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August 04, 2017
Interview with Kyo Maclear
Kyo Maclear is one of my favourite children’s book authors and one of the loveliest people I know. She’s the author of many acclaimed picture books including Spork, Virginia Wolf and The Fog, and ...
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December 02, 2020Writers' Trust Announces $100,000 of Career Literary Prizes, including Matt Cohen Award for CanLit Icon Dennis Lee
Rounding out a spectacular prize season, the Writers’ Trust of Canada announced today the winners of their four final literary awards of the year.The four $25,000 prizes spotlight exceptional literary ...
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October 16, 2020Poets Becoming Novelists: On Trusting Leaps and Fragments
I finished the first draft of my novel in mid-March – in the first week of isolation. I hadn’t grasped the gravity of the pandemic then, so I was grateful for the sudden reprieve from the real world. ...
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March 18, 2021The Chaos of Creation and Why I Chase the Rupture Point
When I write, it feels like I am on the inside of a spinning wheel that never stops. The wheel lets itself loose from the chassis and throws itself, willingly, down the hillside. The after effects of ...
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April 22, 2022How I look at a map (part one)
Art is all about process. Community spurs us on and the practice of creation is an active one. There is of course the cliché about art never being finished, merely abandoned, but in my opinion, neither ...
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April 30, 2022Artist's Books
For my last blog post as Open Book’s writer-in-residence and to close out poetry month I want to talk to you about one of my favourite things: Artist’s Books! I’ve shared some of my passion for ...
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October 12, 2022Canada Council for the Arts Announces Nominees for the 2022 Governor General's Literary Awards
This morning, the Canada Council for the Arts announced the nominees for the 2022 Governor General's Literary Awards. Including French and English nominees, 70 works have been honoured, with writers, ...
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October 25, 2022On Giving Yourself Room to Change (Or, Eros the Bittersweet)
A few months ago, I talked to someone on the phone. I didn’t know this person well and though I’d seen them over Zoom somewhat regularly for our work together, I never really noticed them too much. ...
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March 26, 2025A Greedy Businessman Gets His Comeuppance in ICEMEN by Acclaimed Playwright Vern Thiessen
Governor General Award-winning playwright Vern Thiessen is up there with some of the most prolific artists in his field, with his plays being read and staged all over the world. The reasons for his continued ...
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May 05, 2025The Pros and Cons of Beta Readers
I just finished an early draft of a new middle grade novel and realized as pressed “save” that even though it was nowhere near done, I’d taken it as far as I could.It was officially time for a beta ...
