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July 09, 2020
On Kendrick Lamar's good kid, m.A.A.d city
Music has always been part of my DNA. I consumed it with the same intensity as I did literature, and at no less voracious a rate. Large swaths of my adolescence were spent lying on the floor, eyes closed ...
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October 14, 2025Coltrane Seesequasis Continues the Powerful A Wolf in the Sun Series with THE THREADS OF TIME
In The Threads of Time (Kegedonce Press), the second novel in the A Wolf in the Sun series, the very talented Coltrane Seesequasis takes readers back to a world of ancient rivalries and haunting choices. ...
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April 24, 2018FOLD Authors Kusow, Maynard & Robertson on Diversity in CanLit, Festival Life & Recommended Reads
The Festival of Literary Diversity (aka the FOLD) is nearly here! The fastest-growing literary festival in the country is back for a third year, running from May 3 to May 6, 2018 with an incredible line ...
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April 06, 2017
Kid Lit Can: Personal "Firsts" In Kid Lit, Part One
My Time To series of three board books– Nap Time, Play Time, and Bath Time – are being published this September. This signifies two “firsts” for me – first board books ever, and first time ever ...
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March 23, 2020On Road Maps
Before beginning a project, is it worthwhile to do a detailed outline? Or is it preferable just to dive in? I’ve tried both approaches. In writing my first novel, After the Bloom, I outlined extensively. ...
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June 30, 2019Behind the Title: "Frying Plantain"
This is my last post for Open Book and I’ve been thinking about how I should end my June tenure as Writer in Residence. I landed on writing about the title of my book. I’ve been asked a few times ...
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July 02, 2019Read an Excerpt from Hassan Ghedi Santur's Powerful Second Novel, The Youth of God
Journalist and author Hassan Ghedi Santur's second novel, The Youth of God (Mawenzi House), is a moving portrait of a young man caught between two worlds. Nuur is 17-years old, whip-smart, and at a ...
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March 31, 2022"That’s You Sharing a Moment With Someone " Introducing April Writer in Residence Matthew James Weigel
To explore something complex and painful, that weaves through long history, a writer must take an approach as nuanced and shifting as their subject matter. We see that kind of creativity on display in Matthew ...
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February 25, 2026Read an Excerpt from ECHO-MIRROR by Famed Dub Poet Klyde Broox
Spoken word and written poetry collide in Echo-Mirror (Wolsak & Wynn), a collection that gathers decades of work from one of Canada’s most respected dub poets. These poems carry rhythm in each ...
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March 09, 2016Kid Lit Can, with Susan Hughes: Sex, and Drugs, and Rock and Roll: Writing Edgy Ya (Part 2)
They’ve written about it all: drugs, gambling, sexual harassment, suicide, sexual abuse, physical abuse, cutting, death, sex, drugs, body image issues, bullying, STDs, abduction...Today I continue my ...
