Writer's Reading Series Begins September 20, 2010

The Department of English Literature is delighted to announce the 22nd season of the Writers Reading Series in Peterborough.  These events bring award-winning and world-class authors to Peterborough for literary readings, critical/practical discussions and plain old casual conversation.  As befits the range and scope of Canada’s literary landscape, our authors cover a lot of emotional and intellectual ground. These are smart people with serious talent, but the events are stimulating and funny, not stodgy and solemn.  Because we choose writers for their unique talents no two events are exactly alike, but they’re all free and they’re all fun. 

All events begin at 7:00 PM in the Junior Common Room (Scott House) at Traill College, 310 London Street, Peterborough, with a public reception in The Trend Pub immediately afterwards.  We start this year with a double-whammy first week featuring Lisa Moore on September 20, then Alexander MacLeod on September 22.  We invite all members of the community to take advantage of this opportunity to see, hear, and meet these writers in relaxed and hospitable circumstances.

Sept 20:
Lisa Moore is the author of two collections of short stories Degrees of Nakedness and Open and two novels, Alligator and February.  She selected and introduced the Penguin Anthology of Short Fiction by Canadian Women and is the co-editor of Great Expectations: 24 True Stories About Birth. Open and Alligator were both nominated for the Giller prize, and Alligator won the Commonwealth Literary Prize for the Canadian/Caribbean Region and was long-listed for the Orange Prize and the Dublin Impac Award. February was short-listed for the Commonwealth Prize for the Canadian/Caribbean Region and was on the Globe and Mail's best one hundred books for 2009 and will be published in the U.K., the U.S., France, Holland, and Germany.

Sept 22:
Alexander MacLeod reads from his highly anticipated debut story collection,
Light Lifting.  His award-winning short fiction has been published in
leading journals throughout Canada and the US and was featured in the 2009
Journey Prize Anthology.

Oct 20
Karen Solie was born in Moose Jaw and grew up in southwest Saskatchewan. Her first collection of poems, Short Haul Engine (Brick Books, 2001) won the BC Book Prize Dorothy Livesay Award, and was shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert Award and the Griffin Poetry Prize. Her second, Modern and Normal (Brick Books, 2005), was shortlisted for the Trillium Prize, and included on the Globe and Mail's list of the best books published that year. Her third, Pigeon (Anansi, 2009) recently won the Griffin Poetry Prize and The Trillium Book Award for Poetry.

Nov 4
Adam Sol is, most recently, the author of Jeremiah, Ohio, a novel in poems published by House of Anansi Press, which was shortlisted for the Trillium Prize for Poetry in 2009.  His previous books are Jonah’s Promise, which won MidList Press’s First Series Book Award for Poetry; and Crowd of Sounds, which won Trillium Award for Poetry in 2004.  He is also the author of numerous essays and reviews for publications as various as The Globe and Mail, The Forward, Critique and CNQ.  His work has been featured on Nextbook.com, Poetry Daily, National Post Online and the CBC radio program “The Next Chapter.”

Nov 17
Ray Robertson is the author of the novels Home Movies (Cormorant, 1997), Heroes (Dundurn, 2000), Moody Food (Doubleday, 2002), Gently Down the Stream (Cormorant, 2005), What Happened Later (Thomas Allen, 2007)—which was nominated for the 2008 Trillium Award--and, most recently, David (Thomas Allen, 2009)—which was voted one of the Globe and Mail ’s Best Books of 2009--as well as a collection of non-fiction, Mental Hygiene: Essays on Writers and Writing (Insomniac, 2003).  He is a contributing reviewer to the Globe and Mail.

For more information about the Series, please contact Lewis MacLeod (lewismacleod@trentu.ca)