Canada Reads American Style

Eden Mills Writers' Festival Wrap-Up

Rebecca and Tara chat about their great day at the annual Eden Mills Writers' Festival in Eden Mills, Ontario.  Check out the link below for the entire day's lineup of authors and titles discussed on the podcast. 

https://edenmillswritersfestival.ca/featured-writers/

Rebecca (@canadareadsamericanstyle):

• Driving the Green Book: A Road Trip Through the Living History of Black Resistance by Alvin Hall

Tara (@onabranchreads):

• Instagoner (A Bark and Blog Mystery Series) by Sydney Leigh
• God Isn't Here Today by Francine Cunningham
• Tear by Erica McKeen

 

Interview - Hollay Ghadery and Widow Fantasies

Tara talks with Hollay Ghadery, an award-winning Iranian-Canadian multi-genre writer living in rural Ontario on Anishanaabe land. Fuse, her acclaimed memoir of mixed-race identity and mental illness, was published by Guernica Editions' Microland imprint in 2021 and won the 2023 Canadian Bookclub Award for nonfiction/memoir. (Check out Rebecca's interview with Hollay on the January 11, 2023 episode.) Her debut collection of poetry, Rebellion Box, was released with Radiant Press in April 2023. Her short fiction collection, Widow Fantasies, will be released on September 1, 2024, with Gordon Hill Press.

 

Hollay is also the Poet Laureate of Scugog Township as well as the founder of and senior publicist with River Street Writing, a team of creatives who aim to produce and celebrate amazing writers.

 

Books, authors highlighted:

• Brevity: A Flash Fiction Handbook by David Galef
• Through the Sad Wood Our Corpses Will Hang by Ava Farmehri
• Frenchman's Creek by Daphne du Maurier
• Anthills of the Savannah by Chinua Achebe
• Cracking India by Bapsi Sidhwa
• The Boulevard by Jerrod Edson
• Poet Bronwen Wallace
• Most of All the Wanting by Amanda Merpaw
• Whylah Falls by George Elliott Clarke
• A Simple Carpenter by David Margoshes
• Author Adele Wiseman
• Off the Tracks: A Meditation on Train Journeys in a Time of No Travel by Pamela Mulloy
• The Years Shall Run Like Rabbits by Ben Berman Ghan
• The Mona Lisa Sacrifice (The Book of Cross #1) by Peter Roman

Publishers:

• Radiant Press https://radiantpress.ca/
• Latitude 46 https://latitude46publishing.com/
• Wolsak & Winn https://www.wolsakandwynn.ca/

Literary Festivals:

• The Word on the Street Toronto https://toronto.thewordonthestreet.ca/
• Eden Mills Writers' Festival https://edenmillswritersfestival.ca/
• The & Festival https://theampersandreview.ca/the-festival-2024
• Wordstock Sudbury https://wordstocksudbury.ca/

Book Chat #19

Rebecca and Tara share their latest good reads!

Rebecca (@canadareadsamericanstyle):

• Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson
• Golden Boys: The Winnipeg Falcons of 1920 by Paul Keery; illustrated by Michael Wyatt https://shop.teachmag.com/collections/frontpage/products/golden-boys-the-winnipeg-falcons-of-1920
• Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America by Matika Wilbur
• The Book of Delights: Essays by Ross Gay
• Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
• The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
• Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay

Tara (@onabranchreads):

• Where the Falcon Flies: A 3,400 Kilometre Odyssey From My Doorstep to the Arctic by Adam Shoalts
• Real Ones: A Novel by Katherena Vermette
• The Widow's Guide to Dead Bastards by Jessica Waite
• The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan
• Merlin Bird ID: https://merlin.allaboutbirds.org/
• All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker
• The Paradise Problem by Christina Lauren
• Road Ends by Mary Lawson
• The Puppet Master (Major Crimes #3) by Sam Holland
• The God of the Woods by Liz Moore

 

 

When Place is a Character

Rebecca and Tara highlight books they've read in which the location or place is a distinct character in the novel.

Rebecca (@canadareadsamericanstyle):

• True Gretch: What I've Learned About Life, Leadership, and Everything in Between by Governor Gretchen Whitmer
• Widow Fantasies by Hollay Ghadery
• Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez / Scarborough, Ontario
• Brother by David Chariandy / Scarborough, Ontario
• Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay / Hanging Rock, Victoria, Australia
• The Street by Ann Petry / Harlem, New York City
• My Ántonia by Willa Cather / Nebraska
• Denison Ave by Christina Wong / Chinatown, Kensington Market
• Bellevue Square by Michael Redhill / Toronto
• The Lost Ones (Nora Watts series) by Sheena Kamal / Vancouver
• The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty / Vacca Vale, Indiana
• Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah / Montreal
• Chevy in the Hole by Kelsey Ronan / Flint, Michigan
• The Break by Katherina Vermette / Winnipeg's North End

Tara (@onabranchreads):

• Death & Other Inconveniences by Lesley Crewe
• Field Notes from an Unintentional Birder: A Memoir by Julia Zarankin
• Love That Story: Observations from a Gorgeously Queer Life by Jonathan Van Ness
• Road Ends by Mary Lawson
• Lost Girls by Andrew Pyper / Northern Ontario, Cottage Country
• The Dry by Jane Harper / Australia
• River Mumma by Zalika Reid-Benta / Toronto
• Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery / Prince Edward Island
• Galore by Michael Crummey / Newfoundland
• David Adams Richards / New Brunswick

 

Interview - Susan Wadds and What the Living Do

Tara chats with Canadian Susan Wadds, author of What the Living Do.  Winner of the Writer's Union of Canada's Prose Contest in 2016, Susan's award-winning work has appeared in The Blood Pudding, Room, Quagmire, Waterwheel Review, Funicular, WOW--Women on Writing, and many more.

The first two chapters of her debut novel, What the Living Do, (Regal House Publishing, 2024), won the Lazuli Group's Prose Contest, and were published in Azure Magazine.

Susan is a certified Amherst Writers and Artists (AWA) workshop facilitator.  She lives on a quiet river in South-Central Ontario with an odd assortment of humans and cats.

https://www.instagram.com/deepamwadds/

https://writeyourwayin.ca/about-me/

https://regalhousepublishing.com/susan-wadds/

Reading Recommendations:

• Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano
• The Stones of Burren Bay by Emily de Angelis
• Unrest by Gwen Tuinman
• Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
• Story Genius: How to Use Brain Science to Go Beyond Outlining and Write a Riveting Novel by Lisa Cron

 

Interview - Michael Redhead Champagne and We Need Everyone

Rebecca chats with author Michael Redhead Champagne about his first children’s book, We Need Everyone, which premiered with HighWater Press in January 2024.

Michael is working towards a revolution that dismantles harmful systems and builds up new ones based on justice, equity and love. A community leader from Winnipeg's North End with family roots in Shamattawa First Nation, Michael is host, helper, published author, on-screen personality and sought-after public speaker. He happily shares his words, wisdom and welcoming energy across Canada and around the world.

He loves family friendly jokes, Tetris, Stevie Wonder music and celebrating the successes of others.

https://www.michaelredheadchampagne.com/

https://www.instagram.com/northendmc

We Need Everyone Free Teacher Guide:

https://www.portageandmainpress.com/Books/T/Teacher-Guide-for-We-Need-Everyone

Community Resources:

https://fearlessr2w.ca/

https://necrc.org/

https://www.facebook.com/MBHealthCoal/

Upcoming Graphic Novel--Little by Little You Can Change the World by Sonya Ballantyne: https://www.portageandmainpress.com/Books/L/Little-by-Little

Recommended Title--Tipiskawi Kisik: Night Sky Star Stories by Wilfred Buck:

https://mfnerc.org/product/tipiskawi-kisik-night-sky-star-stories/

 

 

 

 

 

Reader Repartee with Katie

Rebecca welcomes Katie from Whitehorse, Yukon Canada to answer the Five Reader Repartee Questions. 

1. How did you become a reader?
2. What book do you wish you could read again for the first time?
3. Which author, living or dead, would you like to meet in person and why?
4. What fictional character would you like to meet and why?
5. What are you currently reading?

Katie's responses include:

• CNIB (Canada): https://www.cnib.ca/en/library-services-people-who-are-blind?region=on
• LEO (Michigan): https://www.michigan.gov/leo/bureaus-agencies/bureau-of-services-for-blind-persons/btbl
• On Fragile Waves by E. Lily Yu
• Sara Hildreth: https://www.instagram.com/fictionmatters/ and https://www.instagram.com/novelpairingspod/
• Into the Beautiful North by Luis Alberto Urrea
• A Fake Girlfriend for Chinese New Year by Jackie Lau
• The Foghorn Echoes; Crooked Teeth: A Queer Syrian Refugee Memoir by Danny Ramadan
• The Philistine by Leila Marshy
• Shawn Breathes Books: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXFFuV_loS97oL-UTCazcXA
• The Book of Ramallah: A City in Short Fiction edited by Maya Abu al-Hayat

If you would like to be featured on a future episode of Reader Repartee, contact Rebecca through her Instagram account: @canadareadsamericanstyle

 

Interview - Emily A. Weedon and Autokrator

Rebecca chats with the author of Autokrator, Emily A. Weedon.  Emily is a debut novelist and a screenwriter from Toronto Canada. Her web series Chateau Laurier was the most awarded web series on the entire planet in 2023 and won a Canadian Screen Award. Her novel Autokrator released by Cormorant Books in April 2024 is already receiving acclaim for its thoughtful messages, especially about women's health in a fractious world, for its wild creativity, and its driving pace as a story.

Other titles mentioned:

• Eris by Larry Gaudet
•  Serotonin; The Map and the Territory; Submission by Michel Houellebecq

https://emilyweedon.com/

https://www.cormorantbooks.com/emily-a-weedon

https://www.instagram.com/emily.weedon.creates/

Immediately after their discussion, Emily shared the following news with Rebecca:

"Dundurn Press Acquisitions Editor Russell Smith has acquired world rights to award-winning screenwriter and AUTOKRATOR author Emily A. Weedon’s HEMO SAPIENS, an erotic noir thriller, pitched as a sleek THE HUNGER meets a twisted HANNIBAL, that reimagines vampires through a lens of female sexuality and anthropology, wherein a homicide detective, while exposing a secret society of bloodthirsty women, will do anything to protect his wife and unborn child from a mysterious and powerful femme fatale for the ages. Publication is expected for Fall 2025."

 

 

 

Interview - Marion Agnew and Making Up the Gods

Rebecca interviews author Marion Agnew.  Marion is a dual US/Canadian citizen, who moved north mid-life, after a career in technical writing and editing. MAKING UP THE GODS (Latitude 46, Sudbury, 2023) is her first novel. Her previous book, REVERBERATIONS: A DAUGHTER’S MEDITATIONS ON ALZHEIMER’S (Signature Editions, Winnipeg, 2019) was shortlisted for the Louise de Kiriline Lawrence award for nonfiction. She lives on the Lake Superior shoreline, a grateful guest in Robinson-Superior Treaty territory, home of the Anishinaabe (Fort William First Nation) and Metis peoples.

https://www.marionagnew.com/ (includes citations to Marion's fiction and essays, short and collected)

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marionagnew/

Currently reading:

Fuse; Rebellion Box; Widow Fantasies by Hollay Ghadery

If Sylvie Had Nine Lives by Leona Theis

 

2024 Goals - Midyear Review

Rebecca and Tara provide an update on their 2024 goals!

Rebecca (@canadareadsamericanstyle):

• Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America by Matika Wilbur
• 2024 Inclusive Picture Book Read Along Challenge @readingwithredandthemagpie
• My Ántonia by Willa Cather
• The Street by Ann Petry
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
• The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
• Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay
• The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty
• My Brilliant Career by Miles Franklin
• February by Lisa Moore

Tara (@onabranchreads): 

• The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan
• Merlin bird ID app

2023 Giller Books:

• Away from the Dead by David Bergen
• Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
• Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton
• The Double Life of Benson Yu by Kevin Chong
• We Meant Well by Erum Shazia Hasan
• The Island: Stories by Dionne Irving
• Wait Softly Brother by Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer
• Girlfriend on Mars by Deborah Willis

Helen Humphreys:

• The Lost Garden
• The Frozen Thames
• Followed by the Lark
• Leaving Earth

Currently reading:

• I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy
• All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker

Book Chat #18

Rebecca and Tara share their latest reads!

Rebecca (@canadareadsamericanstyle):

• The People's Hospital: Hope and Peril in American Medicine by Ricardo Nuila
• The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
• Autokrator by Emily A. Weedon
• The Street by Ann Petry
• The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
• Small Acts of Courage: A Legacy of Endurance and the Fight for Democracy by Ali Velshi

Tara (@onabranchreads):

• The Bones of Ruin by Sarah Raughley
• Indian Burial Ground; Sisters of the Lost Nation by Nick Medina
• The Shining; Salem's Lot by Stephen King
• The Residence; The Damned by Andrew Pyper
• Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
• Fungal: Foraging in the Urban Forest by Ariel Gordon

 

Interview - Leslie Shimotakahara and Sisters of the Spruce

Rebecca welcomes Canadian author Leslie Shimotakahara, whose third novel, Sisters of the Spruce, is on Quill & Quire's "2024 Spring Preview: Fiction" and the 49th Shelf's "Most Anticipated: Our 2024 Spring Fiction Preview." Her memoir, The Reading List, won the Canada-Japan Literary Prize and has been translated into Japanese, and her fiction has been shortlisted for the KM Hunter Artist Award. She has written two other critically acclaimed novels, After the Bloom and Red Oblivion. 

Leslie’s writing has appeared in the National Post, World Literature Today, and Changing the Face of Canadian Literature, among other anthologies and periodicals. She completed a PhD in English at Brown University, after which she returned to her hometown of Toronto, where she now resides with her husband. 

https://leslieshimotakahara.com/

https://www.instagram.com/leslieshimotakahara/

https://caitlinpress.com/Books/S/Sisters-of-the-Spruce

 

Highlighted books:

• From Slave Girls to Salvation: Gender, Race, and Victoria's Chinese Rescue Home, 1886-1923 by Shelly D. Ikebuchi
• We Measure the Earth with Our Bodies by Tsering Yangzom Lama
• Within the Barbed Wire Fence: A Japanese Man's Account of his Internment in Canada by Takeo Ujo Nakano

Interview - Barbara Black and Little Fortified Stories

Tara interviews author Barbara Black, a self-described "serial artist", who was born in North Vancouver, B.C. and currently resides in Victoria, B.C.  

 

As a writer and editor, Barbara has worked in journalism, public relations, government policy, education, and the arts. As a creative writer, Barbara has explored the genres of poetry, fiction, flash fiction, non-fiction, and libretto.

 

As a classically trained vocalist, she has performed in both the classical and jazz worlds, in both vocal ensembles and as a soloist with an orchestra.  She is also a composer and most recently, collaborated as a lyricist and librettist.

 

Barbara's short story collection Music from a Strange Planet debuted in 2021 to critical acclaim (Barbara discussed the collection on the podcast dated February 12, 2022). Her most recent book, Little Fortified Stories (Caitlin Press), was released on May 17, 2024.

 

https://barbarablack.ca/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bblackwrites/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/21410142.Barbara_Black

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/barbarablackwriter

 

Links to journals, authors, and books mentioned:

https://www.ekphrastic.net/

https://megpokrass.com/about/

The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing by Adam Moss

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/192723955-the-work-of-art

 

Interview - Finnian Burnett and The Price of Cookies

Tara welcomes author Finnian Burnett, who is a professor, writer and lifelong learner.  Their work often explores the intersection of the human body, mental health and gender identity.  Finnian holds a doctorate in English pedagogy from Murray State University and teaches college English, creative writing and early British Literature, using story-based pedagogy to create equity in multicultural classrooms.

 

Finnian is a recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts grant, a finalist in the 2023 CBC Nonfiction prize and a 2024 Pushcart nominee. Under their former name, they have published several novels with Sapphire Books Publishing, including two rainbow award winners and the Writer's Digest first place in fantasy self-published book called, Coyote Ate the Stars.

 

In addition, Finnian has two novellas-in-flash, The Clothes Make the Man (published by Ad Hoc Fiction) and The Price of Cookies (published by Off Topic Publishing).

 

Finnian lives in beautiful British Columbia with their wife.

 

https://finnburnett.com/

https://finallyfinnian.com/

 

Highlighted books and authors:

• Curious Wine by Katherine V. Forrest
• Cold by Drew Hayden Taylor
• The Scourge by Jennifer A. Nielsen
• Poet Miranda Krogstad
• Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice
• All the Quiet Places by Brian Thomas Isaac
• Never Let Me Go; Klara in the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

Don't forget to check out Rebecca and Tara live on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/@canadareadsamericanstyle/streams

 

Book Chat #17

Rebecca and Tara share their latest reads and links to their new feature on YouTube: Reading From Our Shelves!

Rebecca (@canadareadsamericanstyle): 

• Somehow by Anne Lamott
• Imagining Imagining: Essays on Language, Identity & Infinity by Gary Barwin
• Autokrator by Emily A. Weedon
• I Shall Not Hate: A Gaza Doctor's Journey on the Road to Peace and Human Dignity by Izzeldin Abuelaish
• James by Percival Everett
• The Last Slave Ship: The True Story of How Clotilda Was Found, Her Descendants, and an Extraordinary Reckoning by Ben Raines
• Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo" by Zora Neale Hurston
• Eleanor Courtown; The Brickworks; Stella's Carpet; The Marzipan Fruit Basket by Lucy E.M. Black
• Making Up the Gods by Marion Agnew

Tara (@onabranchreads): 

• Cold; Chasing Painted Horses by Drew Hayden Taylor
• Coexistence: Stories; A Minor Chorus by Billy-Ray Belcourt
• A Sweet Sting of Salt by Rose Sutherland
• Nosy Parker; The Spoon Stealer by Lesley Crewe
• Followed by the Lark by Helen Humphreys
• Walden by Henry David Thoreau
• A House with Good Bones; Thornhedge by T. Kingfisher

Reading From Our Shelves:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObgtKpEdnRE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lek38hy8jCA&t=93s