Lucy E.M. Black is one of our favourite writers of historical fiction. Ever. Her upcoming (and fourth) book, The Brickworks, is due out with Now and Never Press in October 2023. Told in Black's signature luminous prose, The Brickworks tells the story of Alistair and Brodie, two ambitious Scottish immigrants to North America at the turn of the century. This is an unforgettable story of hardship and triumph from one of the most fiercely gifted writers of historical fiction in Canada. We are delighted Lucy agreed to join us for our latest Power Q & A. Here, she lifts the hood on her writing process and allows us to get a glimpse of the wonderfully intricate workings of her creative process.

Colleen Brown’s book, If you lie down in a field, she will find you (Radiant Press, October 2023), is an absorbing, eye-opening, and heart-wrenching memoir in fragments, conversations, and memories of her mother’s life and murder by a serial killer. It’s also about the impact violence has on memory and storytelling and how persistent contact with the justice system affects individual needs for a narrative that can make sense of a life. On this Power Q & A, we ask Colleen about the perhaps not-so-obvious challenges of writing this story.

When the war in Ukraine erupted, Russian-Canadian author Marina Sonkina dropped everything and flew to the Russian-Ukrainian border. Having come to Canada as a refugee with two young sons, she knew she had to help. Today, we ask her about how her experiences at the border became her new book, Ukrainian Portraits: Diairies from the Border (Guernica Editions, September 2023).

We’re delighted to be interviewing author and lyricist Steven Mayoff, whose most recent novel, The Island Gospel of Samson Grief, is coming out this fall with Radiant Press. Masterfully disrupting the idyllic picture often painted of Prince Edward Island, The Island Gospel According to Samson Grief is a darkly funny and thrilling story of spiritual dissonance and cultural satire in Canada's most wholesome province.

Canadian author and actor Melia McClure joins us for this Power Q & A to talk about her exceptional new novel, All the World’s a Wonder, and her masterful use of voice to create unforgettable, vibrant characters. You’re not going to want to miss this!

We’re tickled to be joined by the incomparable Jason Heroux for this Power Q&A to talk a little about the impulse to get surreal and his latest book, a collection of short stories, Survivors of the Hive (Radiant Press, 2023).

We invited Jerrod Edson, Canadian author of six books, for a quick chat with us about his wild and wonderful latest work of speculative fiction, The Boulevard (Galleon, 2023). We’re delighted he joined us!

One of my professor’s frequently says that the publishing industry exists at a rather contentious intersection between art and commerce. But I want to tweak his metaphor a little. I say that the publishing industry is less of an intersection and more of a grown person with one foot on either end of a child’s seesaw. With one foot on art, and the other on commerce the person wobbles around vicariously in the middle. 

Time is a Mother, Ocean Vuong’s latest poetry collection, is a timely piece of writing in more ways than one. The work grapples with the immediacy of our ever-fleeting lives, reflecting on his mother’s death, while stubbornly refusing to submit entirely to grief. Vuong’s earlier poetry collections as well as his debut novel: On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, earned acclaim for their intimate depictions of raw emotion. Vuong’s newest work is no exception.

Bob Henderson is an outdoor educator, writer, and resource editor for Pathways: The Ontario Journal of Outdoor Education. Additionally, he has been resource editor for Nastawgan: The Quarterly Journal of the Wilderness Canoe Association since 2008. Bob is also one of the editors and writers of Paddling Pathways. He joins us here for our Power Q & A.

If you do not have an appreciation for Persian carpets you will by the time you finish Lucy EM Black’s novel Stella’s Carpet. After reading Black’s vibrant descriptions of their artistry and rich history, I found myself searching the Internet for images of the patterns she writes about. But this is not a novel about carpets. At the heart of the story is a dysfunctional family with many secrets.

When I was the managing editor of a national infertility blog, the Executive Director gave me free rein to highlight voices as I saw fit. I created the schedule, coordinated the topics, and nurtured the writers using editorial experience, empathy, and compassion.

She left me with one stipulation, however. “We don’t publish anything that discusses politics or religion.”

I was crushed. Not simply for the writers but for myself.

The first time I heard the term “voice” in relation to a book was in high school. The definition remained fuzzy, far harder to pinpoint than theme, setting, point of view, and characterization. A writer’s voice seemed somehow part of her style, but I didn’t really know what that meant, either.

Mostly, an author’s voice seemed extremely important: Voice helps distinguish one writer’s work from another and makes a writer unique.

Okay. But what is it?

If you’re like me, your favourite summer activities include: reading on the beach, reading by the poolside, reading in your sunny backyard, reading in the park, and reading on the couch during rainy days. With all that reading, it’s easy to run out of material. I’ve compiled a list of my favourite reads that I think everyone should check out this summer. Without further ado, here they are:

All writing is about life. Whether it’s a novel that follows the life of its protagonist or a poem that describes a particular moment in time, when you write, you communicate a life experience. Therefore, a wide range of life experience is very valuable for writers.

As a writer, I need to know how to analyze texts. I have to be able to analyze my own works so that I can improve them, and I also need to know how to analyze other author’s works so I can understand and learn from them.

Everyone has parents. Everyone’s parents die. Yet the stories where parents and death intersect are unique.

George K. Ilsley’s recent memoir tells one such story. As a young adult, George left his Nova Scotia home, heading west, eventually landing in Vancouver—as far away as he could get while remaining in North America. Then, as he turns 50, his father turns 90, and his father needs, but doesn’t especially want, Ilsley’s care.

I usually pride myself on the organization of my writing. My mind typically flies all over the place, and writing is where I sort out those thoughts into coherency. But for this blog, I wanted to share a sort of messy array of various writing tips. They all pertain to writing and they are all (in my opinion) very useful, though other than that they share no unifying quality to make an articulate blog post.

Personal growth is a pretty difficult thing to avoid. As the world shifts and changes about me, I find myself shifting and changing too. In this blog, I wanted to reflect on some of the things I’ve learned through my writing over the past few years.

ACCEPTING BOOK REVIEW SUBMISSIONS! Learn more about River Street’s new book review series. New reviews published bi-monthly—and we PAY for them! Get the deets in this blog post.