Fiction (short stories)

Ian Colford

Ian Colford is a fiction writer living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. His stories, reviews, and commentary have been widely published in print and online. From 1995 to 1998 he was editor of the literary journal Pottersfield Portfolio. He has served on the Steering Committee of One Book Nova Scotia, the board of directors of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, and the board of the Atlantic Book Awards Society. He has completed residencies at the Hawthornden Castle International Retreat for Writers and Yaddo, an artists’ colony in Saratoga Springs, New York, and is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers Summer Workshop.

Evidence, a collection of short fiction, was published in 2008 by Porcupine’s Quill and won the Margaret and John Savage First Book Award; Evidence was also shortlisted for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award, the Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Prize and the ReLit Award. A novel, The Crimes of Hector Tomás, followed in 2012. Published by Freehand Books, it won Trade Book of the Year at the 2013 Alberta Book Awards. Perfect World was published by Freehand in 2016 and shortlisted in the book design category at the 2017 Alberta Book Publishing Awards. In 2019 A Dark House, a collection of short fiction, was published under the Vagrant Press imprint of Nimbus Publishing and subsequently shortlisted for the Alistair MacLeod Prize in Short Fiction, the Miramichi Reader “Very Best” Books, and the Relit Awards.

In 2022 his novel, The Confessions of Joseph Blanchard, won the Guernica Prize and was published by Guernica Editions in 2023.

A collection of short fiction, Witness, is scheduled to be published in 2026 by Galleon Books of Moncton, N.B.

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Don Aker

A former high school teacher, literacy mentor, and university instructor, Don Aker fell into writing in 1988 after attending the Martha’s Vineyard Summer Writing Workshops, where instructors encouraged participants to write with their students. Encouraged by winning the short fiction and nonfiction categories of the 1989 and 1990 WFNS Atlantic Writing Competitions as well as Canadian Living’s 1990 National Literary Competition, Don went on to publish numerous stories and articles and has written more than 20 books.

Because he taught hundreds of teenagers during his teaching career, it isn’t surprising that young adults are the focus of most of his work. What subjects does he choose to write about? “Things that bother me, that don’t go away,” he says. For example, Don wrote his first novel after a student shared with him that she was being physically abused by her father. Of Things Not Seen tells the story of sixteen-year-old Ben Corbett, who, along with his mother, is physically abused by his domineering stepfather. Besides domestic violence, Don’s novels have focused on peer pressure, bullying, youth crime, suicide, sexuality, teen gambling, and a variety of other social issues. However, he is quick to point out that the strongest stories are never about issues or events–“They’re about how characters are affected by those issues and events.”

Don holds a Master of Education from Acadia University and, besides working as an educator and writer, he has been a freelance reviewer and consultant for various educational publishers, including Nelson Education, Pembroke Publishers, and Pearson Education. He has written several books for classroom use, among them Hitting the Mark: Assessment Tools for Teachers (Pembroke, 1995) and a series of language arts texts for grades 8 to 11 (Nelson Education), and he has had articles and fiction published in The International Journal of Reading, Quill & Quire, Books in Canada, Canadian Living, The Toronto Star, Our Family Magazine, The Pottersfield Portfolio, Dandelion Magazine, The Chronicle Herald, and various anthologies.

The father of two daughters, Don lives with his wife in Bedford.

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Laura Best

Laura lives in East Dalhousie, Nova Scotia with her husband, Brian. A member of the Parkdale/Maplewood Museum Society, Laura has a strong interest in local history, and participates in the school group program at the museum. At the age of ten, she wrote her first play and she’s been writing ever since. She is also a member of CANSCAIP.

Laura’s first young adult novel, Bitter, Sweet, was published in 2009 and was short listed for the Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People. It also made the “Best Books for Kids and Teen 2011” list. Her middle grade novel, “Flying With a Broken Wing,” was name one of Bank Street College of Educations Best Books for 2015. Her book “Cammie takes Flight” was nominated for a 2018 Silver Birch Award and made the Best Books for Kids and Teens 2018 list. In 2020, Laura’s first novel for adults,“Good Mothers Don’t” was published.

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Jenni Blackmore

A new season just beginning! Definitely time to upgrade my bio; even though some things never change life’s experience continually morphs and expands. Have to love that 🙂

Part of me is still the kid from Manchester, England, who always wanted to be a writer, a painter and a farmer, living by the ocean, and much to my amazement, here I am, living my dream on a small island just east of Halifax. Of course I’m greatly influenced by the coastal environment and references to this locale have a way of sneaking into most of my work. I love my reality but I usually can’t resist adding a twist or two of magic to my work, especially my favorite genres of poetry, adult short fiction and childrens fiction.

As an illustrator and writer, I like to combine both these forms of expression, especially in my books for children. Recently, however the denizens of QuackaDoodle Farm, who take up a fair amount of my attention, have been demanding their space on the page and this has resulted in, Permaculture for the Rest of Us (New Society Publishing) a factual account of life here at QuackaDoodle, my blog site QuackaDoodle.Wordpress.com and occassional posts on the Mother Earth News Site.

My latest book The Foodlovers’ Garden (New Society) is scheduled for release May 2017 and I was delighted to be able to illustrate this with thirty+ illustrations and forty digital images, all celebrating the wonders of homegrown food. Yum! And oh so colourful.

The second edition of Gully Goes to Halifax flew into my life recently. The story remains mostly unchanged but this edition has twice the page size and all the illustrations are in full colour, so I’m delighted about that.

I believe everyone is writer at heart because of course we all have things to say, ideas to share. This is one of the reasons why I particularly enjoy leading writing workshops for both children and adults but mostly, it’s about the stories that get shared. Surely story is the thread that binds us all together while, equally importantly, poetry tends to magnify and perhaps suggest a new way of seeing both the mundane and the magical.

Please visit me at: Quackadoodle.wordpress.com for sporadic but ongoing news of life down here on the farm

Jenni has been mentioned in “Our Choice Book List” and “Outstanding Canadian Children’s Books” by the Children’s Book Centre, Toronto. Her recent novel Island of Dead Souls came first in the Atlantic Writing competition YA category.

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Judith Meyrick

Judith’s writing has appeared in various publications in both Canada and New Zealand. Her articles and essays appear in the NZ Listener, the NZ Woman’s Weekly, Pandora Publishing, The Avondale Press, Atlantic Books Today, the Landscape Architectural Review and the Canadian History Association magazine. For about three years, she wrote a book review column for the Halifax Herald which are collected here at reviewbites2.blogspot.com. Her children’s book, Gracie the Public Gardens Duck (Nimbus 2007), won Best Published Book and Best Illustrated Book at the Atlantic Book Awards. Most recently, she wrote an essay which appears in Dwelling on the Margins of History (Bloomsbury, 2025).

She returned to university in 2019, graduating in 2023 with an Honours BA and, in 2024, with a master’s, both in history. Her master’s thesis researched a little acknowledged 1911 amendment to the Indian Act.

She is currently researching and writing a non-fiction book which links Scotland, Nova Scotia and New Zealand in a fascinating history of migration and adventure. After university, she moved to Ottawa to be near her daughter and grandchildren.

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David Huebert

David Huebert’s writing has won the CBC Short Story Prize, appeared several times in Best Canadian Stories, and was a finalist for the 2020 Journey Prize. Huebert’s first story collection, Peninsula Sinking, won a Dartmouth Book Award and was runner-up for the Danuta Gleed Literary Award, among other accolades. His second story collection, Chemical Valley, won the Alistair MacLeod Short Fiction Prize, received glowing reviews, and was a finalist for the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award and the ReLit Award. His first novel, Oil People, will be published by McClelland & Stewart in August 2024. David teaches in the MFA in Fiction at the University of King’s College in Kjipuktuk (Halifax), where he lives with his partner and their two children.

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Kate Watson

Kate Watson is a freelance writer. She is the theatre critic for Halifax’s alternative weekly newspaper The Coast. She is also a columnist and reporter for the Dartmouth/Cole Harbour and Halifax/Clayton Park weeklies.

She has written pieces for Our Children, Rural Delivery, Our Times, and Halifax Magazine, among others. She frequently does book reviews for Atlantic Books Today.

Kate also writes poetry and fiction, and has had her poems published in Ascent Aspirations and Regina Weese. She has a short story coming out in A Maritime Christmas, published by Nimbus in the fall of 2008.

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Chris Benjamin

Chris Benjamin is a freelance journalist and an author of fiction and non-fiction.

He is the author of Chasing Paradise, a memoir, and The Art of Forgiveness: Short Fiction. His previous collection of short stories, Boy With a Problem, was shortlisted for the Alistair MacLeod Prize for Short Fiction. His nonfiction book, Indian School Road: Legacies of the Shubenacadie Residential School, won the Dave Greber Freelance Book Prize before being published, was listed by librarians as a Book of Influence, and recently became a Nova Scotia bestseller.

His previous book, Eco-Innovators: Sustainability in Atlantic Canada, won the 2012 Best Atlantic-Published Book Award and was a finalist for the Richardson Non-Fiction Prize. A series of short video documentaries has been made based on the book.

Chris’ novel, Drive-by Saviours, won the H.R. Percy Prize, was longlisted for a ReLit Prize and made the CBC Canada Reads Top Essential Books List.

Chris has written for a long list of magazines and newspapers in Canada and the United States. A few highlights include The Globe and Mail, Science Friday, Z Magazine, Saltscapes, Halifax Magazine, Progress Magazine, and The Coast.

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Hugh R. MacDonald

Hugh R. MacDonald is a writer of fiction, and a singer/songwriter. Hugh has been a member of the Writers Union of Canada and the Writers Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) for many years. His YA novel, Trapper Boy was published by Cape Breton University Press, and the sequel entitled Us and Them waas released in October 2016. Hugh is a graduate of Cape Breton University, and worked in the human services field for 25 plus years, and is now happily retired.

September 2017 — “Trapper Boy” was included in the Reading Nova Scotia publication of “150 Books of Influence” in Nova Scotia–see the link below, which will redirect you to the site. You may have to copy and paste the link.

https://www.nsla.ns.ca/150-books-of-influence

Hugh’s song, “Trapper Boy,” that he wrote prior to the novel of the same name, has been added to the repertoire of the world famous Men of the Deeps, and was included on their 50th Anniversary Compilation CD, which was released in April 2016. Hugh’s version of his song, “Trapper Boy” can be found here: https//www.youtube.com/watch?v=37GBaudAgZA&t=4s

Hugh’s song “A Cape Breton Lament” (written and performed by Hugh) was included on the CD Cape Breton Songs of Steel, Coal and Protest, produced by Dr. Richard MacKinnon (Cape Breton University). See the Youtube link here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZpCDIqbZ20.

Trapper Boy was selected by Dr. Patrick Howard of Cape Breton University’s Education Department as a novel around which to develop a Teacher Resource. The resource is currently available at no charge for teachers using Trapper Boy.

Hugh is a member of the Writers in the Schools (WITS) program through WFNS. Hugh enjoys going into schools to meet with young people and sharing his passion for writing. His presentation includes readings from his work, using his songs and his videos to share thoughts on his writing process, and encouraging young people to try their own hand at writing. WITS grade levels P-12.

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Andre Fenton

Andre Fenton is an award-winning African Nova Scotian writer, performer, and arts educator who has represented Halifax at eight national spoken word festivals across Canada, and the director of the Narrative Program at The Bus Stop Theatre Co-Op.

Andre is the 2023 recipient of the Portia White Protege Award and a 2022 recipient of an Emerging Artist Recognition Award from Creative NS Awards. Andre is the author of three young adult fiction novels, Worthy of Love. ANNAKA, which was the 2022 recipient of The Community & Place Award from Digitally Lit, and The Summer Between Us, which won Gold in The Coast’s 2022 Best Of Awards.

Andre has facilitated writing and performance workshops in over 100 classrooms across Nova Scotia, and founded The Ink Collective, a Black writers workshop series. He is currently screenwriting the film adaptation of his novel, ANNAKA with Fine Devil Films, and is repped by CookeMcDermid and Meridian Artists. Andre is based in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

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