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.
Carole Glasser Langille is the author of 5 books of poetry, 2 collections of short stories, 2 children’s books and a non-fiction book “Doing Time: Writing Workshops in Prison.”
Her second book of poetry, In Cannon Cave, was nominated for a Governor General’s Award in 1997, and the Atlantic Poetry Prize in 1998. “I Am What I Am Because You Are What You Are,” her second collection of short stories, was nominated for the Alistair MacLeod Award for Short Fiction. Her children’s book, Where the Wind Sleeps, was the Canadian Children’s Book Center Choice in 1996.
Several selections from Carole Glasser Langille’s book of poetry, Late In A Slow Time, have been adapted to music by renowned Canadian composer Chan Ka Nin. The production, also called Late In A Slow Time debuted at the 2006 Sound Symposium in St. John’s, Newfoundland and will be on Duo Concertante’s forthcoming CD.
Originally from New York City, where she studied with the poets John Ashbery and Carolyn Forche among others, Carole now lives in Black Point, Nova Scotia.
She has taught at The Humber School for Writing Summer Program, Maritime Writer’s Workshop, the Community of Writers in Tatamagouche, and at Women’s Words the University of Alberta. She has taught Creative Writing at Mount Saint Vincent University, Writing for the Arts at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, and currently teaches Creative Writing: Poetry at Dalhousie University.
Carole has given poetry readings in Athens, Delhi, Prague, London England, New York City, Kirkcudbright Scotland, and throughout Canada. She has received Canada Council Grants for poetry, non-fiction and fiction as well as Nova Scotia Cultural Arts grants for poetry and fiction.
Carole Glasser Langille Read More »
Jennifer Hatt is a former newspaper reporter and editor who brings words to life for periodicals, corporate clients, fiction lovers and students of all ages. She has written articles for a variety of national and regional trade magazines and since 2010 has completed three novels in her Finding Maria series. She is also a participant in the Writers in the School program, instructing grades 3-9 on the elements and rewards of creating their own newsletters, and has developed and taught communications and writing skills programs for the Nova Scotia Community College and the Nova Scotia School of Fisheries.
Jennifer’s debut novel, Finding Maria, was a semifinalist in the Kindle Book Review Best Indie Book of 2012. She has won the Thompson Newspapers Award of Excellence for Canadian Newspapers, circulation under 15,000, non-deadline writing, for “The Silent Thief”, depicting the struggle of two men to cope with the slow loss of their wives to Alzheimer Disease. She is also the Thompson Newspapers Award of Excellence winner for East Coast Newspapers, circulation under 12,000, for “Double Vision”, an exploration of the battle over herbicide use in Nova Scotia forests. Jennifer was part of the news team that in 1992 received the Thomson North American award for coverage of the Westray Mine disaster.
“It’s neat for kids to read about things, but the best thing is for them to muck around and discover things on their own.” – Pam on why her books are activity-based
Pamela Hickman was born and raised in Mississauga, Ontario. She holds an Honours Bachelor degree in Environmental Studies and Biology from the University of Waterloo. She was the Education Co-ordinator for the Federation of Ontario Naturalists for 7 years. During that period, Pamela wrote several education kits and other natural history material for children. In 1989, Pamela began a freelance writing career and has published over 35 books to date. She moved to Canning, N.S. with her husband and three daughters in 1992. Pamela divides her time between her writing, family and volunteer work in her community.
Pamela won the 1995 Lilla Sterling Memorial Award. In 2007, she also won the Green Prize for Sustainable Literature Award from the Santa Monica Public Library.
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.
Martine Jacquot is a prolific writer who writes in French but can make presentations in either French or English. She has published over 30 books so far (novels, poetry, short-stories, essays and novels for young readers).
She has been invited to many literary events across Canada and abroad, namely to Lafayette’s book festival during the 2nd World Acadian Congress in 1999, to Tunisia to attend a panel of women writers in 2000, the International Poetry Festival in Trois-Rivières, the Northrop Frye International Literary Festival and to the Paris Book Fair in 2004 and 2006.
She did several reading tours: Tunisia in 2000, Russia and Cameroon in 2008, Morocco in 2010, Roumania in 2011, India in 2012.
She holds several degrees: BA from La Sorbonne, Paris, 3 MA degrees from La Sorbonne, Acadia and Dalhousie, a BJ from the University of Kings College and a PHD from Dalhousie University. She has studied and lived in France, England, Switzerland and Canada.
Past Vice President of the Association des Écrivains Acadiens, past president of the Conseil Culturel Acadien de la Nouvelle-Écosse, she has been on many editorial committees, member of several juries, has received creation grants and travel grants both from the Canada Council for the arts and the NS Arts Council. Her novel Les oiseaux de nuit finissent aussi par s’endormir was short listed for the Antonine-Maillet-Acadie Vie award. She was thrice finalist for the Éloizes awards, once as a writer, and twice as a cultural journalist. She was shortlisted for the France-Acadie Award three times for Au Gré du Vent (2006), Le jardin d’herbes aromatiques (2006) and Le silence de la neige (2008). She won the Award Prix Européen de l’ADELF with a special mention 2007 for Au gré du vent. She has also been chosen on 2 occasions to advise beginning authors, once by the Talent Trust of NS, once by the Association des auteurs de l’Ontario. Some of her poems and short stories have been broadcast on SRC. One of her stories was staged in Ottawa at the Théâtre Trillium. She was a member of the Board of Governors of the NS Museum for 12 years and an author in residence with the ArtsInfusion program and Fecane program
Her articles and interviews have appeared in LittéRéalité, Ancrage, Arcade, Alpha Arts magazine, Eloizes, Femmes d’Action, The Fiddlehead, Liason, Studies in Canadian Literature, Vent’d’est, Waves, Ashtarowt and Al Quds, among others. Her poems and short stories have appeared in Concerto pour huit voix, La Diversité: 15 nouvelles francophones á travers le monde, Ecphore Anthology 1987, Eloizes, Les Elytres du Hanneton, Herspectives, Liaison, Lieux d’être, Littéréalité, Les Maritimes, Mensuel, 25 Offerta Speziale, Poetry Halifax-Dartmouth, The Pottersfield Portfolio, Reflets Maritimes 2, Voices and Echoes: Stories and Poems of Women’s Spirituality, Walk through Paradise, La Poésie acadienne and Pour l’Amour de toi, among others. Some of her work is being translated into English, Russian, Portugese, Italian, Basque and Arabic.
Joanne Jefferson has been passionately involved in the Nova Scotia writing community ever since she helped create Quod Libet, the QEH arts and literary magazine in 1981. She was a contributing editor with the Halifax-based newspaper, Pandora; a founding member of the Oxford Street Writers Group; and she helped establish Community of Writers, a Tatamagouche Centre program. Joanne has also been a teacher at Write Here, Write Now, the Centre’s March Break program for young writers. She facilitates hands-on writing, performance, and zine-making workshops for creators of all ages.
Joanne’s first novel, Lightning and Blackberries, was released by Nimbus Publishing in April 2008. Her short fiction, poetry, and personal essays have been published in various anthologies, including The Vagrant Revue of New Fiction, and her non-fiction work has appeared in Saltscapes, The Chronicle Herald, and The Globe and Mail. She also works as a freelance editor.
Born and raised in Halifax, Joanne now makes her home in West LaHave, Lunenburg County. She received a BA from Acadia and an MA from Dalhousie. er other passions include music, visual art, history, and baseball.
Dean Jobb is a true crime writer, book reviewer and a professor in the School of Journalism at the University of King’s College in Halifax, and a member of the faculty of the university’s MFA in Creatiive Nonfiction program.
He is the author of seven books. His latest, Empire of Deception, tells the stranger-than-fiction story of master swindler Leo Koretz, who hoodwinked the elite of 1920s Chicago before escaping to a new life of luxury and excess in Nova Scotia. It won the Crime Writers of Canada Arthur Ellis Award, was named the Chicago Writers Association Book of the Year and was a finalist for the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction. His previous books won the Evelyn Richardson and City of Dartmouth awards for nonfiction, and he was runner up for the National Business Book Award.
Dean writes a monthy column on true crime for Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and is a contributing reviewer to the Chicago Review of Books. His articles, commentaries and reviews have appeared in The Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, National Post and Winnipeg Free Press. He also has written for numerous magazines, including Canada’s History, Canadian Lawyer and the Literary Review of Canada, and has been published in the Chicago Tribune, The Scotsman, The Irish Times and the Belfast Telegraph.
A reporter, editor and columnist during a 20-year career at The Chronicle Herald, Dean is a three-time winner of the Atlantic Journalism Award and a finalist for the National Newspaper and National Magazine awards.
Originally from Kingston, Ont., K.V. Johansen studied English and History at Mount Allison, received a Master’s in Medieval Studies from the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto, and another Master’s in English, from McMaster. She writes mostly epic fantasy, as well as fantasy and science fiction for young readers; she has also written short stories and literary criticism for adults. Ancient and Medieval history and languages are one of her main interests. Johansen taught workshops at the spring 2010 MASC Young Authors and Illustrators Conference in Ottawa. She has worked with the elementary or elementary/intermediate sessions of Writers in Electronic Residence (WIER) over a number of terms and has visited schools from Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario, to Austria and Macedonia. She has in the past written a large number of articles for the Nova Scotia based farm magazines Rural Delivery and Atlantic Beef Quarterly, as well as other non-fiction. She was the editor of Stalin Versus Me, the final volume of the late Donald Jack’s triple Leacock-Award-winning Bandy Papers series (Sybertooth 2005). Johansen currently lives in Sackville, NB.
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.
A.J.B. (John or Jay) Johnston Read More »
The Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) uses the following terms to describe writers’ experience levels:
Please keep in mind that each form of creative writing (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, writing for children, writing for young adults, and others) provides you with a unique set of experiences and skills, so you might consider yourself an ‘established author’ in one form but a ‘new writer’ in another.
Occasionally, WFNS uses the phrase “emerging and established writers/authors” to mean ‘writers and authors of all experience levels.’
The “Recommended experience level” section of each workshop description refers to the above definitions. A workshop’s participants should usually have similar levels of creative writing and / or publication experience. This ensures that each participant gets value from the workshop and is presented with info, strategies, and skills that suit their experience.
For “intensive” and “masterclass” workshops, which provide more opportunities for peer-to-peer feedback, the recommended experience level should be followed closely.
For all other workshops, the recommended experience level is just that—a recommendation—and we encourage potential participants to follow their own judgment when registering.
If uncertain about your experience level with respect to any particular workshop, please feel free to contact us at communications@writers.ns.ca
