Nonfiction (reference)

Patrick d’Entremont

Patrick d’Entremont is a former newspaper and magazine columnist who, now in retirement, writes literary fiction set in rural Nova Scotia, based on his childhood growing up in the 1960s. Readers have said these stories evoke laughter and tears, with their snappy dialogue, distinct characters, and unique and vivid settings.

His debut novel, “Eating Grass (Manger de l’herbe)” is being published by OC Publishing and is due to be released in July, 2026. It is the story of a teenager in an Acadian village in the late sixties who—once exposed to the world around him via television and U.S. radio stations—starts questioning everything about himself and his upbringing.

A sequel set in the university years, and a prequel outlining the backstory, are current works in progress.

Patrick grew up in West Pubnico, a fishing community founded by returning exiles following the Acadian expulsion of 1755. His stories show how growing up in this milieu shaped who he became as an adult, a coming-of-age reminiscing that seems to resonate with many people, whether or not of Acadian descent.

www.patrickdentremont.com

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Darryl Whetter

Dr. Darryl Whetter is the author of 4 books of fiction and 3 poetry collections. His collection of stories, A Sharp Tooth in the Fur, was named to The Globe and Mail’s Top 100 Books of 2003. His debut novel, The Push & the Pull, was released in Spring 2008. Origins, his 2012 collection of poems, concerns energy, evolution and extinction as they can be observed at Joggins, Nova Scotia. Professor Whetter edited the nomination dossier of the Joggins Fossil Cliffs in their successful bid for inclusion on UNESCO’s World Heritage List. He has published nearly 20 stories in journals and anthologies, including Best Canadian Stories, The Fiddlehead, PRISM, Prairie Fire, The New Quarterly and Best Asian Short Stories 2020. In 2021, he won the Banff Centre Bliss Carman Poetry Award.

Darryl holds a PhD in English from UNB and has published or presented papers on contemporary literature in France, Sweden, Canada, Germany, the United States, India, Singapore, Australia and Iceland. Nearly 100 of his commissioned book reviews have appeared in venues such as The Toronto Star, The National Post, The Vancouver Sun, The Montreal Gazette, The Globe and Mail, and Detroit’s Metro Times. Darryl Whetter has been a professor of English and Creative Writing at various universities in Canada and was the coordinator of the creative writing program at Dalhousie from 2008-2010. In the mid-2000s, he was a regular panelist on the national CBC Radio program “Talking Books.”

His most recent books are the climate-crisis novel Our Sands, from Penguin RH (2020) and the anthology Teaching Creative Writing in Asia, from Routledge (2021)

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Sandra Phinney

Sandra Phinney is a professional writer and photographer who lives on the edge of the Tusket River in Southwest Nova Scotia. She’s had a few former lives including teaching, social work and farming. Now, instead of driving a tractor and growing vegetables, Sandra wields a camera and harvests stories.

Her articles have appeared in over 70 publications and many online line magazines. She’s also contributed to several travel guides including National Geographic’s Guide to Parks Canada. Over the years, her work has garnered several writing and photography awards (which help to keep her humble.) Part of her portfolio spills into the corporate world where she does everything from writing scripts for video, to advertorials, brochures, newsletters, and company profiles.

In the book writing realm, Sandra’s penned four non-fiction books: Risk Takers and Innovators—Great Canadian Business Ventures since 1950; Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The Prankster Who Never Flinched; Maud Lewis and the “Maudified” House Project; and Waking Up In My Own Backyard~Explorations in Southwest Nova Scotia. She’s currently working on two more non-fiction books.

To satisfy her craving to teach, Sandra gives writing workshops on various topics including narrative, writing memoir, how to start a freelance business and travel writing. In her spare time she does Tai Chi and paddles in the wilderness.

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donalee Moulton

donalee Moulton has been writing professionally for over 25 years. Her byline has appeared in more than 100 magazines and newspapers throughout North America – and beyond. Among the publications donalee has written for are The Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, Maclean’s, Canadian Business and The National Post.

donalee Moulton’s first mystery book Hung out to Die was published in 2023. A historical mystery, Conflagration!, was published in 2024. It won the 2024 Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense (Historical Fiction). donalee has two new books in 2025, Bind and Melt, the first in a new series, the Lotus Detective Agency.

A short story “Swan Song” was one of 21 selected for publication in Cold Canadian Crime. It was shortlisted for an Award of Excellence. Other short stories have been published in numerous anthologies and magazines. donalee’s short story “Troubled Water” was shortlisted for a 2024 Derringer Award and a 2024 Award of Excellence from the Crime Writers of Canada.

As well, donalee is the author of the non-fiction book The Thong Principle: Saying What You Mean and Meaning What You Say, and co-author of Better Policy | Better Performance: The Who, Why, and What of Organizational Policy and Celebrity Court Cases: Trials of the Rich and Famous.

donalee has had poetry published in Arc Poetry Journal, Queen’s Quarterly, Prairie Fire, The Dalhousie Review, Atlantis, South Shore Review, Carousel, and Whetstone, among others. She is a former editor of The Pottersfield Portfolio and Atlantic Books Today.

donalee is a teacher. She has taught writing, editing, grammar and communications for the past 20 years in a variety of programs. She currently teaches numerous writing and editing courses as part of the Executive and Professional Development program at Saint Mary’s University, and has taught courses at Dalhousie University and Mount Saint Vincent University.

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Virginia MacIsaac

Virginia writes from a coastal perch about the character of Atlantic Canada, it’s people and places. She writes about Nova Scotia’s rich heritage – of challenges and celebrations, revealing pieces from the past that fit together, or sometimes don’t fit, that will open windows to the now. Connecting historical and current, articles and features, poetry and back-of-the-book indexes, and collaborating with other writers, rounds out her non-fiction. She contributes articles to a column at the Inverness Oran and has a short story published. You might hear her several times a year as a community correspondent on CBC radio. At other times she’s an archivist at a cultural centre and is a member of the Shean Poets & Writers.

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Martine Jacquot

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.

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Monica Graham

Monica Graham is the author of several non-fiction books. Her newest, Senior Moment (Nimbus), an almost-humorous account of finding residential care for her aging mother, came out in the spring of 2021. In the Spirit, Reflections on Everyday Grace, is a collection of some of the best columns she wrote over eight years for the Chronicle Herald religion page. Cradle of Knowledge: Pictou Academy 1816-2016 tells the history of the 200-year-old school. A columnist as well as a freelance journalist and photographer, Monica has had her work published by the Halifax Chronicle Herald, Rural Delivery, Atlantic Business Magazine, The Pictou Advocate, Canadian Living, Trident, The Atlantic Fisherman, and other publications. She is a member of the Writers in the Schools program, and also presents writing and storytelling workshops for adults and literacy groups. Monica served as writer-in-residence at Pictou Antigonish Regional Library in 2011-12; and at Berton House in Dawson City, YT, in 2008. She lives in the woods in Pictou County, NS, with her husband, a dog, and visiting bears, deer and people. between She is working on an historical novel and a collection of short stories.

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