Ontario book news, interviews and more

Things you didn’t know you could get funding for

There really is a huge world of funding out there beyond grants for individual writing projects. These professional development grants offer anywhere between $1000 to $12,000 (or even more) for numerous ...

Writing the same poem as everyone else, over and over

If you’re in Southern Ontario you might have spent last week soaking in the sun, switching from sweatpants to shorts, and strolling along a river, lake, stream, etc. I walked along my usual path around ...

Love Poems in the Wild

Moments of love from photos in my camera roll from 2020-present. 1. A heart-shaped piece of limestone from Elora Quarry2. Chalk graffiti reading "Love is the only engine of survival"3. Love Song from ...

Cool-down Time

There’s a third part to the poetry tour series. This post doesn’t have resources or logistical advice, but rather on how to survive the way a book tour suddenly occupies huge parts of your life.In ...

Poetry Tours: Funding

Last time on the WIR blog, I talked about tips for planning a poetry tour, including tips on building a tour from existing events. In this post, I hope to share some resources on funding a poetry tour, ...

Poetry Tours: Planning

Planning a book tour is a lot of work, and it’s the kind of work I dread the most. Events are unpredictable. You can plan and plan, but factors like weather, health, money, and so many others can come ...

Poetry as Joy: A Retrospective and Introduction

April in Ontario is unpredictable. There can be warmer days to soak up the sun by a river, or ice storms to coat everything with a perfect translucent film. In any case, April feels ideal for poetry—the ...

Was It Worth It?

Was it worth it? I get asked this a lot.I think they are asking if putting in all the time, effort and emotional labour to write a vulnerable and raw memoir about trauma, is worth it. Like, if I say yes, ...

Procrastination Station

It’s just shy of midnight and I’m sitting here, writing this, thinking about how I should have started it sooner. But if I had started it sooner, would it have been finished before now?If this question ...

Don't Bother Saving The Cat

When it comes to books about memoir writing, there are a select few that I would recommend an aspiring author read, including BIRD BY BIRD by Anne Lamott and THE ART OF MEMOIR by Mary Karr. But when I ...