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.
Elizabeth Peirce is a Halifax-based author, editor, teacher, and gardener. For Nimbus Publishing, she has authored and co-authored two historical fiction books about infamous cases of piracy in Nova Scotian history, Saladin and The Pirate Rebel, one guide to vegetable gardening in a tough climate (Grow Organic, winner of the 2011 APMA Best Atlantic Published Book award) and a preserving cook and guide book, You Can Too! Her book for children, The Big Flush, is dedicated to her young son and his horror of loudly-flushing public toilets. In 2019, she published Lost and Found: Recovering Your Spirit After a Concussion, a toolbox of strategies for healing from a difficult injury. When she’s not writing and editing, she enjoys cooking, canning, and encouraging people to tear up their lawns and grow some vegetables! Visit her website at https://elizabethpeirce.ca
Elizabeth will be offering virtual workshops based on her books through the WITS program in 2020-21, including:
(for P-2) How your biggest fears can make the best stories
(for grades 3-9) What is food security and where does our food come from?
(for grades 9-12) Writing to heal: surviving and thriving under challenging circumstances
Shelley Thompson is an actor, screenwriter, and activist based in Wolfville, in Mi’kma’ki (NS). She trained at The Royal Academy of Drama.c Art, the Canadian Film Centre, Women in the Directors’ Chair, the New York Writers’ Lab, and the Whistler Producer’s Lab.
As an actor she’s received and been nominated for Gemini and ACTRA awards for her work in film and television, including THE TRAILER PARK BOYS, and feature films SPLINTERS, and THE CHILD REMAINS among others.
Her short films have screened internationally with the most
recent, DUCK DUCK GOOSE, winning Best Atlantic Short at FIN Halifax. It was selected by Telefilm Canada’s Not Short on Talent at Clermont-Ferrand, and was a finalist in CBC’s Short Film Faceoff.
Her first feature film, Dawn, Her Dad & The Tractor premiered at INSIDE OUT International Film Festival in Toronto,selling out in Toronto, Halifax and London. (BFI Flare) and also screened in Whistler, BC, (Nominated for the Borsos Prize) Amsterdam’s Roze Filmdagen and many others across the US, Canada and in Germany. Among many prizes and awards, the film recently won the 2022 Nova Scotia MasterWorks Award.
Thompson is working on a full slate of projects: a second novel (GALILEE JUMP), and TV and cinema projects under the banner of her emerging production company, Rusty Tractor Productions Inc.
A committed LGBTQ+2SP ally, Thompson is proud parent to singer/ songwriter T. Thomason, a trans man who inspires her, every day.
ROAR, her first novel, is being published by Nimbus/Vantage Press in Nova Scotia, in late October 2023.
“It may take time, but dreams can come true.” This speaks to Hui Zhou, a bilingual nonfiction writer with a long career in natural science.
Born, educated, worked, married, became a mother and a respected senior scientist in her home city Beijing, Hui created her next opportunity to Canada. In the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia, she researched in her favourite field, entomology and obtained a Master of Science Degree, dreamed for a long time, from Saint Mary’s University in Halifax.
Still, Hui explores wider in science, but she never stops writing that had been one of her hobbies for most of her life. Since 2016, she has focused more on writing, one more dream come true.
Many of her nonfiction stories have been published in print and heard on radio broadcast since the 1990’s. Her latest publications include, Grandpa Santa, published in The Chronicle Herald and three other Atlantic daily newspapers on a same day, December 3, 2021. It was about how her daughter at six excitedly learned about Christmas in her birth country where Christmas has never been a holiday. Over the SandBar was published by The Masthead News 2025 (October Issue). A Glance at an Old Newspaper, about how Hui “ran into” the history of the Halifax Explosion, was published on Blood & Bourbon Magazine, Issue #15, 2025. It was also named as a Finalist in 2025 Next Generation Short Story Awards.
Running Wild with Bossy Boy (2018) is Hui’s first nonfiction photograph-storybook for children about a flock of free-run backyard chickens, focusing on their different personalities, or to them, chicken-alities. Children can easily understand chicken’s personalities, learn the biology through the interesting stories and imagine how happy the chickens are when running freely.
In Hui’s second nonfiction photograph-storybook, Puppy Oland (2023), children will meet the lively dog Oland and discover what Oland liked at his puppy training, if Oland was a good swimmer, how many corn ears Oland retrieved from neighboring campers, whom Oland once badly offended . . .
The success, in writing, photographing, book design, self-publishing, marketing and much more, encourages Hui’s further works to participate in nonfiction contests or awards.
Hui loves animals, including insects that she has studied and especially now speaking for about their beauty, their irreplaceable importance to the ecosystem and their dramatic population decline because of human activities.
Gardening, a heritage from her grandpa, remains her favorite pastime.
As a novice hiker, Michael was constrained by the limited accurate information available about local trails. During his own explorations he began keeping notes, and sharing his observations with family and friends. With their encouragement, in 1995 he wrote and Goose Lane published Hiking Trails of Nova Scotia (7th Edition), in cooperation with the Canadian Hostelling Association.
Since then, Michael has written ten guides on hiking and biking trails in Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Québec, and Ontario. He has been a regular contributor to CBC Radio in Halifax, Sydney and Ottawa. In addition to his books and radio appearances, Haynes has published numerous articles about Canada’s outdoors, both locally and nationally.
Michael has hiked in every province in Canada, numerous states in the U.S., Australia, and several countries in Europe and Asia. He tries to walk every day, but when not hiking, he orienteers, runs, bikes, cross-country skis, and otherwise keeps active.
In addition to writing about trails, Michael also works in trail development and active transportation. He has been a member of the consulting teams that have produced trail plans for communities such as Sault Ste. Marie, Chatham-Kent, and North Grenville, and active transportation/bike plans for Oromocto, Corner Brook, Lunenburg, and Essex County. Michael has also presented at numerous Canadian trail workshops, and at Australian, and American national trail conferences.
He currently resides in Nova Scotia.
Julian Mortimer Smith has published more than a dozen science fiction and fantasy stories in some of the world’s top speculative fiction magazines, including Asimov’s, Terraform, Lightspeed, and Best American Science Fiction & Fantasy. His first collection, The World of Dew and Other Stories, will be published in 2021 by Indiana University Press. Julian is a member of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) and SF Canada.
Julian lives in Yarmouth and spends his days writing copy for a web design company. He previously made a living as a freelance editor, working on projects ranging from romance novels to board games. When he lived in Edinburgh he worked as the books section editor of The Skinny, a Scottish arts and entertainment magazine.
In 2017, Julian led the “So You Want to Write Science Fiction” session at the WFNS in Halifax along with Professor Jason Hazlam. In April 2018, he led the four-week “Out of Your Head, Onto the Page” workshop at Waves of Confetti Creative Space in Yarmouth. He has also delivered workshops at schools throughout Southwest Nova as part of the Writers in the Schools program and has been an invited panel speaker at Hal-Con.
Julian has a bachelor’s degree in English literature from McGill Univeristy in Montreal and a Master’s in Communication and Culture from York University in Toronto. You can find out more about his writing at his website: http://julianmortimersmith.com/
Justin Gregg is science writer and author of the book Are Dolphins Really Smart? He writes about animal behavior and cognition, with articles and blog posts appearing in The Wall Street Journal, Aeon Magazine, Scientific American, BBC Focus, Slate, and other print and online publications (more info here). Justin produced and hosted the dolphin science podcast The Dolphin Pod, and has provided voices for characters in a number of animated films (more info here). Justin regularly lectures on topics related to animal/dolphin cognition (more info here). He also blogs about science and humor/nerd/pop culture topics on his personal blog at justingregg.com
Justin received his PhD from the School of Psychology at Trinity College Dublin in Dublin Ireland in 2008 having studied dolphin social cognition. He is currently a Research Associate with the Dolphin Communication Project, and Adjunct Professor at St. Francis Xavier University. Justin has a research focus in dolphin social cognition, and a background/interest in linguistic and the evolution of language. A list of Justin’s academic publications can be found at this link.
Follow Justin on twitter: @justindgregg
An article in Vermont Quarterly about Justin’s career can be found at this link.
Patrick Woodcock is the author of 10 books of poetry and countless reviews. His work has been translated and published in 14 languages. Since travel is so essential to his work, Mr. Woodcock has lived and worked in such diverse countries as Iceland, Poland, Russia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, The Sultanate of Oman, Saudi Arabia, Colombia, The Kurdish North of Iraq and Azerbaijan. Within Canada he has travelled from the West to East coasts, as well as working as a volunteer for almost a year with the elders of Fort Good Hope, NT – 20km south of the Arctic Circle. His seventh book Always Die Before Your Mother was shortlisted for Canada’s ReLit award in 2010 and reached the number one spot on the Globe and Mail’s bestseller list. His 8th book Echo Gods and Silent Mountains was extremely well reviewed all over the world and was called “…the most beautiful, deep and touching collection of poetry written on Kurds by a non-Kurd.” by the Kurdish media network, Rudaw. He has read at International poetry festival’s in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia, the Kurdish North of Iraq, Azerbaijan, England, The Republic of Georgia, Tanzania, Kenya and Canada’s Winnipeg International Writers Festival. While living in Colombia he read at the Ibague Poetry Festival, The XVIII Medellin International Poetry Festival and was the first poet from outside of Latin America to ever read at the Bogota Poetry Festival. Patrick’s ninth book of poetry You can’t bury them all which is set in the Kurdish North of Iraq, Fort Good Hope, NT Canada and Azerbaijan was published by ECW Press in 2016. You can’t bury them all won the Alcuin Society Book Design Award for Poetry and was shortlisted for the JM Abraham Poetry Award in 2017. After living for two years in Tanzania as a volunteer at Baraa Primary School, Arusha, Patrick moved to the hamlet of Paulatuk in the Inuvik region of the Northwest Territories to work while completing his new manuscript Farhang Book I which was published by ECW Press, Toronto, Canada, September 5th 2023 and called by CBC Books one of Canada’s must reads in 2023. The album “Bill Pritchard Sings Poems By Patrick Woodcock” was released by Tapete records May 5th, 2023. He now lives in between Iqaluit, Nunavut and Toronto Ontario where he is the Regional Instructor/ Coordinator for United for Literacy. In September 2024 he was awarded the 2024 Council of the Federation Award in recognition of his outstanding achievement in literacy from the Premier of Nunavut, The Honourable P.J. Akeeagok. Farhang Book II will be published by ECW Press in 2026 along with his first collection of short stories entitled Animare (Tidewater Press, 2026).
Sarah Mian’s debut novel, When the Saints (HarperCollins), is about a dysfunctional family in rural Nova Scotia. It won the Jim Connors Book Award, the Margaret & John Savage First Book Award, and was a finalist for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. After completing the film adaption, she is currently working on a second novel, a ghost story titled, The World in Awful Sleep.
Joanne Light holds degrees in psychology, education and fine art (painting) from Acadia and NSCAD universities (influences ranged from Blake, Jung, Teilhard de Chardin, Vanier, Frye, Plath, Elizabeth Bishop and Roethke to Rothko, Borduas, Riopelle and Beuys). She taught in six provinces in Deschambault and Big Trout Lakes and Davis Inlet, Whapmagoostui and Kuuguarapik, Kimosoompotnak, Kitchee Nuhmay Koosib and Natuashish and five countries in Korea, Brunei Darussalam, Hong Kong and in Abu Dhabi.
She has three juried acceptances at the Banff Centre’s Wired Writing Studio and Advanced Seminar in poetry with mentors Irving Layton, Barbara Klar, Sid Marty, Fred Stenson and Alison Pick; also, Yvonne Trainor at the Maritime Writers’ Workshop; Daphne Marlatt at Sage Hill Writing Experience’s Poetry Colloquium; Mick Burrs at the Saskatchewan Writer’s Guild and Thomson Highway and Allen Ginsburg at the WFNS. Her most recent journal publication was two poems in Toronto’s Arc Magazine.
Light has published two trade books with Nimbus Publishing and three titles under her own press–Tapwema. She is presently finishing up a memoir: On, On, On, On: Stories of Teaching and Travelling.
Having travelled to twenty-five countries, she has lived for the past six years in her birthplace–Halifax.
She has given writing workshops in poetry nd travel writing at Dalhousie University and the Saint John Arts Centre and is a seasoned teacher and facilitator.
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
