2012 Lineup Announced!

You’ve been so patient waiting all winter to see what we have in store for you at this year’s 24th Eden Mills Writers’ Festival. We’ve held back nothing to bring you the very best fiction, non-fiction, young adult, and children’s authors. And let’s not forget the poets! You’ll find past favourites back with new stories, and you’ll discover fresh faces ready to introduce you to new adventures. Visit Eden Mills on Sunday, September 16th to hear from:

Wade Davis and Tim Ward, 2009. (Cr. Peter Grimaldi)

As always, you’ll find authors featured each month in our newsletters. You can also visit our website to find authors' biographies along with their most recent publications (to add to your summer reading list, of course).

EMWF Presents: In Conversation with Jian Ghomeshi

In a campaign over the winter, Guelph fought hard against five other Canadian cities, including London, Hamilton, Stratford, Kingston, and Oshawa, for the chance to host a live session of Q with Jian Ghomeshi. In the end, London—the city that started it all—won, with Q streaming live from London on February 29th.

Well, not to be outdone, the EMWF is ecstatic, and even a little giddy, to announce In Conversation with Jian Ghomeshi at the University of Guelph on September 15, 2012. Jian’s book, 1982 (Penguin) will be released in late September, but the Festival is hosting a launch in advance! Not only will you hear from Jian himself but you’ll also be able to purchase a copy of 1982 before its official release and have it signed.

Check future newsletters for further event details and ticket information. Tickets will go quickly!

Get Writing: 2012 Contest Details

The EMWF is committed to providing a venue for unpublished or modestly published writers to showcase their work. Over the years, past contest winners have returned to the Festival as published authors, as is the case this year with YA Author Pat Bourke, who was a Fringe reader in 2006.

Sit down at the keyboard or pick up your pen and get working on this year’s submission. Judges for the Fringe, the EMWF Literary Contest, and the Student Poetry Contest are eager to read your work.

Fringe
Open to writers who have not previously read at the Fringe and who are unpublished in book format, the Fringe is a set of readings that takes place Festival Sunday. The top prose and poetry submissions are selected and writers share their work in front of a supportive crowd.

Entry Requirements
A maximum of 2500 words of prose (fiction or non-fiction) or five pages of poetry.
Submit five copies.
On a cover page, include title(s) or first line with your name, address, phone number, and email. Name and contact information should NOT appear on any copies of the work.

Submission Fee
$10.00 (CDN) per entry. Cheques to be made payable to EDEN MILLS WRITERS' FESTIVAL

To Submit
Mail five copies and cheque or money order to:
Eden Mills Writers’ Festival
94 Alma St. S.
Guelph, ON
N1H 5W9

Please no cash.

Submission Deadline:
July 31, 2012.

For more information email edenmillsfrringe@yahoo.ca or visit www.edenmillswritersfestival.ca.

 
The Eden Mills Writers’ Festival Literary Contest
Open internationally to new and modestly published writers, ages 16-plus. Submit a short story, poetry collection (of 5 poems or less), or one-act play. The best entry in each category will win a $100 prize.

Entry Requirements:
Include four copies of each submission.
On a cover page, include title, with your name address, phone number, and email. Name and contact info should NOT appear on other copies.
Manuscripts will not be returned.
Finalists will be notified prior to the Festival, and winners will be announced at the Festival.

Submission Fee:
$15.00 (CDN) per entry. Cheques to be made payable to EDEN MILLS WRITERS' FESTIVAL.
*A combination of entries may be sent in one envelope with one payment for all entries, i.e., a short story and a poetry collection, and $30.00.

To Submit:
Mail four copies to:
Laurel Marsolais
39 Bushmills Cres.
Guelph, ON
N1K 1T6

Submission Deadline:
July 15, 2012

For more information email lmlmarso@gmail.com or visit www.edenmillswritersfestival.ca.

Student Poetry Contest
This year’s theme is Anything and Everything. Cash prizes and a chance to read at the Festival await the winners of our four categories: Primary/Junior, Gr. 1-6; Intermediate, Gr.7-8; Gr. 9-10; and Senior, Gr. 11-12.

Entry Requirements
Submit four copies.
On a cover page, include title(s) or first line with your name, address, phone number, and email. Name and contact information should NOT appear on any copies of the work.

To Submit
Mail four copies to
Susan Ratcliffe
57-295 Water St.
Guelph, ON
N1G 2X5

Submission Deadline:
July 3, 2012

For more information contact Susan Ratcliffe at susanrat@gmail.com.

Featured Authors

Angie Abdou began writing fiction in 2000 and has since published three books.  Anything Boys Can Do was praised by the Times Colonist (British Columbia) for its original take on female sexuality. The Bone Cage, a novel about Olympic athletes, was the inaugural One Book, One Kootenay, as well as a 2011 Canada Reads finalist and the 2012 MacEwan Book of the Year. It is taught in university Sport Literature courses across the continent and topped CBC’s list of “Top Ten Sports Books.” Her newest novel, The Canterbury Trail (Brindle & Glass, 2011), is a dark comedy specifically about mountain culture and more generally about community and our relationship with the environment. The Canterbury Trail was a finalist for the Banff Mountain Book of the Year. Angie was born and raised in Moose Jaw, SK.  She currently lives in Fernie, BC, and teaches full-time at the College of the Rockies.  www.abdou.ca  twitter.com/#!/angie_abdou

Karen Bass claims that libraries are dangerous. She'd never written fiction until she started working in her local library – which was where the storytelling bug bit. Her third novel for teens, Drummer Girl (Coteau, 2011) is the contemporary story of Sid and her desire to be a drummer and what she’s willing to do to get the gig. Kirkus calls Drummer Girl "fast paced and insightful," and it received an OLA Best Bets honourable mention. It's also a "best bet" that Karen will continue writing and reading YA, which thrills her inner teenager.  www.karenbass.ca

Ben Caesar has been performing magic for more than twenty years. His show combines humour, illusion, and audience participation to amaze audiences of all ages. He has become a regular and favourite performer at the Children’s site on Festival Sunday, keeping the fun going between author sets.

Dani Couture is the author of two collections of poetry, Good Meat and Sweet. Sweet was nominated for the Trillium Book Award for Poetry and shortlisted for the ReLit Award. Dani’s first novel, Algoma (Invisible, 2011), follows Leo’s family after he falls through the ice. Refusing to believe Leo is gone, his twelve-year-old brother Fred begins sending letters to Leo via any pool of water. Then, sopping notes begin appearing around the house.       Dani won This Magazine’s 2007 Great Canadian Literary Contest and received an Honour of Distinction from The Writers’ Trust of Canada - Dayne Ogilvie Grant in 2011. She resides in Toronto.  twitter.com/#!/danicouture  blackbearonwater.com arts.nationalpost.com    

Richard Gwyn is an award-winning author and political columnist. He is widely known as a commentator for the Toronto Star on national and international affairs and as a frequent contributor to television and radio programs. His books include two highly praised biographies, The Unlikely Revolutionary on Newfoundland premier Joey Smallwood, and The Northern Magus on Pierre Elliot Trudeau. His book, Nationalism Without Walls: The Unbearable Lightness of Being Canadian, was selected by The Literary Review of Canada as one of the 100 most important books published in Canada. John A: The Man Who Made Us, Richard’s first volume on Sir John A. Macdonald became a national bestseller and won the 2008 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction. Last fall, he published the second volume, Nation Maker: Sir John A. Macdonald: His Life, Our Times (Random House, 2011), which is the 2012 winner of the esteemed Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing.  www.richardjgwyn.ca  arts.nationalpost.com

Linden MacIntyre is a co-host of CBC’s the fifth estate and the winner of ten Gemini Awards for broadcast journalism. His bestselling first novel, The Long Stretch, was nominated for a CBA Libris Award and his boyhood memoir, Causeway: A Passage from Innocence, was a Globe and Mail Best Book and won both the Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction and the Evelyn Richardson Prize. His second novel, The Bishop’s Man, which he shared with Festival-goers in 2010, won the Scotiabank Giller Prize, the Dartmouth Book Award and the CBA Libris Fiction Book of the Year Award and has been translated into eight languages.       This year Linden returns with Why Men Lie, a novel exploring the nature of family, love, and the intricacies of relationships between men and women. At middle age Effie MacAskill Gillis is sure that she knows everything that she needs to know about men. Yet on a Toronto subway platform during the Christmas rush, Effie is taken by surprise when she runs into an old acquaintance, JC Campbell. As Effie lets down her guard and takes the plunge with a new romance, she is soon reminded that the progress of love can be difficult. In this whirlwind affair of the heart, Effie must also deal with the trials and tribulations of two ex-husbands trying to pull their lives together, a grown daughter who is about to make a surprising choice for a husband, and a brother in the midst of a difficult transition.  www.cbc.ca

Donna Morrissey is the award-winning author of four adult novels: Kit’s Law, Downhill Chance, Sylvanus Now, and What They Wanted, as well as the Gemini Award-winning screenplay, Clothesline Patch, and the children’s book Cross Katie Kross. Donna grew up in the Beaches, a small fishing outport in Newfoundland, and now lives in Halifax. Her new book, The Deception of Livvy Higgs (Penguin, 2012) will be released this fall.  www.donnamorrissey.com  gov.ns.ca/govt/cometolife/media/vignettes/downloads/donna-morrissey.mov

Carrie Snyder was born in Hamilton, ON, and grew up in Ohio, Nicaragua, and Ayr, ON. Her first book, Hair Hat, was nominated for the Danuta Gleed Award for Short Fiction. Her latest publication is, The Juliet Stories, a collection of linked short stories set in Nicaragua and Ontario. Quill & Quire raves The Juliet Stories provides “the kind of nourishment that comes from a moving story, beautifully told.”       Carrie lives in Waterloo, ON, with her husband and four children.  twitter.com/#!/carrieasnyder  Obscure Canlit Mama  www.theglobeandmail.com

Teresa Toten is an award-winning author who was born in Zagreb, Croatia, but left for Canada on that same day. She developed her broad taste in reading as a result of her non-English-speaking mother’s habit of filling shopping bags full of books from wildly different sections of the local library. Teresa’s first job out of graduate school was freelancing for Radio-Canada International. She’s twice been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award, once for The Game in 2001 and again for Me and the Blondes in 2006.  Her acclaimed anthology, Piece by Piece: Stories about Fitting into Canada was released in 2010. The Taming (Doubleday, 2012), which was written in alternating voices with Eric Walters, was released this year. It is a dark and compelling look at young love gone very, very wrong.  www.teresatoten.com    

Nora Young is a writer, broadcaster, producer, and documentary-maker. She was the founding host and producer of Definitely Not the Opera and currently hosts CBC's national radio show Spark. She is fascinated with the intersection of technology and culture: how changing technology affects the way we see ourselves and each other. The Virtual Self: How Our Digital Lives Are Altering the World Around Us (McClelland & Stewart) takes that personal, psychological reality of everything from email to status updates and teases out the increasingly bigger impacts of the virtual information we all generate on the real world around us.  twitter.com/#!/nora3000  norayoung.ca

News from Our Members

The May-June issue of Alternatives, Canada’s Environment Magazine, is dedicated to exploring the intersection of Arts, Media & Culture, and the environment.

"As one of our contributor’s states, ‘Art is vital to our conversations about the world around us. It can say the things we can’t quite articulate, and provide us with vocabularies beyond the usual’. I like that sentiment and you’ll find that belief reflected throughout this special issue”," says Alternatives' editor Eric Rumble. "This issue focuses on those immeasurable dimensions and enchanting views, taking stock of the role that visual art and our approaches to creativity can play in environmental stewardship." alternativesjournal.ca

Guelph Spoken Word
www.guelphspokenword.com

Friday June 1st AT 5:30PM
Event: SOUND OFF!
(Featuring, Timaj Garad)

Sound Off is usually the last Friday of EVERY month, but due to construction the next one will be on June 1st. Come to the workshop and sharpen your writing and performance skills. The open stage is all ages and gets on the way 6:30 p.m., along with the slam for those 22 or younger. Guelph Public Library, 100 Norfolk St. PWYC/Free.

Saturday June 16th AT 7PM
Event: Guelph Poetry Slam - (Featuring A-Knowmadic from Edmonton).
A poetry slam is an interactive spoken-word poetry competition. Poets have 3 minutes to deliver their poem and are judged by randomly selected members of the audience based on content and performance. SLAMs encourage audience participation and the winner takes home a $100 cash prize! Cover is only $10 and students (w/card) get a 2 for 1 deal. eBar, 41 Quebec St.

Friday June 29th AT 5:30PM
Event: SOUND OFF!
Come to the workshop and sharpen your writing and performance skills. The open stage is all ages and gets on the way 6:30 p.m., along with the slam for those 22 or younger. Guelph Public Library, 100 Norfolk St. PWYC/Free

Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival

May 31 - June 3, 2012
www.guelphdance.ca

The Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival is proud to present Power Up, our 14th annual festival running from May 31 to June 3, 2012. This year’s festival will simmer with explosive force, masculine energy, and raw physical dialogue between dancers; it will explore vulnerability and trust, tension and aggression, political divide and the divine aesthetic.

This year our On the Stage series includes powerful works by Canadian dance legends Allen Kaeja and Yvonne Ng, while also showcasing critically acclaimed emerging companies like Gadfly.

The In the Park series goes from the sublime to the hilarious, including works by Wants&Needs Danse and Zata Omm who explore spirituality and enlightenment, while Femmes du Feu bob for their lives.

For more information about ticket prices and available discounts, please contact the River Run Centre box office by calling 519-763-3000 or online at www.riverrun.ca. Additional information about the 2012 Festival can be found at: www.guelphdance.ca.

Hillside Festival

July 27-29, 2012
www.hillsidefestival.ca

Weekend passes may have sold out, but day passes are still available for this favourite summer festival held at Guelph Lake. An all-star lineup is set, vendors and workshops leaders are getting organized, all you need is a ticket.

Tickets are available through Ticketbreak (www.ticketbreak.com or 1.866.943.8849) as well as Hempire (54 Carden St., Guelph), Encore Records (54 Queen St. S., Kitchener, cash only), and at Soundscapes (572 College St., Toronto). Check out the Hillside website for artist info and ticket prices.

The Bookshelf is looking for book reviewers for its forthcoming online magazine. If you love reading and like writing, we need your contributions! Reviewers can promote books they love, pick up advance reading copies, or request review copies. Advance and review copies are yours for the price of a review. We are also looking for writers interested in producing short articles on arts and culture topics. For more information and to receive our Guidelines for Contributors, send an email to contribute@bookshelf.ca.