poets, de la Quebec Writers Federation, de Haïku Canada, de la Haïku Society of America et de l’Association française de haïku en France. Elle habite en Nouvelle-Écosse depuis 2002. Écrire est pour elle un joyeux délire ainsi qu’une véritable aventure.

BIOGRAPHY
Bob Kroll has been writing professionally for more than thirty-five years. His work includes books, stage plays, radio dramas, TV documentaries, as well as historical docu-dramas for Canadian and American museums. He lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Born New Haven, CT. Graduated Providence College and St. Thomas University.

BIOGRAPHY

Writer, director and  producer, Brenda MacLennan-Dunphy has had two novels published by Pottersfield Press as well- Never Speak of This Again (2018) and The Silence of the Vessel (2020), which was nominated for an Atlantic Book Award. Four of Brenda’s plays have been on the stage at Strathspey Place, a 500 soft seat theatre in Mabou, Cape Breton- John Allan Cameron’s Last Show (November 2021), John Archie and Nellie (2016, 2012) , The Weddin’ Dance (2013), and Displacement (2014). Her play The Reiteach was put at two small stages in 2020. She was a featured writer at the 2021 Cabot Trail Writers Festival and also won the HR Bill Percy Novel Prize in 2017 for Never Speak of This Again. Born and raised in Inverness County, the mother of four is a teacher by trade, but a gypsy by nature. She loves to find characters along the way in life. Brenda lives in Skye Glen, Inverness County, with her wonderful and patient husband, Ed.

BIOGRAPHY
Bretton Loney is a novelist and non-fiction writer who has published two books that were nominated for Whistler Independent Book Awards: a biography, Rebel With A Cause: The Doc Nikaido Story in 2015 and in 2018 his first novel, The Last Hockey Player.

His short stories have appeared in various Canadian short story anthologies and literary journals, including the short story collection Everything Is So Political. In 2019 his story, “The Coulee Song”, appeared in The Group of Seven Reimagined, a collection of very short stories inspired by the artists’ paintings.

In 2022 Bretton independently published his second novel, Joe Howe’s Ghost. The novel tells the story of Erin Curran who is a rookie Government MLA when a startling encounter with the ghost of Joe Howe, Nova Scotia’s most famous politician and journalist, changes the trajectory of her career and her life.

Joe Howe’s Ghost is a reflection on Howe’s tumultuous political era and of provincial politics today, and an exploration of the personal struggle between the desire for political power and upholding heartfelt personal convictions that are common to both.

Bretton was an award-winning journalist for more than 20 years in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and worked in communications for the Government of Nova Scotia for 16 years. He was born and raised in Bow Island, Alberta and has undergraduate degrees from the University of Lethbridge and the University of King’s College. He lives in Halifax with his wife, Karen Shewbridge.

More information on Bretton’s writing is available at brettonloney.com

 

BIOGRAPHY

Brian Bartlett was born in St. Stephen, New Brunswick, in 1953, grew up in Fredericton, lived for 15 years in Montreal, and moved to Halifax in 1990 to teach creative writing and literature at Saint Mary’s University. He will retire from teaching in June 2018. He has published seven collections and six chapbooks of poems, as well as Wanting the Day:Selected Poems, which was published internationally (by Peterloo Poets of Cornwall, England, and Goose Lane Editions in Canada) and won the 2004 Atlantic Poetry Prize. His other honours have inclued two Malahat Review Long Poem Prizes, first prize in the Petra Kenney poetry awards, and the 2009 Acorn-Plantos Award for People’s Poetry. In 2014 Fitzhenry & Whiteside published his first book of prose, Ringing Here & There: A Nature Calendar (a 366-paragraph book of days going from April 1st to the following March 31st), followed by Branches Over Ripples: A Waterside Journal (Gaspereau Press, 2017), a “plein air” experiment, drafted outdoors by various bodies of water (lakes, rivers, brooks, ponds, marshes, bays, waterfalls, etc.). A selection of Brian’s prose on poetry from over two decades is gathered together in All Manner of Tackle: Living with Poetry (Palimpsest, 2017).

He has also edited the Collected Poems of Alden Nowlan; a book of prose, Don McKay: Essays on His Works; selections of poetry: Earthly Pages: The Poetry of Don Domanski and, all from The Porcupine’s Quill, The Essential James Reaney, The Essential Robert Gibbs, and The Essential Dorothy Roberts; and The Child Alone, an anthology of childhood poems from which parents and other adults are largely marginalized or excluded. His wife is Karen Dahl, a Halifax Regional Library system manager, and their two children are Josh and Laura.

BIOGRAPHY

Briana was born in Salem Massachusetts in 1981.

She made her first picture book in 1988 for a contest, at the age of seven. Her incredible first grade teacher, Mrs. Chronholm, noticed how much she loved to draw and write and encouraged her to enter the contest. Although Briana did not win, she experienced a process that has stayed with her into adulthood.

In 2013, Briana reconnected with this childhood dream while drawing with her children at the kitchen table. She had been working as a fine artist since her graduation from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in 2005. As the primary care giver for her growing family, she felt an increased constraint on the time she had to make her large still life oil paintings. This frustration, combined with two bouts of postpartum depression, landed her in a deep artist’s block in 2010.

In 2013, something shifted. She drew a paper doll and cut it out for her daughter to play with. This simple activity created a joy that changed the course of her life. Briana felt a reconnection with her inner child, which ignited a new energy to create and share work that was inspired by her own childhood memories. Artful play, living close to the sea and in the woods, and re-imagining fairy tales became source material for her projects. Briana started this new path by making illustrations inspired by these childhood experiences, and vowed to follow her curiosity without question from then on. She broke her three year artist’s block when she created paper dolls as art kits, and she has been designing and selling them for a decade.

Through the years, the paper dolls turned into characters for picture books, as well as puppets for stop motion animations.

Following her curiosity without question led Briana to Sable Island, which became the subject of her first paper doll picture book published by Nimbus Publishing in 2018. Since then, Briana has relied on the ideas of play and curiosity to explore other themes, and she has created the images and words for eight books with Nimbus Publishing in a short five years.

Her stop motion animation titled “The Happy Island,” combined her words, paper doll puppets, and oil painted landscapes to tell the story of how she creates her art in her new found “happy place” and was screened at the Lunenunburg Doc Fest in 2021. Her short animation called “Little Islands,” soothed the souls of lonely children after being featured on CBC during the Covid 19 pandemic. She has retold the story of Thumbelina in her picture book “Wildflower,” illustrated mermaid babies in her board book “Mermaid Lullaby,” and reimagined the “Twelve Days of Christmas.” The repeating patterns of her paper doll’s clothing and the endpapers of her books have become a line of wallpaper. Her second picture book titled “The Book of Selkie”, was short listed for the David Booth Poetry prize for Children in 2022.

Briana has shown her work in solo and group shows in Halifax and Boston, and her illustrations have appeared internationally in online features, films and magazines. As wonderful as all this is, the best place to find her is in her happy place, wandering the shore with her paints, writing stories by the sea.

BIOGRAPHY
Brittni Brinn (she/they) writes science fiction and horror from a tower in Kjipuktuk/Halifax. She graduated with an M.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Windsor and worked in community theatre for a few years before moving to the East Coast.

Her debut novel, The Patch Project, was published by EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing in 2018. A revised edition and the two sequels in the post-apocalyptic trilogy are currently available through Adventure Worlds Press. Their short stories appear in anthologies with Eibonvale Press, Little Ghosts Books, and JayHenge Publishing.

Their weird novella Misplaced is set to release on November 1, 2024 with Little Ghosts Books.

BIOGRAPHY
Bruce Bishop, originally from Yarmouth, N.S., has been writing professionally since the mid-1990s, primarily for travel, tourism and leisure freelance markets. He has written and contributed to several guidebook companies over the years, especially Fodor’s, Michelin, and DK Eyewitness Guides. From 2000 to 2002, he was the elected president of the Travel Media Association of Canada.

In 2020 at the outset of the pandemic, he decided to begin writing fiction for the first time, and his debut novel Unconventional Daughters (Icarus Press) was published the same year. Based on its popular appeal, he chose to embark upon writing a trilogy, and the second novel, Uncommon Sons, was released in 2021. The final novel in the trilogy, Undeniable Relations was published in December 2022.

He was one of five authors selected to read from his last novel at the Read by the Sea annual literary festival in July 2023.

Besides memberships in the Writers Union of Canada and Screen Nova Scotia, Bishop is proud to be associated with the WFNS and hopes to meet many likeminded writers (emerging, intermediate and established) in the future!

BIOGRAPHY
Camilla Thompson is an author, educator and storyteller on a mission to improve mental health education and literacy across Canada. As the director of Sunnyside Self Wellness and author of Skating Late, Camilla introduces people of all ages and abilities to writing and wellness practices proven to increase peace, positivity, health and happiness, and shares inspiring stories of hope determination and community involvement.

Camilla’s debut book, Skating Late, is a work of Canadiana in children’s literature that features a confident and creative gender neutral fox that all Canadian kids can relate to. Parents, teachers and grandparents will love to read this tale aloud, but it is best enjoyed when recited by the author during class visits and community events.

“After sleeping in and waking up to a Canadian conundrum, Skating Late to school is the only solution. Facing some slippery situations along the way, is it possible to make it on time? Skating Late is a fast paced adventure full of danger, dread and determination! Strap on your skates, buckle your helmet, and prepare yourself for a wild ride!”

As a dynamic educator and entertaining storyteller with a passion for whole self wellness and mental health education, Camilla is excited to visit classrooms and communities across Canada sharing her Sunnyside stories and introducing the writing and wellness practices that have been life enriching at her best times and life saving during her most difficult trials.

Camilla is a disability entrepreneur returning to the workforce after her career was interrupted by kidney disease and the Covid 19 pandemic. During her three year healing hiatus, Camilla dedicated herself to her writing and studies. She wishes to thank The Halifax Humanities Society for offering free education in the humanities to Nova Scotians who face barriers to traditional education. This life changing educational opportunity is based on The Foundation Year Programme offered by the University of King’s College, and is is made possible by the generosity of local professors who donate their time and tutelage to help participants develop as writers, speakers and thinkers.

Camilla’s second book, Canada’s Ocean Letdown, is the story of a Come From Away grandchild who has an unfortunate introduction to the shores of Nova Scotia when they are stung by a jellyfish, attacked by swarm of mosquitoes and have to eat a peanut butter and SAND sandwich picnic for lunch. Her storytelling performances of this tale are receiving lots of laughs across the province. It will be illustrated by Canadiana artist Bonnie Lemaire and published in March of 2024.

BIOGRAPHY

Carol Ann Cole is a best-selling author with four non fiction books and a growing number of novels in The Paradise Series.  In July 2020 Paradise on the Morrow, third fiction in the Series was published by Moose House Press in Granville Ferry, Nova Scotia. www.moosehousepress.com .(Publisher Brenda Thompson/Editor Andrew Wetmore)

Carol Ann has received the Order of Canada, the Golden and Silver Jubilee Medals, the Terry Fox Citation of Honour, the elite Maclean’s Honour Role and numerous other awards. Carol Ann is profiled in ‘Canadian Who’s Who’ and in the 2005 edition of ‘1000 Great Women of the 21st Century,’ published by the American Biographical Institute in Raleigh, North Carolina. Carol Ann is the founder of The Comfort Heart Initiative and has raised over one and one half million dollars for cancer research through the Canadian Cancer Society. 

BIOGRAPHY

Carol Bruneau is the author of eleven books: four short story collections, After the Angel Mill (1995), Depth Rapture (1998), A Bird on Every Tree (2017), shortlisted for the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award and the Dartmouth Book Award; and Threshold (2024); one nonfiction book, No Ordinary Magic: the Art of Laurie Swim (2023), shortlisted for the APA Best Book Published in Atlantic Canada Award; and six novels. These include Brighten the Corner Where You Are (2020), nominated for the IMPAQ Dublin Literary Award; A Circle on the Surface (2018), winner of the Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction; These Good Hands, a novel based on the life and art of Camille Claudel; Glass Voices (2007), named a Globe and Mail Best Book, German translation Glasstimmen (2010); Berth (2005); and Purple for Sky (2000), US edition A Purple Thread for Sky (2001), winner of the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award and the Dartmouth Book Award.

In numerous starred reviews, Bruneau has been praised by Quill & Quire as a master of the short story form and “a first-class storyteller who uses words magically” (Quill & Quire), and by bestselling author Lesley Crewe as “a marvel.”

Giller-Prize shortlisted author Leo McKay Jr. calls Bruneau’s most recent collection “stories of great power and insight,” and says, “Bruneau illuminates her fictional world with a light so clear and bright that in it we can see into the shadows of our own world, into the usually unuttered spaces between human action and intent, between what we mean to each other and our usually inadequate attempts to articulate that meaning. And the source of that light,” he notes, “is Bruneau’s powerfully controlled language…every sentence perfect unto its purpose.”

She has been writing since childhood; her professional writing career spans thirty years. Her stories, reviews and articles have appeared nationwide in anthologies, print and online journals and newspapers.

She has appeared at various literary festivals including TIFA (Toronto International Festival of Authors), the Vancouver Writers’ Festival, Eden Mills, the Northrop Frye Festival, the Cabot Trail Authors’ Festival, the Lunenburg Literary Festival, the Margaree Literary Festival, Read-by-the-Sea, FogLit, AfterWords Literary Festival and the Winterset Festival.

The recipient of four Canada Council grants in support of her fiction, Bruneau has been Writer in Residence at Acadia and Dalhousie Universities, and taught writing for the arts for many years at NSCAD University. Having led workshops throughout the Maritimes and mentored new and emerging writers through the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program since the program’s inception, she continues to teach workshops in fiction writing at various levels for the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia.

Bruneau lives and works in Kjipuktuk/Halifax, Mi’kmaki/Nova Scotia.