Thanks to Sean Cranbury for the photo.

Such an honour to be at the Mayor’s Arts Awards on October 11, and I’m thrilled that Bad Endings won the Vancouver Book Award! Congrats to all the nominees, and many thanks to the judging panel, and the City of Vancouver.

If I look a little nervous here, it’s because I was a little nervous! I didn’t have a speech prepared, but people tell me I did okay. 🙂

Well, I certainly didn’t expect to get this news at 6AM yesterday. Absolutely thrilled to be a finalist for the Rogers Writer’s Trust prize, alongside Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, Omar El Akkad, David Chariandy, and Claire Cameron. Grateful to be included in this list! Many thanks to the Writer’s Trust, and to my publisher, Anvil Press.

I’m going to be all over WORD Vancouver this year, but there’s plenty of great non-Carleigh events happening too! Here’s the full schedule, check it out!

As for me, I’ll be on the Mixed Voices Raised panel at Perspective Point from 11:00 am to 11:45 am on Sunday, September 24, I’ll be doing a reading of Bad Endings at Suspension Bridge from 12:25 pm to 12:45 pm (also on Sunday, September 24), and Writers Reading Writers: A PRISM panel on Influence, Space, and Resources at Perspective Point from
1:50 pm to 2:35 pm (on Sunday as well).

As a new board member of the BC Book Prizes, I’ll be manning their table from 3-4PM on Sunday, stop by and say hello, and learn all about us!

Hope to see you there!

I was asked to contribute to the Georgia Straight’s supplement for WORD Vancouver, and talk a little about a book that changed my life. I chose Thomas King’s Massey Lecture series, The Truth About Stories: A Native Narrative.

Read about it here.

Very excited to say that Bad Endings is a finalist for the City of Vancouver book award. The other finalists are Gabrielle Prendergast’s Pandas on the Eastside (Orca), Invisible Dead by Sam Wiebe (Random House), and Susan Point: Spindle Whorl, a collection of her work by Kathleen Bartels (Black Dog). So I am in very good company!
It’s a huge honour for this little book to be following in the footsteps of some hardworking and wonderful writers I admire, like Wayde Compton, Jen Sookfong Lee, Elee Kraljii Gardiner, Billeh Nickerson, Doretta Lau, Amber Dawn, Aaron Chapman, and a whole bunch of local peeps!

Here’s a link with more info on the award.

Hey, I’m judging the Malahat Review Open Season awards this year, (fiction) along with Evelyn Lau (poetry) and Betsy Warland (non-fic). So send them your stuff!

What a thing to wake up to! I’m so happy to be included on this list with a bunch of talented writers!

Check it out.