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October 16, 2017"What's Your Story?" 2017 Obpo Writing Contest Winners! Part Two: East York
We've got brand new original fiction and poetry today on Open Book as we present the second set of winners of the 2017 Ontario Book Publishers Organization's and East End Arts’ What's Your Story? writing ...
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June 24, 2016Working at Home: the Fine Line Between Distraction and Productivity
I have learned that it's not unusual in that I like to listen to podcasts while I draw comics. Those of us who work on things alone much of the time have tricks to feel less isolated. Music, podcasts, ...
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July 18, 2014Grounds for Communion
People in grief think a great deal about self-pity. We worry it, dread it, scourge our thinking for signs of it. We fear that our actions will reveal the conditions tellingly described as “dwelling ...
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July 23, 2018David Ward, Back from 5 Years in a Tiny, Isolated Newfoundland Community, Shares Publishing Highs & Lows
For writers in Canada, Newfoundland is a special place. After five years living in an isolated Newfoundland community, ecologist David Ward understood that intimately. His story of that time, Bay of ...
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June 27, 2016Comic: What Did Ben McNally Do When He Wasn't Selling Books?
I must have met Ben McNally weeks after moving to Canada. The details are a little fuzzy on when that was. It might have been at Harbourfront for IFOA, or maybe at Nicholas Hoare, where he was selling ...
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April 26, 2015
Anna Karenina, Dance, and Relief
Last week, I saw the Eifman St. Petersburg Ballet perform Anna Karenina. Before the performance, Julia Zarankin gave a lecture on the novel to ballet-goers. She said that Tolstoy was deeply interested ...
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April 15, 2015
Spring in Elsinore
In the beginning of Spring I often think of the very beginning of Hamlet:ACT ISCENE I. Elsinore. A platform before the castle.FRANCISCO at his post. Enter to him BERNARDOBERNARDOWho's there?FRANCISCONay, ...
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October 08, 2014Shifting Gears
Dear Open Bookers,It’s a pleasure to be this month’s Writer-in-Residence. I look forward to sharing thoughts and ideas with you over the coming weeks!Monday morning, I arrived at the Banff Centre ...
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October 01, 2020Jonathan Poh wins 2020 CBC Nonfiction Prize for His First Personal Essay, "Value Village"
This morning, CBC Books announced that Burnaby-based writer Jonathan Poh has won the 2020 CBC Nonfiction Prize for his essay "Value Village". Poh is a writer, former magazine editor, and communications ...
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February 01, 2021
LOVE IN THE TIME OF COVID: The writing process Part 1 of 9
When I was first approached by Open Book about doing the author residency for the month of February, my first thought was that I would do a serialized short story and write a piece of fiction in the same ...