Kristina Stanley, Founder & CEO, Fictionary

Kristina Stanley grew up in a household where reading books was very important. “I’ve had a lifelong journey with reading, and that comes from my mom. She was born in Italy, and throughout World War II she didn’t have access to books. When she came to Canada, books became a really big thing.”

When she was in her 40s, Kristina decided to write her own book with the hope of writing something that gets a reader so involved they can’t put it down. She went on to write a series of books, and in that process, she discovered that it’s actually quite hard to document all of the different characters and settings. “I would use a huge spreadsheet to keep track of all of the different elements in my story. I thought there must be an easier way, but I couldn’t find it.”

 

 

Kristina decided to build Fictionary with her husband and brother to solve some of the challenges writers were facing. Fictionary transforms editing through deep story analysis software.

She went to conferences and interviewed hundreds of writers and editors, asking them how they edit and keep track of their work. They took all of that learning and spent months building an alpha prototype to help writers display their story arc and keep track of their characters, settings, and plot lines. As any entrepreneur knows, it can take some time to go from idea to launch. “We had the idea in 2014, but we didn’t come out with the first product until January 2018.”

Since they launched, they’ve heard from many of their writers that while they love the product, they want more automation and more visual tools. In order to get Fictionary to that next level, they realized they needed more funding. “Through their support, Creative BC is helping us focus on getting to that next level of wow, so we can make Fictionary more beneficial to our writers.”

Kristina found out about Creative BC by accident. “We were at a dinner party when someone told us to apply for a grant. Applying for the grant itself made us take a hard look at what we were doing. We had to do our due diligence, thinking hard about how and where we wanted to spend the money. When we received the grant, we were able to make it public on our website and in a news release, and that helped our credibility.”

While writing is typically thought of as a lonely profession, technology has changed that. “There are authors out there who have been successful and are willing to help the next writers coming along, showing them what worked and what didn’t. Writing can be a lifelong joy, and my philosophy is: the more writers we help, the more likely they’ll continue to write.”

 

Kristina knows better than most that a book can open up the world, especially for young people. “Kids that are read to by their parents are more confident and social. Storytelling is an important part of our lives, and the more we can do to help people tell good stories, the better it is for us all.”

While Fictionary currently focuses on supporting writers, they plan to adapt their technology to support editors as well as other forms of storytelling. “We built this to help writers because we believe that storytelling can positively impact a person’s life. That’s the driving factor behind all of this.”

 

Fictionary is a creative editing software for fiction writers and editors.

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Michael Neill and Brian Lam of Arsenal Pulp Press Named 2019 ABPBC Award Recipients

Yesterday evening the Association of Book Publishers of British Columbia (ABPBC) honoured the recipients of two awards recognizing outstanding contributions to British Columbia’s publishing industry. Vancouver’s Arsenal Pulp Press received the Jim Douglas Publisher of the Year Award, and Kelowna-based Michael Neill, bookseller and owner of Mosaic Books and TBM Bookmanager, received the Gray Campbell Distinguished Service Award. The recipients were honoured at the annual Book Publishing Conference in Vancouver on February 13, 2020.

The Jim Douglas Publisher of the Year award is presented to an active British Columbian book publishing company that has in recent times earned the respect and applause of the community of publishers for a specific publishing project, an extraordinary contribution to the B.C. publishing community, and/or its extended commitment to excellence in publishing. This year’s recipient, Arsenal Pulp Press, started in 1971 as an alternative small press specializing in literature and politics. They have evolved over the past decades to become one of Canada’s leading independent presses, specializing in LGBTQ literature, books by writers of colour, graphic novels, books on cultural issues, and literary fiction. Some of Arsenal Pulp Press’ recent notable works include Aaron Chapman’s Vancouver After Dark, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha’s Care Work and Louis-Georges Tin’sThe Dictionary of Homophobia, a personal favourite of Brian Lam, founder and owner of Arsenal Pulp Press.

The Gray Campbell Distinguished Service Award is presented annually by the Association of Book Publishers of BC to an individual or individuals who have made a significant contribution to the book publishing industry in the province. Named for the pioneering publisher and founder of Gray’s Publishing, the Gray Campbell Award recognizes the importance of the many individuals who comprise the book industry; their energy and creativity are essential to the continued creation and dissemination of books that tell our stories. This year’s recipient is Michael Neill, founder and president of Bookmanager and owner of Okanagan’s largest independent bookstore, Mosiac Books. Bookmanager is a leader and invaluable point-of-sale provider that has provided bookstores across North America the ability to advance their services

For more updates on the BC Book Publishing Conference visit ABPBC’s website.

Arsenal Pulp Press
Book Manager
Mosaic Books

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Chelene Knight, CEO #LearnWritingEssentials & Breathing Space Creative 

“Sometimes being a leader means creating space by giving up your space.”

 

 

Chelene Knight knew fairly early on that she was a storyteller. “I was a really quiet kid, I wouldn’t talk a lot, but you could pull things out of me with a paper and pen. In school, there was always this fear of getting it wrong or saying things people didn’t want to hear. In my 20s, I threw that out the window and started to break some templates and get creative.” 

Once Chelene threw away her need for structure, doors started to open. She uses a variety of formats in her writing to address her own experiences with mixed ethnicity and belonging and often speaks about her desire to build community through authentic storytelling. As a mentor, teacher and entrepreneur, she encourages her students to think about their message before they focus on their structure. “I want them to think about what they want their community to take away from the book, how they will engage with it.”

Growing up, Chelene felt isolated. “I was shy, and my family wasn’t the closest. I didn’t have that close-knit community.” Yet, she found that when she attended SFU’s The Writer’s Studio in 2013, suddenly, she felt safe to explore the stories she wanted to tell. She also realized that there were conversations taking place behind closed doors and decisions being made that had restricted access. “I came into the publishing world really fresh. I had no idea what it meant to publish something. I just knew that the industry was really hard to break into without an MFA or someone leading you behind those closed doors.” 

Chelene started volunteering with Room Magazine, and that’s when she got a behind-the-scenes look at what was happening in the industry. “I was let into so many private rooms; I got to hear the conversations taking place amongst writers and publishers. I saw the gaps of what was missing and what was starting to take shape.” 

As Room’s former Managing Editor and now owner of her own writer’s boutique studio and author care consulting firm, she has that opportunity. She works with emerging writers to not only help them produce better work but also to better prepare them for the opportunities they’re presented with. “We have this huge responsibility to filter down what we’ve learned. It can be life-changing to bring someone into a community they didn’t know existed. My goal is to help bring people into worlds they’ve not seen before. Organizations like Creative BC help us try new things and connect with communities in different ways. They give us permission to explore.”

For Chelene, one of the most important things we can do in publishing is to take better care of our authors. For so many new authors, they’re asked to travel to new cities and speak on panels in rooms full of people they don’t know. Chelene wants to support emerging authors too, especially those from marginalized communities who might be too afraid to ask questions like she was. That’s why she started Breathing Space Creative, an author care consulting firm where artist care is rooted in building resilience, community, and trust through authentic communication (launches fall 2019).

“I remember sitting in front of an audience feeling like I was going to vomit, and being asked questions I didn’t want to answer. It’s so important to help writers navigate all of that, and prevent situations where they feel uncomfortable or vulnerable. Trust and safety are so important when you’re sharing your story.”

 

Learn more about Chelene and Breathing Space Creative.

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Galiano Island Books’ Top 10 Books of 2019

Right around the corner from the exit of the Galiano ferry terminal sits the first independent bookstore of the island, Galiano Island Books. Since its opening in 1997, the storefront has remained the heart of the island’s arts and culture community. Owners and avid-readers, Lee Trentadue and Jim Schmidt share their top 10 reads of the year.

 

 

Greenwood by Michael Christie

From the award-winning author of If I Fall, If I Die comes a propulsive, multigenerational family story, in which the unexpected legacies of a remote island off the coast of British Columbia will link the fates of five people over a hundred years. Cloud Atlas meets The Overstory in this ingenious nested-ring epic set against the devastation of the natural world.

 

An Earthling’s Guide to Outer Space by Bob McDonald

Beloved science commentator Bob McDonald takes us on a tour of our galaxy, unraveling the mysteries of the universe and helping us navigate our place among the stars.

 

Taking Measures by George Bowering

Taking Measures includes work from each of the last six decades, beginning with Bowering’s engagement with process-based long poems in the 1960s and 1970s and moving through his continued exploration of the form in recent decades.

 

Gather: A Dirty Apron Cookbook by David Robertson
Bestselling chef David Robertson, of The Dirty Apron Cooking School, is back with a stunningly designed book of new recipes for the home cook and the whole family. The Dirty Apron Cooking School has taught thousands of Canadians to cook. In this anticipated follow-up to his bestselling Dirty Apron Cookbook, David Robertson’s latest book celebrates the simple pleasures of cooking food for friends and family.

 

Cedar and Salt: Vancouver Island Recipes by Emily Lycopolus

Homegrown, modern recipes that feature the most treasured local ingredients from Vancouver Island’s forests, fields, farms and sea. Off the shore of Canada’s west coast lies a food lover’s island paradise. Vancouver Island’s temperate climate nurtures a bounty of wild foods, heritage grains, organic produce, sustainable meats and artisan-crafted edible delights. This thoughtfully curated, beautifully photographed cookbook brings Vancouver Island’s abundant food scene into the kitchens of home cooks everywhere.

 

Under Occupation by Alan Furst

From “America’s preeminent spy novelist” (The New York Times), Alan Furst, comes a fast-paced, mesmerizing thriller of the French resistance fighters working secretly and bravely to defeat Hitler.

 

 

Morning Glory on the Vine by Joni Mitchell

A gorgeous compendium of Joni Mitchell’s handwritten lyrics and drawings, originally handcrafted as a gift for a select group of friends in 1971 and now available to the public for the first time. In 1971, as her album Blue topped charts around the world, Joni Mitchell crafted one hundred copies of Morning Glory on the Vine as a holiday gift for her closest friends. For this stunningly beautiful book, Joni hand-wrote an exquisite selection of her own lyrics and poems and illustrated them with more than thirty of her original pictures. Handcrafted, signed, and numbered in Los Angeles, the existing copies of this labor of love have rarely been seen in the past half-century.

 

Fishes of the Salish Sea by Theodore Pietsch and James Wilder Orr

Fishes of the Salish Sea is the definitive guide to the fishes of Puget Sound and the Straits of Georgia and Juan de Fuca. Featuring striking illustrations of the Salish Sea’s 260 fish species by noted illustrator Joseph Tomelleri, this comprehensive three-volume set details the ecology and life history of each species, and recounts the region’s rich heritage of marine research and exploration.

 

Lampedusa by Stephen Price

From the #1 nationally bestselling author of By Gaslight, a novel of exquisite emotional force about love and art in the life of one of the great writers, reminiscent of Colm Tóibín’s The Master, or Michael Cunningham’s The Hours. In sun-drenched Sicily, among the decadent Italian aristocracy of the late 1950s, Giuseppe Tomasi, the last prince of Lampedusa, struggles to complete the novel that will be his lasting legacy, The Leopard. With a firm devotion to the historical record, Lampedusa leaps effortlessly into the mind of the writer and inhabits the complicated heart of a man facing down the end of his life, struggling to make something of lasting worth, while there is still time.

 

The Innocents by Michael Crummey

From bestselling, award-winning author Michael Crummey comes a sweeping, heart-wrenching, deeply immersive novel about a brother and sister alone in a small world. A brother and sister are orphaned in an isolated cove on Newfoundland’s northern coastline. Their home is a stretch of rocky shore governed by the feral ocean, by a relentless pendulum of abundance and murderous scarcity. Still children with only the barest notion of the outside world, they have nothing but the family’s boat and the little knowledge passed on haphazardly by their mother and father to keep them.

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Heidi Waechtler, Executive Director, Association of Book Publishers of British Columbia

“To me, leadership means making space for new voices.”

Heidi Waechtler grew up surrounded by books. “I always assumed I would move into writing books, but as I got older, I realized I was better at communicating with writers and helping them improve their writing.”

After studying literature at university, Heidi started working in communications before going back to school to get her editing certificate at Simon Fraser University (SFU). That’s where she found her true calling. She worked for several publishing houses in Toronto, learning all of the different facets of the industry when an opportunity opened up to lead the Association of Book Publishers of British Columbia (ABPBC) in Vancouver.

The publishing industry is changing all the time, and to stay in the game, you have to be able to move quickly and adapt to new surroundings. For Heidi, that means innovation. “I’ve always been interested in how the editorial process intersected with the business side of publishing. When I saw the new technology coming out, and all of the different ways to bring people together, I started thinking about how I could help innovate this industry.”

Heidi believes it begins with connection. Her focus at ABPBC has been to reach readers online and offline and build those connections directly. She knows that she needs to help publishers get into spaces they might not have been before, introduce them to new markets, and help them shine a light on new voices.

ABPBC supports around 30 organizations working in publishing across British Columbia, from the Sunshine Coast to the Okanagan, Vancouver to Smithers. While their membership is fairly diverse, including universities, museums, children’s book and regionally-focused publishers, the needs are typically the same. “Every one of our members wants support with advocacy, marketing, business development, access to technology and introductions to new markets.”

Heidi sees ABPBC as the centre of a community, and it’s essential to hold that community together, especially during times of change. “We are driven by what our members need, and we are constantly looking for ways to support them. We’re working in an ecosystem, and one of the most gratifying things about my job is that we get to bring competitors together to talk about how we can collectively address our challenges.”

Heidi looks to Creative BC to support her members when opportunities for growth are cost prohibitive. “They open up relationships and partnerships that our members wouldn’t have access to and help get their published work on an international stage. They also help us grow as an industry. With the support of Creative BC, we are working with the Magazine Association of BC to produce workshops on building greater inclusivity, diversity, accountability and accessibility.”

Heidi sees leadership everywhere she looks; from amazing bookstores in rural communities to independent publishers supporting diverse voices, there is no shortage of publishers innovating across our province. There are also lots of organizations stepping up when it comes to making space for new voices in the industry. From mentorships for emerging Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) authors, to books on reconciliation, the publishing industry is taking on challenging topics and making them accessible.

“Our industry has become aware of how much more diverse we can be, and publishers are now helping to put stories out into the world that will influence young leaders. They are helping to raise socially conscious citizens, and it’s quite inspiring to see.”

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BC Represented by 3 Writers Shortlisted for the ScotiaBank Giller Prize

This year, 3 highly talented writers based in British Columbia encompass half of the shortlist for the ScotiaBank Giller Prize. The full short list includes:

  • Immigrant City by David Bezmozgis (Toronto, ON)
  • Small Game Hunting at the Local Coward Gun Club by Megan Gail Coles ( Montreal, QC)
  • The Innocents by Michael Crummey ( St. John’s, NL)
  • Dual Citizens by Alix Ohlin ( Vancouver, BC)
  • Lampedusa by Steven Price ( Victoria, BC)
  • Reproduction by Ian Williams ( Vancouver, BC)

 

About The Giller Prize:

The Giller Prize was first announced in 1994, in tribute of literary journalist Doris Giller. The award acknowledges long form or short story fiction, written by Canadian authors. It is the largest cash prize for literature in Canada, holding tremendous honour. In 2005, Scotiabank began to co-sponsor the event, greatly increasing the endowment.

Biographies of BC Based Shortlisted Writers:

Alix Ohlin:

Alix Ohlin is currently the chair of the creative writing program at the University of British Columbia. She is an author of four books, and has been featured in the New Yorker, Tin House and Best American Short Stories.

The Jury citation of her Novel:

Chronicling the wayward trajectories of two very different but equally fascinating Montreal-bred sisters from childhood into midlife, Alix Ohlin’s novel, true to its title, quietly refutes monolithic tenets that regard identity as something fixed and singular. Dividing its narrative between Canada and the U.S., the urban and the wild, solitude and solidarity, creativity and caregiving, Dual Citizens is a long-term sororal love story and affecting double-portrait of female self-actualization unthethered from established paradigms of ambition.

Steven Price:
Steven Price is an author and poet. He has written two novels, as well as two award winning poetry books.

The Jury Citation of his Novel:

Lampedusa is a fairy tale about a dying prince, the last of his line, the real-life Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, author of the beloved Italian novel The Leopard. Steven Price powerfully imagines Tomasi’s final days as the ailing author struggles to complete and publish his treasured manuscript. Set in a post war Palermo of bombed-out buildings and ruined palazzos, the novel contemplates what values are worth retaining in life and in art. A masterful storyteller, Price conjures Tomasi with language and images that evocatively fix him and his distant world indelibly in our minds.

Ian Williams:

Named one of the top ten writers to watch by the CBC, Ian Williams is a poet. He is an assistant professor of poetry  at the University of British Columbia and has a Ph.D. in English. Williams’ writing has been featured in several North American journals and anthologies.

The Jury Citation of his Novel:

Ian Williams’s Reproduction is many things at once. It’s an engrossing story of disparate people brought together and also a masterful unfolding of unexpected connections and collisions between and across lives otherwise separated by race, class, gender and geography. It’s a pointed and often playful plotting out of individual and shared stories in the close spaces of hospital rooms, garages, mansions and apartments, and a symphonic performance of resonant and dissonant voices, those of persons wanting to impress persuade, deny, or beguile others, and always trying again.

More Information

The winner of the ScotiaBank Giller Prized will be announced tonight, November 18, 2019. For more information, visit the official website here.

Source: https://scotiabankgillerprize.ca/2019-finalists/

 

Update:

Congratulations to Ian Williams for winning the 2019 Giller Prize!

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An Interview With Vici Johnstone Owner of Caitlin Press

“Trust for me is when people take the time to understand the value of our industry.”-Vici Johnstone

Vici Johnstone has worked in the arts her whole life, but it hasn’t always been a straight line. She went from high school drama classes, to working in theatre production, to being a rock’ n’ roll roadie for a sound equipment company. From there, she worked at the Banff Centre and then at CBC Radio.

Along the way, she met Howard White and started working at Harbour Publishing. “I worked my way up and learned the nuts and bolts of publishing.” Vici was given a crash course in the business of publishing, which proved serendipitous a few years later. While she was working at Harbour, Howard’s sister, the owner of Caitlin Press, sadly passed away. There was an opportunity for Vici to buy the publishing house, and she jumped at the chance to build upon its longstanding history.

Caitlin Press was originally named for Caitlin Thomas, the wife of Dylan Thomas, yet its feminist roots don’t end there. While Vici doesn’t solely publish books written by women, there is definitely a focus on women. “We have a stronger focus on women’s stories then the politics of feminism. The problem has always been that women’s stories haven’t been well documented. So much has been written about men, but I’m more interested in what lies in the trunks of our grandmothers’ attics.”

Over the years, Vici’s brought her own personality to Caitlin Press. She’s especially proud of her latest initiative, Dagger Editions, which focuses on queer women’s stories. “We’re trying to create a national voice for queer women. We want it to be a voice for the community.”She also hasn’t lost sight of one of Caitlin Press’s original mandates – to give voice to people in rural parts of B.C. “I’m especially interested in stories taking place in rural areas with connections back to larger cities.” Located in the coastal community of Halfmoon Bay, Vici understands the challenges of being both connected and disconnected from the big city. She also understands the importance of bringing the stories being told in rural settings to light. “The community is really supportive here on the Sunshine Coast, but export remains our biggest issue.”

Creative BC has been instrumental in helping Vici promote her books overseas. “Export is on everyone’s mandate because we’ll be the guest host at the Frankfurt 2020 Book Fair. Livres Canada Books and Creative BC sponsored my trip to Germany because they see the value in getting our stories out into the international market.”

Publishing is an art form, and there are so many nuances to consider. “I think publishing as an industry is really reaching outside itself – there are so many books now that are breaking the boundaries, pushing the edges. It’s not just love stories – our narrative here in Canada is different. There’s something like 10,000 books being published in Canada each year. What people read, what people write, it’s all changing. What doesn’t change is our desire to know people.” That’s what Caitlin Press continues to explore.

Publishing is an art form, and there are so many nuances to consider. “I think publishing as an industry is really reaching outside itself – there are so many books now that are breaking the boundaries, pushing the edges. It’s not just love stories – our narrative here in Canada is different. There’s something like 10,000 books being published in Canada each year.

What people read, what people write, it’s all changing. What doesn’t change is our desire to know people.”

That’s what Caitlin Press continues to explore.

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2018 BC Book Festival Calendar

A Literary Adventure

We have complied a list of all of the incredible book festivals in BC! Take some time out of your summer and stretch your literary lens with a festival journey of a different kind.

 

Elephant Mountain Library Festival: July 12-15 | Nelson

Denman Island Readers and Writers Festival: July 19-22 | Denman Island

Spoke Literary Festival:  August 10-12 | Vernon

36th Annual Sunshine Coast Festival of the Written Arts: August 16-19 | Sechelt

LiterAsian: Sept 21-23 | Vancouver

Word Vancouver: Sept 24-30 | Vancouver

Victoria Festival of Authors: Sept 25-30 | Victoria

Whistlers Writers Festival: Oct 11-14 | Whistler

2018 Vancouver Writers Festival: Oct 15-22  | Vancouver

Surrey International Writers Conference: Oct 19-21 | Surrey

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An interview with Rob Sanders from Greystone Books

“Support in getting out to other parts of the world is critical. We can’t just sit back.”

-Rob Sanders

Without question, there is a strong demand for Canadian content in Canada, yet that doesn’t always translate to international success. According to Rob Sanders of Greystone Books, in order to thrive in today’s publishing market, you need to think globally.

Greystone had the foresight many years ago to set up strong distribution channels across the US and UK, and that’s helped them stay in the game. “We are a stealth publisher, which for us means not pushing Canada on the rest of the world. We find it’s more effective to publish ideas and information without borders.”

While it can be hard to compete with major publishing cities in different time zones, such as New York or Toronto, what it really comes down to is readership. Rob believes that a reader in Texas or London, England can be just as engaged as a reader in Cranbrook, BC. It’s only a matter of reaching them in the most economical and efficient way.

 

Despite the advantages the big publishing cities have, they’re not always better, according to Rob. “In places like Toronto and New York, there’s always something happening, 24 hours a day and that can detract attention. Out here, you have a bit more quiet so you can focus on your community. We have a good sense of what people are doing here.”

British Columbia has a strong publishing community. From writers to designers, artists to small publishing houses, there are lots of people working in the industry. In order to stay ahead, publishers need to continue to be innovative and push the envelope. “We do something new every month – we’re always trying new things. Yet there aren’t a lot of resources to draw on, and we don’t have deep pockets, so it can be challenging. Creative BC has been helpful as we set out to learn what other markets, in other parts of the world, are doing.”

What it comes down to is building relationships and fostering communities. It’s helping establish places, in person and online, for books to find their readers.

“I believe that good material will always find interested readers. For us, it’s about being sensitive to what people want, how they will react and where they will hear about it. Young people are the readers of today and tomorrow, and we want to continue to create an active, dynamic community of writers and people who are interested in what they are saying.”

This interview originally appeared in Creative BC’s 2016/2017 Impact Report.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Celebrated BC Children’s Authors Release New Book

Following the success of their bestselling book Hello Humpback!, celebrated and award-winning children’s authors Roy Henry Vickers and Robert (Lucky) Budd are back with One Eagle Soaring.  We had a moment to check-in with Lucky and learn more about these wonderful books. Read our full interview below and follow along on Twitter with Lucky and Roy.

How did the partnership begin?

Roy and I met over our love of BC’s stories! I was working for a time at the Royal BC Museum as the person charged with digitizing their oral history collections. It took me nearly 5 years to listen to all of the amazing stories in there! Roy called me one day because there were a few recordings he was looking for. We connected right away and have been in this together ever since.

How many books are in the series (or, how many will there be)?

We are planning on doing 3 books in this series: first words (Hello Humpback), numbers (One Eagle Soaring) and colours (that will be next year). It is possible we will do a 4th.

What inspired One Eagle Soaring and Hello Humpback?

I was visiting Roy’s home which overlooks the Skeena River. My children (5-3 at the time) were playing on the grass with a friend’s little one (1 year old). An eagle swooped over the river and landed in a tree. Our friend said, “I wish there was a little book that could explain what we see every day on the west coast to my toddler!” Roy and I looked at one another and said, “We can do that!” The result was Hello Humpback!

What’s next for the series?

The next book in the series is a book that will introduce the colours we see everyday when we are out playing along our majestic west coast!!

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ROY HENRY VICKERS is a renowned carver, painter and printmaker. He is the co-author of Harbour Publishing’s popular children’s Northwest Coast Legends series, all of which were shortlisted for the Bill Duthie Booksellers’ Choice Award: Raven Brings the Light in 2014, Cloudwalker in 2015, Orca Chief in 2016 and Peace Dancer in 2017. He lives in Hazelton, BC.

ROBERT (LUCKY) BUDD is the co-author of the Northwest Coast Legends series and the author of Voices of British Columbia (Douglas & McIntyre, 2010), which was shortlisted for the 2011 Bill Duthie Booksellers’ Choice Award, and its sequel, Echoes of British Columbia (Harbour Publishing, 2014), which won second prize in the BC Historical Federation’s writing competition in 2014. He lives in Victoria, BC.

 

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