Michael Helm reads from his novel, In the Place of Last Things

Published by: McClelland & Stewart

Time of the reading: 6:17

Notes: Barbara Gowdy is an award-winning author whose five previous books, The Romantic, The White Bone, Mister Sandman, We So Seldom Look on Love and Falling Angels, have appeared on bestseller lists throughout the world. The recipient of the Marian Engel Award in 1996, she has been a finalist for the the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and a repeat finalist for the Giller Prize, the Governor General’s Award, the Trillium Award and the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. She lives in Toronto.

"The prose is frequently thrilling and always arresting. It is also unsparing in its determination to distil both the precise eternals of a moment and the fierce interiority of the human mind."
— The Globe and Mail

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Racheal Preston reads from her novel, The Wind Seller

Published by: Goose Lane Editions

Time of the reading: 3:21

Notes: Racheal Preston is a Hamilton-based writer. Her debut novel, Tent of Blue, was published in the fall of 2002 by Goose Lane Editions. For two years, beginning in 2005, she acted as Chair of gritLIT, the Hamilton Writers’ Festival. Since 2003 she has been a judge for Power of the Pen, the Hamilton Public Library Creative Writing Competition. In 2001, Rachael was nominated for the Journey Prize and won the Arts Hamilton Literary Award. In 2006, she won the City of Hamilton Arts Award for Literature. A native of Yorkshire, England, she has a Master’s degree in English Literature from Queen’s University and also studied at Emily Carr College in Vancouver. She has taught English in Vancouver, London (U.K.), and the Czech Republic, and creative writing courses both in class and online for Mohawk and Sheridan Colleges.

"Preston is deft at creating a number of simultaneous plots and intricately detailed characters, smoothly moving her story to its completion without abandoning any of them along the way. "
— The Chronicle Herald

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