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Busting the Myth of Work-Life Balance by Susan Olding
About a year ago, I was invited to give a talk to some graduate students at Queen’s University about what was billed as “work-life balance.” Sure, I said. Why not? That should be easy. There was only one small problem. For me, “work-life balance” is an unattainable mirage. I am the farthest thing from an… Continue reading
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My Invincible Summer: Rebooting My Writing Purpose by Susan Doherty Hannaford
In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer. – Albert Camus, Return to Tipasa In May 2014, I learned that the publication of my debut novel, A Secret Music, would be delayed by twelve months. It was heartbreaking news, but not unusual coming from a small Canadian publisher who… Continue reading
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A Café of One’s Own by Deborah Murray
I love to write in the mornings. With breakfast finished and my son off to school, I look forward to playing with words, a turn of phrase, an unfolding story. Distraction, though, can thwart my best intentions. When I am about to sit down and write, I’ll do the dishes, the laundry or any other… Continue reading
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A Memoirist’s Dilemma: Telling the Truth Without Betrayal by Karen Zey
In another life, I worked in schools as a special education teacher and administrator. I gathered stories for thirty-five years, and as a writer, I wanted to recapture my classroom days so that readers would land in the scene and see a flicker of universal truth. But as a teacher with a longstanding commitment to… Continue reading
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Hadassah Arms and Other Quandaries: Translating Cultures by Anna Leventhal
In early 2015, I stood in front of a window at Renaud-Bray, looking at a poster that was taller than I was. The poster had my name on it – it was the cover of the French translation of my first book. More than amazement, more than excitement, I felt bemused. This isn’t my book,… Continue reading
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Running a Small Press in 2015 by Guillaume Morissette
Located in Montreal, Canada, Metatron is a small, independent press that publishes contemporary literature and works by new and rising authors. Almost all of its authors are under thirty years old, and their works reflect concerns such as love and relationships in the age of social media, existential angst, reconciling the spiritual with the digital… Continue reading
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Nature’s Way of Getting Books Written by Raquel Rivera
A couple of years ago I was cycling around the ex-garbage dump that is the St-Michel Environmental Complex in Montreal North, collecting details for a scene in my novel. I pedaled across the street from the Complex’s Cirque du Soleil headquarters, and peered through the windows of the National Circus School. Inside was a highly… Continue reading
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Writing with the Body by Kathleen Winter
When I finished writing my novel, Annabel, in 2010, I nearly lost the use of my legs. Between books I make things by hand: hats, collages, kegs of kimchi. So I went to the friperie looking for magpie materials – and found I couldn’t walk up the stairs. “They feel,” I told my doctor, “like planks of… Continue reading
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What Writing Gives Me by Laurie Gough
When I was halfway through writing my first book many years ago, I remember reading in Anne Lamott’s Bird By Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life that the best part of being a writer isn’t getting your name in print. It isn’t all the excitement and accolades that accompany being a published author. The best… Continue reading