[In Alphabetical Order]
Eileen Cook is a multi-published author with her novels appearing in eight languages. Her books have been optioned for film and TV. She spent most of her teen years wishing she were some someone else or somewhere else, which is great training for a writer.
Her novel The Hanging Girl/One Lie Too Many won the John Spray Award for best mystery in 2019. Her most recent novel You Owe Me a Murder came out in March 2019. She’s an instructor/mentor with The Creative Academy and Simon Fraser University Writer’s Studio Program, where she loves helping other writers.
Eileen lives in Vancouver with two very naughty dogs. She will be facilitating a workshop entitled Building Better Characters on Saturday morning and conducting blue pencil sessions in the afternoon during CanWrite! 2019. She will also participate in the agent panel discussion, providing the author prospective.
Heidi Greco is a longtime resident of Surrey, BC. In addition to writing and editing, she often leads workshops — on topics that range from ekphrastic poetry to chapbook making. She’s been an advocate for the literary arts in her community and was instrumental in establishing two distinct reading series, but she considers her greatest success to have been convincing her city to hire an official Poet Laureate.
Although she writes in many genres — with poems, fiction, essays and book reviews to her credit, Heidi is a firm believer in the power of poetry. She has been involved in a number of actions where poetry served as the voice of protest — including the Han Shan Project, which saved a forest from development.
Her most recent poetry collections are Practical Anxiety (Inanna Publications, 2018) and Flightpaths: The Lost Journals of Amelia Earhart (Caitlin Press, 2017).
More information about this presenter can be found at https://heidigreco.ca
Heidi will be leading the workshop Finding New Ways to Write: ‘A Defence of Poetry’ for Today on Friday afternoon at CanWrite! 2019.
Karen Green is associate publisher at Anvil Press and reviews editor at subTerrain magazine. She has worked and consulted with various clients (communications and publishing) over the years, e.g. Word Vancouver, J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing, Prairie Books Now (as editor), and more. She was also chair of the Literary Press Group of Canada.
Karen will be participating in the publisher panel discussion on Friday afternoon.
Charmaine Hammond, MA, BA, CSP, is a three-time bestselling and award-winning author of five books, and she is featured in seven others. She has had tremendous success in finding corporate sponsors to fund her speaking and book projects/events/tours including her printing, graphic design, venues, travel, media, technology, hotels, even her pet food and dog poop bags! She has developed sponsorship relationships with more than 40 sponsors and 60 business partners.
Her recent book and speaking tour, Million Acts of Kindness, involved a 14,000 kilometre tour in a 32-foot sponsored motor home, hotels sponsored for the team, and more than 40 businesses and retail chains raising funds in their stores/businesses to support this movement, Million Acts of Kindness. She has helped her clients secure cash sponsorship, get their clothes, travel, event needs and more sponsored through the power of relationships and collaboration.
Charmaine loves helping authors sell their books in bulk, find sponsors for their book events and projects, and, plan profitable book tours.
Charmaine will be leading the workshop Planning a Successful and Profitable Book Tour on Saturday at CanWrite! 2019.
Vici Johnstone has worked in media and entertainment for over thirty-five years. She started her career as a sound technician and roadie for the local stagehand’s union in Vancouver. In 1984 she moved to Banff and then Calgary, working for local regional theatres. In 1989, she joined CBC and continued to work in sound production, but also wrote and produced two mini documentaries for CBC radio in Alberta.
After ten years in radio and television she went back to school, acquiring a diploma from the Applied Multimedia Training Centre. In 1999, she returned to BC and began working as a producer for Basis Applied Technology where she managed projects for The Learning Company, Disney Interactive and Mattel Interactive. In 2002, Harbour Publishing hired her to work first as their production manager and then as general manager.
Vici bought Caitlin Press in 2008 and is the publisher, editor, designer and chief bottle washer. She will be participating on the publisher panel and entertaining pitch sessions on Friday.
Katherine Koller writes for stage, screen and page. Her trilogy of Alberta Landworks plays includes Last Chance Leduc, The Seed Savers and Coal Valley and her collection of plays is Voices of the Land: The Seed Savers and Other Plays. Her six-part web documentary, Sustainable Me, features Edmonton youth changing their world (sustainablemeyeg.ca).
Art Lessons, her debut novel, was a finalist for both the Edmonton Book Prize and the Alberta Readers’ Choice Award. Her short fiction has appeared in Grain, Epiphany, Alberta Views and Room, and her spring 2019 collection of short stories is Winning Chance (Great Plains). A recital reading of her opera libretto, The Handless Maiden, plays in Vancouver in June, and her radio play, Hope Soup, is part of the Edmonton Fringe Festival this summer.
Katherine is Writer-in-Residence for Canadian Authors – Alberta branch, and she will be offering blue pencil sessions at CanWrite! 2019.
Eve Lazarus is a North Vancouver-based journalist, author and blogger. Her passion for non-traditional history and fascination with murder has led to seven books of nonfiction, including the BC bestsellers Blood, Sweat, and Fear, a 2018 finalist for Best National True Crime book, Arthur Ellis Awards; Cold Case Vancouver, 2016 finalist for the Bill Duthie Booksellers’ Choice Award, BC Book Prizes; and Sensational Vancouver, recipient of a City of Vancouver Heritage Award.
Her latest book is Murder by Milkshake: An astonishing true story of adultery, arsenic, and a charismatic killer, a #1 BC bestseller. Eve teaches nonfiction writing for Simon Fraser University’s continuing education program, and she blogs obsessively at Every Place Has a Story. www.evelazarus.com
Eve will be giving a workshop on Interviewing 101 on Saturday afternoon at CanWrite! 2019.
JJ Lee grew up on Montreal’s South Shore. He studied fine arts at Concordia University and holds a Master of Architecture degree from the University of British Columbia.
In 2014, he hosted the CBC radio show, Head to Toe. It is now available in podcast. Before that, he wrote The Measure of a Man: The Story of a Father, a Son, and a Suit, published in hardcover by McClelland & Stewart and in paperback by Emblem Editions. The Measure of a Man was shortlisted for the 2011 Governor-General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction, the 2012 Charles Taylor Prize for Non-Fiction, the 2012 BC Book Prizes Hubert Evans Prize for Non-Fiction, and the 2012 Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize.
His fashion and personal essays are published in ELLE Canada. His memoir piece, “ELLE First: You are beautiful,” tied for GOLD at the 2011 National Magazine Award for Best Short Feature.
JJ will be leading a nonfiction workshop on Saturday morning entitled Insider, Outsider, Maven, and Maverick: Becoming an Engaging Expert in Nonfiction. He will also be moderating the publishing and the agent panels on Friday and Saturday afternoon.
Donald Maass is a literary agent in New York. His agency, Donald Maass Literary Agency, sells more than 150 novels every year to major publishers in the U.S. and overseas.
Donald is the author of The Career Novelist (1996), Writing the Breakout Novel (2001), Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook (2004), The Fire in Fiction (2009), Writing 21st Century Fiction (2012), and The Emotional Craft of Fiction (2016).
He is a past president of the Association of Authors’ Representatives, Inc.
Donald will be leading two workshops this year at CanWrite!: Writing the Breakout Novel on Friday afternoon and Writing 21st Century Fiction on Saturday afternoon. He will also be a participant in a panel on Saturday and our keynote speaker at the Saturday night CanWrite! Dinner.
Robert Mackwood has spent over 35 years in the book publishing industry.
As the owner and principal agent of the BC-based Seventh Avenue Literary Agency – one of Canada’s leading nonfiction agencies – he represents over 50 authors. The Agency has negotiated over 200 book contracts with sales to numerous English language publishers and translations rights sales to over 15 countries for some works. The agency launched a self-publishing imprint, Brilliant Idea Books, in 2012 for business titles and they also offer a publishing consultancy service.
Robert’s background includes 6 years at Raincoast Books and 8 years as VP at Bantam/Doubleday in Toronto.
He will be participating in the Saturday afternoon agent panel and entertaining pitch sessions that morning.
Douglas Richmond is an editor at House of Anansi Press. He previously held editorial positions at University of Toronto Press and HarperCollins Canada, where he worked on a diverse list of bestselling and award-winning titles ranging from literary and commercial fiction to memoir, sports, and narrative nonfiction. Current authors include Joshua M. Ferguson, Louise Hare, Jonas Hassen Khemiri, David Albertyn, Annahid Dashtgard, Deon Meyer, Shane M. Chartrand, Jonathan Garfinkel, Melanie Raabe, Scott Thornley, and Ian Hamilton, among others.
Douglas actively acquires literary and upmarket commercial fiction, crime/psychological thrillers, memoir, pop culture, and cookbooks.
He will be participating in a publishers’ panel on the Friday, and entertaining pitches on both Friday and Saturday morning.
Catherine Saykaly-Stevens (TheNetworkingWeb.com) is an author, speaker, trainer, and social media consultant who specializes in online audience growth and fan engagement.
Catherine shows entrepreneurs, authors, speakers, and coaches how to expand their online reach, grow their fanbase, and increase fan-engagement to sell more books, programs, and services. She does that with private consulting and with her Social Media Quick Results Programs.
Catherine is also an active member of the Evolutionary Business Council (EBC) where she is a lead in the social media committee. She is also a committee member of When Words Collide (WWC), and is Dean of Digital Media for Social Buzz U. Catherine is the co-host of two online shows: EBE-Live and Social Buzz U.
She will be leading a workshop entitled How to Grow Your Social Media Influence Attending Writers’ Conferences on Friday morning and another workshop, Create Your Author’s 2019 Social Media Plan—Simplified, on Friday afternoon.
Betsy Warland has published 12 books of poetry, creative nonfiction and lyric prose, including her best-selling 2010 book of personal essays Breathing the Page—Reading the Act of Writing. In April of 2016, Oscar of Between—A Memoir of Identity and Ideas was launched by Caitlin Press’ new imprint, Dagger Editions. Reviews have called it “an achievement,” “truly luminous,” and a “tour de force.”
In 2013, Betsy created a new publishing template called Oscar’s Salon. An interactive salon that features excerpts from her manuscript Oscar of Between, Guest Writers and Artist’s work, the salon also includes a Featured Reader each month as well as readers’ comments betsywarland.com.
Betsy co-founded with Myrna Kostash the Creative Writers Nonfiction Collective in 2004 that holds an annual conference for CNF writers creativenonfictioncollective.ca. She also founded and is a mentor in the one-on-one six-month international Vancouver Manuscript Intensive program vancouvermanuscriptintensive.com
Betsy Warland received the Mayor’s Arts Award for Literary Arts in Vancouver in 2016. In 2017, she was the Lyric Prose and Poetry Mentor for The Writer’s Studio at S.F.U. A professional manuscript consultant/editor for the past 30 years, she works with writers from across Canada and abroad.
Betsy will be leading a workshop on The Use of Inquiry and Imagination in Memoir Writing on Friday morning at CanWrite! 2019 and participating in blue pencil sessions that afternoon.