Fiction (adult)

Don Hannah

www.donhannah.info

Don Hannah lives in Lunenburg County. His novels, The Wise and Foolish Virgins (Thomas Raddall Nomination) and Ragged Islands (2008 Thomas Raddall winner) are published by Knopf Canada. His plays include The Wedding Script (Chalmers Award), Rubber Dolly, Running Far Back, The Wooden Hill (AT&T OnStage Award), and Fathers and Sons. Shoreline, a collection of his plays, is published by Simon and Pierre and is available through U of T Press. He has been writer in residence at the Tarragon Theatre, the Canadian Stage Company, the University of New Brunswick, for the Yukon Public Library Service, and at UBC’s Green College. He was the inaugural Lee Playwright in Residence at the University of Alberta where he wrote While We’re Young, recently published by Playwrights Canada Press. He has written two musicals with singer/songwriter David Sereda, Love Jive and Siren Song, both for the Tarragon Theatre. Facing South, his opera, with composer Linda Catlin Smith, premiered at the 2003 World Stage Festival. For five years he was the director of the Tarragon Young Playwrights Unit. As a dramaturge, he has worked at the Playwrights Atlantic Resource Centre (PARC), the National Theatre School, Vancouver’s Playwrights Theatre Centre, and the Banff Playwrights Colony. A founding member of PARC, he is also a member of the Playwrights Guild of Canada, and is a fellow of the MacDowell Colony. In 2008, he directed his play There is a Land of Pure Delight at Live Bait Theatre; his one man show The Woodcutter was produced in 2010 at the Working Title Festival in Edmonton. His second one person show, The Cave Painter was produced in 2011, and was awarded the 2012 Carol Bolt Award by the Playwrights Guild. Both one person shows are published by Playwrights Canada Press. His play Resident Aliens premiered at TNB in 2023.

Representation (Theatre):
Michael Petrasek
Kensington Literary Representation

34 St Andrew St.
Toronto, ON M5T 1K6
kensingtonlit@rogers.com
416 848 9648

Don Hannah Read More »

Renée Hartleib

Renée Hartleib is an author, writer, and writing mentor based out of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Her greatest passion is to help others connect with themselves and bring their creative dreams to life. Her first book, Writing Your Way: A 40-Day Path of Self-Discovery, was published in 2022. And her second book, Solo Camino: An Empowering Guide for Women was published in 2025.

As a writing mentor, Renée considers it an honour to work one-on-one with writers who are completing book drafts or who require a sensitive and thorough review of completed manuscripts.

Renée has also worked as a professional writer and editor for nearly 20 years. Her client list is long and has included the CBC, the National Film Board, the IWK Health Centre, Farmers Cooperative Dairy Limited, The Shaw Group, Saint Mary’s University, and Dalhousie University.

If you join Renée’s online community, you’ll receive inspiring blog posts on a variety of topics.

As a current member of the WFNS Board of Directors and a graduate of both the Humber School of Writers and the Alistair MacLeod Mentorship Program, Renée is proud to be part of the vibrant writing community of Atlantic Canada.

Renée Hartleib Read More »

Pamela Ditchoff

Pamela Ditchoff was born in Lansing, Michigan on September 21, 1950. She received a BA in Communication Arts from Michigan State University (1982), and an MA in English/Creative Writing from Michigan State University (1985). In the mid-1980s, Ditchoff worked at WFSL-TV47 in Lansing as head copywriter/creative consultant and then as a Graduate Teaching Assistant at Michigan State University.During this period, her early fiction and poetry was published in various literary magazines. She taught in elementary and secondary schools with the Writer’s In Schools program, and Interact Press published two of her texts for teachers. In 1993, Ditchoff was recognized in Who’s Who in Writers, Editors & Poets: United States & Canada, 1992-1993 for her significant literary contributions. Ditchoff moved to Liverpool in 2006, and has conducted classes there with WFNS and SCANS.

Pamela Ditchoff Read More »

Sarah Emsley

Sarah Emsley’s debut novel, The Austens (Pottersfield, 2025) brings to life the story of Jane Austen’s friendship with her sister-in-law Fanny Austen, who lived in Halifax, Nova Scotia with her naval captain husband during the years when Jane was writing Pride and Prejudice and other novels that would eventually make her famous. Sarah is also the author of Jane Austen’s Philosophy of the Virtues (Palgrave, 2005) and a history of St. Paul’s in the Grand Parade (Formac, 1999), the church in Halifax where Jane Austen’s niece Cassy was baptized in 1809.

Sarah has hosted several blog series celebrations of Austen’s work at www.sarahemsley.com, and she edited a collection of essays on Jane Austen and the North Atlantic for the Jane Austen Society (2006). She received her PhD from Dalhousie University, held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Rothermere American Institute, University of Oxford, taught classes on Austen in the Writing Program at Harvard University, and now lives in Halifax with her family.

Sarah Emsley Read More »

Greg Cook

Gregory M. Cook was born in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. As one of three poets in his immediate family, he has made writers and their survival a personal and a professional study. His biography of his close friend of twenty years, One Heart, One Way/ Alden Nowlan: A Writer’s Life, was undertaken following a two-year appointment as writer-in-residence at the University of Waterloo. More recently he has lived in Toronto, Fredericton, and Saint John, New Brunswick, where he is writing a biography of his friend, novelist Ernest Buckler (1908-1984).

Cook has read from his works in schools and universities in all Canadian provinces, and the Yukon where he was in residence at Berton House Writers’ Retreat – as well as in Maine and Georgia, USA; England; the Netherlands; and Germany. He is a member of Writers’ Union of Canada, The League of Canadian Poets and the Writers’ Federation of New Brunswick, and an honourary member of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia.

Greg Cook Read More »

Lesley Crewe

Lesley is the author of eight novels and a screenwriter for the movie Relative Happiness, based on her first novel. She is also a columnist for The Chronicle Herald. She lives in Homeville, Cape Breton.

Lesley Crewe Read More »

Wayne Curtis

Wayne Curtis was born near Blackville, New Brunswick in 1943. He was educated at the local schoolhouse and St. Thomas University, majoring in English. He started writing prose in the late sixties. His work has been described by Books in Canada as “a pleasure to read, for no detail escapes his discerning eye.”

He has been a contributor to several newspapers including The National Post and The Globe and Mail, as well as commercial magazines; Quill and Quire, Outdoor Canada, Fly Fishermen, Atlantic Insight, The Atlantic Advocate, The Atlantic Salmon Journal and The New Brunswick Reader. Winner of the David Adams Richards and George Woodcock awards, Wayne’s stories have appeared in literary journals: The Cormorant, Pottersfield Portfolio, Nashwaak Review, Antigonish Review, Origins, Atlantica and New Maritimes. His short stories have been dramatized for CBC Radio and CBC Television. In the spring of 2005 he recieved an Honorary Doctrine Degree (letters) from St. Thomas University. Wayne Curtis has lived in Southern Ontario with stints in Cuba nad the Yukon. He now divides his time between his cabin on the Miramichi and the city of Fredericton.

Wayne Curtis Read More »

Gwen Davies

Gwen Davies writes short stories and novels and the occasional essay. In 2000 she founded the acclaimed writing retreat Community of Writers, a summer retreat at the Tatamagouche Centre. She teaches creative writing at the Nova Scotia Community College and in private workshops and retreats, and particularly enjoys working with new writers. She earns a living as a consultant in clear language and design, and boosts her spirit doing parkour — check out this video on Halifax parkour [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEZLdVbD56E].

Gwen grew up as an Air Force Brat, moving with her strange and interesting family around Ontario and France and exploring Europe with them in a VW camper. She graduated from Wilfird Laurier with a BA Honours in English and later from King’s with a BJ and holds an Adult Education Certificate from the Tatamagouche Centre. Over the years she has taught high school English, worked with health food, written stories for magazines and newspapers including The Globe and Mail, and worked in community development and various types of consulting. For many years, she earned her living editing public materials (like the NS Power Bill and the Youth Criminal Justice Act) into language that was clear and accessible to its intended audience.

Gwen Davies Read More »

Alison DeLory

Alison DeLory is a writer, editor, teacher, and communications professional. She is currently the Associate Director, Writing & Publishing with the University of King’s College’s MFA program. Prior to this she was Director, Advancement Communications with Dalhousie University (2020 – 2026).

Books

Author, Making it Home, Nimbus Publishing (2019) (Finalist for Rakuten/Kobo Emerging Writer Prize) (novel)
Author, Scotia Sinker, Sketch Publishing (2015) (early chapter book)
Anthology contributor, Becoming Fierce: Teen Stories IRL, Fierce Ink (2014) (young adult)
Author, Lunar Lifter, Bryler Publishing (2012) (early chapter book)
Managing Editor, Take as Directed, ECW Press (2010) (nonfiction adult)

Magazines

Editor, Dal Magazine (2025 – 2026); editorial panel, Dal Magazine (2021 – 2026)
Editor, Tidings, University of King’s College (2018 – 2020)
Editor, Folia Montana, Mount Saint Vincent University (2011 – 2014)
Atlantic Canada Correspondent, Chatelaine Magazine (2009 – 2011)
Associate Editor, The Medical Post (2001 – 2007)

Teaching Experience

University of King’s College, 8-week non-credit writing workshops

Organizational Storytelling (2025)
Fiction Fundamentals (2021)

Mount Saint Vincent University, credit courses in Communication Studies (2013 – 2019)

Persuasive Writing
Strategic Writing
Intro to Writing and Editing
Creative Nonfiction
Mass Media and Public Opinion

Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) (2016 – 2017)

Media Literacy

Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia

Creative Nonfiction workshop (2016)
The Braided Essay workshop (2015)

Writers in the Schools (WITS)

Classroom visits grads primary to 9 (2010 – 2018)

Selected Writing Samples

Quickening the pulse of biomedical innovation, Dal Magazine (2026)
International rights scholar says look at history to understand our political present, Dal News (2024)
Cindy Blackstock: Indigenous children are worth fighting for, Dal News (2022)
For me, Sable Island feels like another dimension, CBC (2017)
Finding beauty in unexpected places after my friend’s death, Globe and Mail (2016)

Judge

Evelyn Richardson Nonfiction Award, Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (2017)
CBC Creative Nonfiction Prize (2016)

Education
MPR (MSVU), BPR (MSVU), BAA in Journalism (TMU), Leadership Badge (Dalhousie)

Alison DeLory Read More »

Binnie Brennan

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.

Binnie Brennan Read More »