Book Review: My Father, Fortune-tellers & Me, A Memoir (Italian-Style)
My Father, Fortune-tellers & Me, A Memoir (Italian-Style) by Eufemia Fantetti Book Review By Jane Reid In this haunting memoir, author Eufemia Fantetti takes readers on a wild ride through a childhood steeped in Southern Italian superstitions, family loyalty at all costs and the immigrant experience. Her story begins with tarot cards—a suitable medium for […]
Small Game Hunting Packs an Intersectional Wallop
Book Review by Alli Vail Small Game Hunting at the Local Coward Gun Club by Megan Gail Coles packs an intersectional wallop. Not even 20 pages and two characters in, and author Megan Gail Coles has tackled racism, identity, poverty, sexism, the marginalization of indigenous people, family, alcoholism and revenge. Set in Newfoundland on Valentine’s […]
If you see him, say hello. Blog by Linda Kenyon
If you see him, say hello. Tell him I saw a heron in the park the other morning, on the bank of the creek, beside the culvert that runs under the railway track. I was so close that I could see the scraggy blue feathers on his throat and one yellow eye. What can be […]
A Prescient View of Humanity and Headlines in El Akkad’s American War
American War by Omar El Akkad Book review by Alli Vail It feels impossible to write about Omar El Akkad’s prescient American War without acknowledging realities south of the border and climate change. His novel spans decades but starts in 2074 America. The country is embroiled in civil war after fossil fuel is banned by […]
The Homecoming: Terror in the Family
The Homecoming By Andrew Pyper A Book Review by Katherine Fawcett The Homecoming by award-winning Canadian author Andrew Pyper is a wicked and weird blend of science-fiction, thriller, horror, and family drama that reads like a movie on the big screen. Or a nightmare you can’t wake up from. When the Quinlan family patriarch (it […]
Worth the Wait – blog by Shelley A. Leedahl
This photo—taken minutes before the Toronto launch of The Moon Watched It All in March 2019—is significant to me for a few reasons. Firstly, the man to my left is Red Deer Press editor extraordinaire Peter Carver, whom I’ve had a professional relationship with since he edited my first illustrated book, The Bone Talker, in […]
Carmen Aguierre Writing Retreat Announced Feb.21-24, 2019
Launch your memoir into the next level by participating in the intensive writing retreat with Carmen Aguierre – From the Ground Up: Scaffolding Your Story, happening Feb. 21-24, 2019 in Vancouver. Click here for more info.
Honesty and Vulnerability Key Components in Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age
A Book Review of Darrel J. McLeod’s Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age Reviewed by Katherine Fawcett While immersed in Darrel J. McLeod’s Governor General’s prize-nominated memoir Mamaskatch, I found myself flipping frequently to a picture on the front cover. The adorable Cree boy in the photo, probably about eight or nine years old, had […]
Poetry and Thin Places
Poetry reading event explores boldness, loss and the power of women at Whistler Writers Festival on Oct. 13 A Review by Mary MacDonald The autumn rains have arrived hard, lashing the trees. Fog is making the mornings muted, shadowy and inward. Evening arrives earlier and earlier. The coming dark is a time for shifting, for […]
I’m drawn to the stories where a person takes a dark journey that irrevocably changes them
Written by Maureen Medved | #NoOneSucceedsAlone Over the years I’ve been influenced by the writers who’d come before me. I’m thinking of writers in every form and from every time, the archetypal stories that have been told through the centuries, to the contemporary writers in every genre who have inspired me over the years. I’ve […]