Peter Edwards is the organized-crime beat reporter for the Toronto Star and the bestselling author of seventeen non-fiction books. His works have been published in four languages. Edwards was awarded an eagle feather from the Union of Ontario Indians and a gold medal from the Centre for Human Rights. Kevin Loring is a Governor General’s Award–winning playwright, an […]
Q&A
Q&A with Carleigh Baker
Carleigh Baker is an nêhiyaw âpihtawikosisân/Icelandic writer who lives as a guest on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Skwxwú7mesh, and səlilwətaɬ peoples. Her debut story collection, Bad Endings, won the City of Vancouver Book Award, and was a finalist for a BC Book Prize, an Emerging Indigenous Voices Award, and the Rogers Writers’ Trust Award. […]
Q&A with Shazia Hafiz Ramji
Shazia Hafiz Ramji’s poetry collection Port of Being won the Robert Kroetsch Award for Innovative Poetry and was a finalist for several other awards. Her short story “Selvon in Calgary” appeared in The Malahat Review and her art writing, literary criticism and journalism have appeared in The Literary Review of Canada, Quill & Quire, C […]
Q&A with Maleea Acker
Maleea Acker lives on W̱SÁNEĆ territories. She is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Victoria and faculty at Thompson Rivers University. Her books include Hesitating Once to Feel Glory (poetry, Nightwood, 2022) and Gardens Aflame: Garry Oak Meadows of BC’s South Coast (non-fiction, New Star, 2013). Maleea will be reading previously-unpublished work at the festival, as part of Field Works: […]
Q&A with Mary Bomford
Mary Bomford taught secondary school English as a Cuso volunteer in Lundazi, Zambia from 1969 to 1972. Her memoir explores the transformative power of that experience. She attended the Banff School of Fine Arts and workshops in short story and memoir. She lives with her partner, Larry, in Saanich, B.C. Mary will be reading previously-unpublished […]
Q&A with Jennifer Grenz
Jennifer Grenz is a Nlaka’pamux Indigenous ecologist, scholar and Assistant Professor in the Department of Forest Resources Management at UBC. She has traveled extensively across North America presenting keynote lectures on invasive species management issues, environmental policy, and effective environmental communication strategies to different professional organizations and government agencies. In Medicine Wheel for the Planet, […]
Q&A with Jody Chan
Jody Chan is a writer, drummer, organizer, and therapist based in Toronto/Tkaronto. They are the author of haunt (Damaged Goods Press, 2018), all our futures (PANK, 2020), and sick (Black Lawrence Press, 2020); and winner of the 2018 St. Lawrence Book Award and 2021 Trillium Book Award for Poetry. They are also a performing member […]
Q&A with Christina Myers
Christina Myers is a former journalist and the author of Halfway Home: Thoughts from Midlife (Anansi, 2024), and The List of Last Chances (Caitlin Press, 2021) which was longlisted for the Leacock Medal. She is a member of Da’naxda’xw First Nation and lives in Surrey, B.C. From first bra to first hot flashes, the essays in Halfway Home re-consider […]
Q&A with Chelene Knight
Chelene Knight Chelene Knight is the author of five books including Let It Go: Free Yourself From Old Beliefs and Find a New Path To Joy. She is the founder of her own creative studio, Breathing Space Creative through which she’s launched theThrive Coaching Program where busy creatives can learn how personal development creates the […]
Q&A with Darrel J. McLeod
Darrel J. McLeod was a Nehiyaw (Cree) from Northern Canada, Treaty 8. He published two memoirs, Mamaskatch and Peyakow, as well as a novel, A Season in Chezgh’un. McLeod was a French immersion teacher, School Principal, Director of a curriculum center, Executive Director of Education and International Affairs at the Assembly of First Nations, and […]
Q&A with Susan Juby
Susan Juby is the award-winning, bestselling author of Mindful of Murder, which was nominated for the Leacock Medal for Humour. She has also written Republic of Dirt, Getting the Girl, and The Woefield Poultry Collective, as well as the bestselling Alice series. A third book about Helen Thorpe, Contemplation of a Crime, will be out in 2025. In […]
Q&A with Leslie Gentile
Leslie Gentile’s debut novel Elvis, Me, and the Lemonade Stand Summer won the City of Victoria Children’s Book Prize, the Jean Little First-Novel Award, and was shortlisted for nine other awards. Of Settler and Indigenous heritage, she lives on the traditional territory of the W̱SÁNEĆ people with her husband and their German shepherd. In Shamus […]