· The Great Literary Road Trip: a province-by-province guide taking you across Atlantic Canada this summer, including all kinds of regional books for the road

· 2012 Atlantic Book Awards and Festival May 10-17:  We have the full list of nominated books and authors

· Interview with sports anchor and author Bruce Rainnie     

· Books on Ice! Canada’s national pastime put to the page

 · Is Traditional Publishing the way to go? Find out in our guest editorial from award-winning author Chad Pelley of Saltyink.com

· Excerpts from three great new books: Titanic Ashes by Paul Butler, This Navy Doctor Came Ashore by Charles H. Read, MDCM and Haunted Girl by Laurie Glenn Norris, with Barbara Thompson plus more Titanic books from Atlantic Canada to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the sinking

· Studio’s Cross for Katie Kross: Mother-daughter duo Donna and Bridgette Morrissey team up for a new picture book and we sneak into their home where the magic’s created

· A list of events and the latest news in the Atlantic book world

· Reviews, reviews, reviews—new fiction, poetry, history, art and culture, children’s books and much more!
 

There is a standard procedure a manuscript goes through on its journey to become a published book. Although there are set practices in place the process is not always linear, and can vary based on the publishing house. The following 'Role of the Publisher' document provides an overview of the procedures a book goes through in the publishing process. Click here for the Role of the Publisher document.

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A Taste of the Maritimes by Elisabeth Bailey and Righting the Wrongs by Marie Riley were both released by Atlantic publishers this fall. ABT’s Heather Fegan gathered thoughts on their experiences. Here is Mary Riley's interview.

A Taste of the Maritimes by Elisabeth Bailey and Righting the Wrongs by Marie Riley were both released by Atlantic publishers this fall. ABT’s Heather Fegan gathered thoughts on their experiences. Here is Elisabeth Bailey's interview.

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Colleen McKie bravely makes her pitch

Peter Twohig, left, with Fernwood Publlisher Errol Sharpe

2011 fiction panel from left to right: Host Stephen Patrick Clare, Robbie MacGregor (Invisible publishing), Susanne Alexander (Goose Lane Editions) and Bev Rach (Roseway Publishing)

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It was a packed house at the Alderney Landing Theatre in Dartmouth, NS Thursday night as over 200 of the region’s writers, illustrators, book publishers and readers celebrated the 29 nominees and recipients of 12 different literary prizes at the 2011 Atlantic Book Awards.

The biggest winner of the night was Newfoundland’s Kathleen Winter who took home the coveted $20,000 Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Prize for Annabel (House of Anansi Press), her captivating novel about a baby—who appears to be neither fully boy nor girl, but both at once—born in 1968 into the spare environment of remote coastal Labrador. Annabel was shortlisted for both the 2010 Scotiabank Giller Prize and a 2010 Governor General’s Literary Award.

Fellow Raddall and Giller nominee, Dartmouth’s Alexander MacLeod took home the prestigious Margaret and John Savage First Book Award for his collection of short stories, Light Lifting (Biblioasis). Johanna Skibsrud, winner of the 2010 Giller Prize, took home this year’s Atlantic Independent Booksellers’ Choice Award for her first novel, The Sentimentalists (Gaspereau Press). Skribsrud, who hails from Meadowville, Nova Scotia, was also shortlisted for the Atlantic Poetry Prize for her book of poetry, I Do Not Think That I Could Love a Human Being (Gaspereau Press).

The 2011 Atlantic Poetry Prize went to long-time Newfoundland resident, John Steffler for Lookout (McClelland & Stewart), the fifth poetry collection from Canada’s former Parliamentary Poet Laureate (2006–2008). New Brunswick author and professor Rusty Bittermann received the Democracy 250 Atlantic Book Award for Historical Writing for Sailor’s Hope: The Life and Times of William Cooper, Agrarian Radical in an Age of Revolution (McGill-Queen’s University Press).

The Jim Connors Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction, presented by Boyne Clarke, was awarded to Halifax lawyer, Anne Emery for Children in the Morning (ECW Press), the fifth in her popular Monty Collins mystery series. The Dartmouth Book Award for Non-fiction in Memory of Robbie Robertson, presented by the Kiwanis Club of Dartmouth was presented to double nominee Jerry Lockett for Captain James Cook in Atlantic Canada (Formac Publishing), the first book for the Nova Scotia writer, editor and sailor.

The Evelyn Richardson Non-fiction Prize, the longest-running writing award in Atlantic Canada, was awarded to bestselling Halifax author and professor, Laura Penny for
More Money than Brains (McClelland & Stewart). The Ann Connor Brimer Award for Children’s Literature went to New Brunswick’s Valerie Sherrard for her young adult novel, The Glory Wind (Fitzhenry & Whiteside).

Beloved Nova Scotia author Budge Wilson accepted the Lillian Shepherd Memorial Award for Excellence in Illustration on behalf of Halifax artist Susan Tooke for The City Speaks in Drums, written by Shauntay Grant (Nimbus Publishing). Tooke’s previous collaboration with Grant, Up Home, received “the Lil” in 2009.

The gardening book Grow Organic by Elizabeth Peirce, published by Nimbus Publishing of Halifax, won the APMA Best Atlantic-Published Book Award. Administered by the Atlantic Publishers Marketing Association (APMA), the award goes to the Atlantic Canadian publisher of the printed book that best exemplifies publishing activity in Atlantic Canada. The prize, sponsored by Friesens Corporation, awards the publisher with $4,000 and the writer with $1,000. Prizes for the runners-up—Outloud: Essays on Mental Illness, Stigma and Recovery, a collection of essays by various authors, published by Newfoundland’s Breakwater Books, and Kate Evans’s novel, Where Old Ghosts Meet, also published by Breakwater—are sponsored by Hignell Book Printing who bestow a $1,000 printing credit to each publisher and $250 to each author.

Two HRM illustrators were honoured this year with the Mayor’s Award for Excellence in Book Illustration. Ivan Murphy took home the $1,500 prize for Gadzooks: The Christmas Goose by Jennifer McGrath Kent (Nimbus Publishing) and Sidney Smith also received the prize for Mabel Murple by Sheree Fitch (Nimbus Publishing). There was no recipient this year for the Mayor’s Award for Literary Achievement.

Newfoundland actor/comedian Greg Malone and Breakfast Television host Heidi Petracek kept the audience laughing as they hosted the big awards celebration. Eleanor Dawson, Director of Arts for Newfoundland & Labrador, announced that, in keeping with the mandate of the regional book awards society, the 2012 Atlantic Book Awards will be held in St. John’s, Newfoundland, launching an effort to move the annual event around the Atlantic region.

Anne Emery, Children in the Morning (ECW Press)

 

Tickets for the fundraiser are $12 and can be purchased at local bookstores, The Bookmark, Tattletales, and Woozles as well as the Writers Federation of Nova Scotia, Alderney Gate Library and Nimbus Publishing. The event will take place at Dalhousie’s Ondaatje Hall at 7:00pm.

Sheldon Currie is a retired Professor of English at St. Francis Xavier University and the fiction editor of the Antigonish Review. He now writes full time. His latest book, Two More Solitudes: A Novel, was released in August.

Sheree Fitch is a multi-award-winning writer, speaker, educator and the author of over twenty-five books in a variety of genres. Her latest books are YA novel Pluto’s Ghost, and a re-release of her classic children’s book, Mabel Murple.

Alexander MacLeod’s long-awaited first collection of short fiction, Light Lifting, was short-listed for the 2010 Giller Prize. He currently teaches at Saint Mary's University in Halifax.

Patrons of the event will also be the first to hear the shortlist announcement for the 2011 Atlantic Book Awards, which will be released publicly on March 23. The Atlantic Book Awards Society is a registered non-profit organization that administers thirteen awards for Atlantic writers and publishers including the distinguished $20,000 Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction prize, and the much-discussed—and not cancelled—Halifax Mayor’s Awards.

This year’s festival runs May 12-19 and will include events with the short-listed writers in all four Atlantic Provinces. The festival culminates in an awards ceremony at Aldeney Gate on May 19.

Jacob Akech Deng is a survivor. He is also the inspiration for, and the subject of, a new book called A Hare in the Elephant’s Trunk by Jan L. Coates (Red Deer Press). Jacob is now a Canadian with a passion to repair the country of his origin, Sudan, and especially Duk Padiet, the village where he was born. From the age of seven, Jacob spent seven years tramping through deserts, grasslands and forests in Africa, keeping out of the way of wild animals, crocodiles and pillaging soldiers in his war-torn country. He came to Halifax in 2003. Shirley Gueller caught up with him for ABT.

ABT: Jacob, what made you a survivor?

JD: It was like being thrown into the ocean. I had to swim or drown. I learned instinctively and very quickly to swim, but what I can’t get out of my mind is the vision of looking back and seeing those who did not make it. At the time, it was as though I struck out for shore, but the shore was very far away. You learn very early that you are entitled to nothing; to have no expectations. You learn that a positive attitude will help get you where you want to be; that a dream is a necessity for survival; that it is individuals who will build a collective to make the world a better place. A positive attitude will also inspire others to help you. Fixing Sudan is a collective solution and all I can do is to help. When I arrived in Canada and saw the good Canadian way of life, it made me realize that there are too many people out there who have very little and can take nothing for granted.

ABT: Who is your inspiration?

JD: My mother. Widowed before I was born, she never allowed my siblings and I to feel that we were fatherless. She was both parents to us and she taught us no to cry. Although Dinka worship the sky, she made us believe that there is a god who loves us and that’s why, when my father died, he left us for her. She taught me the word Wadeng. It is all about hope and living your dream. She taught me that all will be good if you follow your dream. She helped to keep my soul awake to get me through the hard times when we were tramping through the bush fleeing from the soldiers. She made sure we never went to bed hungry and she never depended on others for hand-outs. She set the scene for my nascent Christian faith. A strong woman, my mother was completely independent. I missed her when I was in the bush, with all those boys who would never again have a parent’s love, never again know a mother’s kiss, never have a soft hand on a fevered brow. I miss her to this day. She died in 1993, twelve years before I returned to Southern Sudan.

ABT: What is Wadeng Wings of Hope, and how many people have you helped?

JD: The word Wadeng goes right back to when I was born when it became part of my life. It is the foundation of life, the hope to see one through the bad times, the future and all the desire to see my family again. When I arrived in Canada, I felt guilty. Guilty that I had survived while thousands hadn’t. Guilty that I could study where millions couldn’t. How could I be happy when my people were suffering? So I decided to do something to help the Southern Sudanese people. There was no doubt that Wadeng would be the name of the project. We started by collecting money for our first campaign, “Brick by Brick” which will ultimately result in a school. In 2005-2006 I went to Southern Sudan with enough money to buy the first 120 of an eventual 500 goats to give people a start through breeding and a supply of fresh milk and meat. This helped a similar number of families. In 2008, we returned with money to dig a borehole for clean water for the 5,000 villagers and beyond; we also took six sewing machines and enough cloth we had bought in Kenya to make 100 school uniforms. Our main task is to build the first school, which we will sustain through the business undertaking we have created with our growing sewing uniform project. We are probably halfway to the first $100,000 dollars, which will enable us to break ground for the school in what will be a half-million dollar project. This will, I hope, lead to more schools. Wadeng will benefit through partial sales of the book and, who knows, perhaps a good Samaritan will read about the project and step in and the first school will rise up.

ABT: How did you get to Halifax?

JD: I think it is part of a grand design. When the United States was offering some of the estimated 27,000 Lost Children of Sudan (the children who had been misplaced by war) a country and a future, I was not in the refugee camp but at school. To my horror, I discovered that while I was away someone had taken on my identity. I therefore lost the chance to go to the U.S. By sheer luck, I was introduced to the Canadians who interviewed me and accepted my wife, Jenty Mawan, and I. Jenty and I met at school in Kenya in 1999 and married in 2003, the year we arrived in Halifax, where we enrolled in ESL classes. At the time, I spoke Turkana, Dinka, Sudanese
Arabic and Swahili with some English, so English was actually my fifth, not second, language. Jenty is now in her third year as a student nurse; I graduated with a [Bachelor of Commerce] in October this year from Saint Mary’s University and am hoping to get a job somewhere in commerce, in a bank or in government, so I can give up my part-time job taking orders in a hotel just to make ends meet. I am so grateful to the Canadian people for embracing us, people from a different world where the sun shines a lot and to whom snow looked like flour or milk powder …until we touched it!

ABT: If you could wave a magic wand, what would you do with it?

JD: I would make education available to everyone. Basic education leads to training, to self-respect and the respect of others. It pays the rent, gives you security, good food, which can mean good health, and the kind of good life that all Canadians expect. My sons, Jabu and Deng, are with me on this one. It is incomprehensible to them that some people don’t go to school; that others get schooled on the ground under a tree; that I at Jabu’s age was fleeing for my life with no chance of schooling at all. When Jabu turns seven in December, he wants to ask all Canadian children to make a small donation to Wadeng Wings of Hope so that we can build that first school in my village and so sow the seeds to bear more schools.

ABT: What is your immediate and personal dream?

JD: To make sure my boys can take advantage of all the opportunities they have here; and to baptize them in the Nile River, just a day’s walk from the village of my birth.

For Jacob Deng, telling young people his story has always been top of mind.

“Young people need to be empowered; they need to be given hope, especially in the developing world. In the developed world, they need to know that the opportunities they have—health, school and, above all, peace—are not a right, they are a gift and they must value them.

“I have always wanted to tell my story but I am not a writer so I didn’t have the means—until I met Jan Coates, who had been asked to interview me for a story for Acadia University. We met in 2007 in Wolfville and talked and talked. A couple of days later she told me she felt very strongly about the story and asked me if I would be willing to have her write it for children. I was so happy.

“Jan was due to accompany me to the Sudan in 2008 but, sadly, it didn’t work out, but the story did. There are plans to get the book to countries like India, Kenya and South Africa so that the people who really need to hear my story will have the chance. Africa, as you know, has a strong oral tradition and I think the message of this book will be very compelling.

“I think the message is a means to maturity and to the knowledge that young people can change the world. Perhaps a celebrity who visits Darfur and places like that will take the book with them and leave the story behind. That way we can cross borders and really make a difference.”
 

Jon Tattrie is a journalist and writer based in Halifax. His website is jontattrie.ca

Hooking Our Heritage

 Élizabeth LeFort: Canada’s Artist in Wool

Quilts of Prince Edward Island

 Inspired Rug-Hooking

Bob Mersereau

Hilary doesn't plan to stop bookselling anytime soon!

Virgil Hammock, Sackville, New Brunswick Town Councillor, says he’s constantly searching for meaningful ways to make the town the “cultural crossroads of the Maritimes.”

“One way of doing this,” he says, “is by making art and literature accessible to everyone. I want to de-mystify it and bring it to the people.” On a visit to California’s Napa Valley, Hammock saw verses of poetry embedded in concrete blocks on walkways in a small town which gave him an inspiration. “What a terrific idea,” he says, “to have poetry in public places, where people just stumble upon it. They don’t have to attend a reading. It would just be part of everyday life.”

 “And, in Sackville, having our Poet Laureate Douglas Lochhead’s work on display just seemed like a natural fit, especially stanzas from his long work, High Marsh Road, which chronicled his daily walk on the Tantramar Marsh which surrounds the town.” Hammock’s neighbour, Graham Watt, came up with the idea of having thirty of the 112 stanzas, together with Thaddeus Holownia’s evocative photograph of Lochhead on his solitary walk, inscribed on aluminum plates which would then be screwed on telephone poles. From these ideas, the project “Stroll through an Epic Poem” was born.

In the beginning, however, it was not a peaceful stroll for Hammock When Town Council turned down his proposal in 2007, it looked more like an epic struggle was on the horizon, as Hammock doesn’t give up easily. Word of his disappointment got out, and within days he received offers of financial help from three people. “In the end, Jim Troop of Troop Signs offered us a really good deal,” says Hammock, “and George Murray of Tantramar Pharmacy paid the whole bill.”

On March 21, 2009, World Poetry Day, the permanent display was unveiled at the corner of Bridge and West Main Streets, opposite the Town Hall, with an invitation to stroll through a poem. The aluminum plates bearing the stanzas continue on West Main, past two churches, the Swan Pond on the Mount Allison University campus, the entrance to the Waterfowl Park, university residences and on as far as the Civic Centre. Along the way, townsfolk, visitors and students experience the power of words to transform an ordinary walk into something extraordinary, as they travel in spirit with Lochhead, exploring nature and self in these diary-like entries.

The first stanza, across from the Town Office

While all poets are extraordinary in that they have an uncanny ability to take the universal human condition and distill its essence, causing the reader to experience those rare “aaahh!” moments of recognition, what is there specifically about Douglas Lochhead that has endeared him to the people of Sackville?

Lochhead reads from his work at his residence, the Drew Nursing Home

No doubt they are proud of his achievements. He came to Sackville in 1975 as Director for the Centre of Canadian Studies at Mount Allison, following an illustrious scholarly career as librarian and professor of English literature at Massey College and the University of Toronto. He’s a founding member of the League of Canadian Poets, is the author of twenty-seven volumes of poetry, was nominated several times for the Governor General’s Award, won the Alden Nowlan Award and is the only non-Italian winner of the Carlo Betocchi Prize (in 2005 for High Marsh Road). But what really touches the hearts of people in Sackville is that much of his later writing reflects the town, the people, the changing moods of the great Tantramar Marsh and his keen perception of its inhabitants.

There are references to artist Alex Colville, and to the early poet of the Tantramar, Sir Charles G. D. Roberts, “with pince-nez and coattails flying.” He speaks of the late John Thompson, a controversial Mount Allison professor and respected poet. Lochhead’s solitary walk takes him past Thompson’s grave in Jolicure, where in the wind, “there is the murmur of his voice.” On other days, he meets an unnamed girl leading a limping horse through the covered bridge on the marsh, sees “whitethroats finding seed” and witnesses the “sudden drama” of a golden plover getting past the “rum-dipped duck hunters” buckshot. He writes, “There are too many faces I seem to recognize in the parade of clouds.”

When Lochhead was once asked why he wrote with such insight and passion about the area he replied, “The whole world is in your backyard if you choose to see it there, in the voice of a neighbour, the call of a chickadee. That’s the material from which I work.”

Now aged eighty-eight and physically frail, Lochhead is not writing as much poetry as he once did, he says, although Sybertooth Inc., a Sackville press, has issued previously unpublished poems from his notebooks in 2008 and 2009. The most recent, Looking into Trees, combines his poems with reproductions of paintings by his brother Kenneth. He’s also edited a collection of letters written by his mother, Helen Van Wart, to her family in Fredericton from Germany where she studied music before the First World War. Letters from Helen (Sybertooth) will be released later this year.

Along the High Marsh Road

Illustrator Sydney Smith lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Educated at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, his distinctive style, fantastic, sometimes dark, has captured attention and admiration. Renowned for his narrative imagination and detail, Smith is illustrating the new releases of Sheree Fitch’s backlist from Nimbus Publishing, beginning this fall with Mable Murple.

Self-portrait of illustrator Sydney Smith

ABT: What was your initial reaction to this project?

SS: I was ecstatic and honoured. It took time to understand the importance of working with Sheree Fitch.

ABT: How will your illustrations match Sheree’s whimsical text?

SS: I’ve loosened up my drawing; giving it freedom and fun. I love creating detail in characters.
 
ABT: Will your illustrations differ from the originals?

SS: I love Maryann Kovalski’s illustrations, but wanted a different approach. I’m using an alternative medium and creating a new visual narrative. Sheree loves colour so the illustrations will be saturated; especially this book, lots of purple. The series will be unified by being from the same hand. I’ll try for visual variety, but I don’t think I could create completely different art if I wanted.

ABT: Tell us your process for creating these illustrations.

SS: I wrote down the text a couple of times, trying to remove any association with the original illustrations and story. It’s such a familiar classic; I didn’t want to just recreate the original imagery. Mabel’s character revealed itself quickly. She’s the coolest character. She skateboards, has a motorbike, plays music and cooks. The drawing process begins with preliminary sketches where I explore characters and scenes.
Once they’re approved by Nimbus and Sheree I start with pencil, then pen and
watercolour, building up the drawing. It’s ideal to get lost in detail and take time to enjoy the process. I’m sure readers will be able to tell I had a blast.

ABT: What mediums are you using?

SS: I gave Sheree and Nimbus examples of different styles and ideas. They liked a drawing of Mabel done with a Japanese brush pen and water color washes. I love working with those; the brush pen is fun to use and is really expressive. The line quality has such movement and character, the drawing is instant and requires a confident hand. It’s a totally different approach to drawing.

ABT: Do you feel any pressure?

SS: Maybe from me. At first it was overwhelming but Nimbus and Sheree have been very supportive. Their calm confidence rubs off on me. I want to represent myself well. When I relaxed, the real joy of illustrating kicked in, and that’s what it’s about. I think it’s possible to forget your personal vision when you worry too much about how you will be received.

ABT: What do you enjoy most about illustrating?

SS: Getting carried away with my imagination. I hit a point where the drawing creates itself; decides for itself. That channeling process is amazing and exciting; it keeps me creating. I don’t believe there’s such thing is going too far. I love drawings you can get lost in, imagining the story before and after the moment captured in the image.

ABT: When did you know art would be your career?

SS: Drawing has always been cathartic for me. In my first year of university I realized it would be my path; giving me the chance to indulge my imagination and creativity, to explore the surreal and absurd and encourage children to do the same. Imagination and creativity turn great children into great adults.

ABT: What else are you working on?

SS: I’m trying stop motion animation, a technique to make physically manipulated objects appear as if they move on their own. It’s labour intensive, but the result is so special I wouldn’t change anything.

The future poet laureate of Halifax was sixteen years old sitting on her dusty rose coloured sofa. Her eyes were focused on the television set in its wooden frame plunked in the centre of her living room. It was supposed to be just another night watching “Live at the Apollo” with her family.

Shauntay Grant had no idea that her life was about to change.

While the Apollo is known for its comedians and singers, Lauryn Hill and James Brown made their names on this same stage, it would be a little known poet named Jessica Care Moor that would change the trajectory of Grant’s life. Care Moor would introduce her to the power of the spoken word.

“She just said her message in her own words,” says Grant. “I was blown away by how human and real it was. It didn’t need endless runs or dramatic octave raises. She had something important to say and she just said it in her own voice.”

For Grant it was a revelation. She’d written poetry for library contests but those were linguistic tricks and rhyme schemes that had nothing to do with the way she talked. She wasn’t writing about her family and North Preston, which were the focal points in her life. It was that moment that she realized that, “as a writer your life is probably your best story.”

She was shaken by the realization that the most powerful poetry was in the way she naturally talked. She didn’t have to speak differently to reach an audience. It’s this message she stresses during workshops at local schools.

“By utilizing your own voice you can speak for yourself,” says Grant. “I wish someone had told me when I was a kid. I’m seeing the results when I talk to these kids. It’s mind blowing. I’m just amazed by what these kids can do at such a young age simply by explaining their memories of where they came from.”

Her life story could be summed up in a long series of impressive accolades from her first children’s book Up Home (Nimbus Publishing) winning the Atlantic Book Award for Best Atlantic- Published book to her participation as a member of the Halifax Slam team that won the national championships in Ottawa in 2008. But for Shauntay her story begins and ends in the communities she called home, the family that raised her and the friends that became like family.

Her tale begins in North Preston. At age three her family moved to Spryfield and weekends meant a trip to her dad’s mother in the North End. During summers she would live in Halifax’s North End, spending her days at the George Dickson Rec Centre. From the beginning her life was focused on music whether it was playing the cello, learning the piano or singing in gospel choirs. For Grant there are few parts of the city that she hasn’t made her home.

Her new children’s book The City Speaks in Drums (Nimbus Publishing) brings her childhood to vivid life by proving the common everyday music that makes up her memory.

“Music isn’t just about music as we traditionally understand it,” says Grant. “It’s the rhythm of child running a stick along a fence, the sound of their bubble gum popping and the skipping rope as it hits the ground. You find music in trying to capture that sound and the energy that comes from the city. The book begins at the George Dickson Centre with kids playing on the playground, moves down Gottingen, to the Commons where it eventually makes its way to the downtown core. The poetry is about the sights and sounds and experiences they have on that route. The barbecues, the buskers, what makes this city so unique.”

The beautifully illustrated children’s book, with striking artwork provided by the talented Susan Tooke, began its life as a CBC commission. Different writers were commissioned to write about their city and Grant was selected. It continued its life as spoken word poetry even when it became an illustrated children’s novel as Nimbus Publishing agreed to release a spoken word CD with every book. Her rapid fire cadence narrates the story behind the landscape that changed her life.

Shauntay Grant in Victoria Park, where she appeared for the 2010 The Word On The Street Festival

Halifax has also changed as a result of Shauntay’s poetry.

“Shauntay Grant has been the cornerstone of spoken word in Halifax and continues to challenge the poetry community to strive for excellence through expression,” says internationally renowned spoken word artist Martin Trimm, aka Native Son. “She is a trendsetter and devout community focused artist in which her passion shows in her body of work.”

There were humble beginnings to the Halifax spoken word scene that would one day develop into one of the strongest in the world. In 2007 and 2008 Halifax won the Canadian Federation of Spoken Word poetry championships in Halifax and Ottawa. Canada’s representatives for the World Poetry Cup were drawn from the ranks of Halifax’s poets including original Word Iz Bond member Izreal Jones.

These award-winning poets began simply as students hanging out at the Black Student Advising Center in Dalhousie scribbling in their notebooks in between classes. Barb Hamilton Hinch, their adviser, saw potential in the kids and wanted Shauntay to hold a poetry night with music celebrating African Canadian poetry.

The event was held at the Grawood.

It was called “Word iz Bond.”

A lot of familiar faces from the advising center showed up with journals tucked under their arms. Some did covers of famous African poetry. Most did their own pieces talking about the lives they led in their communities and the burdens they faced. Grant remembers being shocked by how many of the people she saw daily had this other life. Somehow she had been in a community of poets and had no idea.

What began in the Grawood would become a monthly event called Speak run by the Word Iz Bond collective, many of whom were at that opening show in March 2001. For years, every third Thursday of the month poets would gather at Gingers Tavern on Barrington Street in Halifax and share their words. With its closing they have found a new home at the Company House on Gottingen Street.

Fists are still being raised as artists take the stage and lowered as audiences shout “Speak.”

For Shauntay her ability to speak came from the same community she is now representing in her work. Comfortable in choirs and nervous with solos she found it nerve-wracking to perform by herself.

Shortly after the night where she watched Jessica Care Moor speak for the first time, Shauntay became involved with the Imani Women’s Artistic Project. It was a three month art performance program coordinated by Anne Marie Woods, who worked at the George Dickson Rec Centre.

Woods would push the seven young women past their comfort zone. At the end of the three month program Grant performed a piece by Maya Angelou and sang in front of a packed audience. At sixteen she knew that her life would be dictated by music and poetry.

The City Speaks in Drums makes it clear that Shauntay loves the city where she grew up, evident from the lyrics written next to the gorgeous illustrations and her impassioned rapid fire delivery on the complimentary CD. She has fused her two worlds of poetry and music into a book that traces her origins and encompasses all that she has learned in the city that formed her.

Now she is a creator and co-curator of the Halifax Jazz Festival’s Words + Music series, creating a permanent place to combine her two loves: poetry and music. The city speaks in drums and if you walk downtown you are likely to see Grant walking by, with her jambay in its carrying case.

"By utilizing your own voice you can speak for yourself," says Grant. "I wish someone had told me when I was a kid."
 

When most people think of Atlantic Canadian literature, two genres come to mind: culturally focused non-fiction, or contemporary literary fiction like that of Lisa Moore and Michael Crummey. However, a long-standing, although overshadowed crime fiction scene is getting more of a spotlight than ever in 2010, particularly thanks to Pamela Callow’s and Anne Emery’s spring releases, Damaged and Children in the Morning respectively, and the highly anticipated fall forays into the genre by CanLit icon Michael Winter and critic-favourite Allan Donaldson.

Crime Fiction Highlights from 2010

Anne Emery’s 2006 debut won Canada’s best-known crime fiction award, the Arthur Ellis Award for best first novel, and she has been writing at a diligent pace ever since, having released a novel a year since 2006. The Chronicle Herald has said, “She dares to challenge those readers who are so fond of anticipating the outcome of the plot.” In the spring of 2010, she released her latest novel, Children in the Morning (ECW Press), the fifth book in her Monty Collins series, and the Globe and Mail has called it her best so far. Children in the Morning has also earned her an invite to the prestigious International
Festival of Authors, which unites over 100 writers from twenty countries for eleven days of readings, interviews, round table discussions and award presentations.

Anne Emery

The summer of 2010 also saw Pamela Callow burst onto the crime scene with her thriller, Damaged (Mira books), in which a young woman, haunted by the death of her sister, throws herself into her new career at a high-powered law firm. Before long, heroine Kate Lange “finds out how far she would go to stop a serial killer.” Callow describes her protagonist as an “ordinary woman, a woman who suffered heartbreak, who struggled with her career, who couldn’t afford to buy the alarm system she needed for her house because her plumbing was leaking.” She wanted to write about “an ordinary woman who has to face her darkest fears.” New York Times bestseller James Rollins on Damaged: “Lightning paced, innovative, topical, and most of all, frightening.” Callow was invited to the fifth annual ThrillerFest in New York City in July.

Pamela Callow. Photo: Florian Kuchurean

Highly anticipated Fall Forays into Crime Fiction

This fall has seen two highly acclaimed authors “go criminal” for the first time as well.

Known as one of the freshest voices in the country, multi-awardwinning Michael Winter has had a remarkable career to date, winning over not only readers and critics, but earning the awe of writers across Canada as well. More impressive than the diversity of his books to date is how he manages to re-invigorate whatever genre he is working with. In continuing with this groundbreaking trait of his, his latest book is a work of “documentary fiction” called The Death of Donna Whelan (Penguin Canada), in which he has pieced together the actual transcripts and court testimonies of the real–life murder trial of Donna Whelan: a woman stabbed thirty-one times by, her friends and family felt, an abusive boyfriend. The course of justice “takes many unpredictable twists and turns before the truth is finally revealed,” and Winter “preserves the nuanced voice of each witness.” The Death of Donna Whelan, like his innovative 2000 breakout journal-a-clef novel, This All Happened (House of Anansi), promises to be another unforgettable
mark on the face of Canadian literature.

The fall of 2010 also marked Allan Donaldson’s foray into crime fiction. His 2005 debut novel, MacLean (Vagrant Press), was a harrowing, literal day in the life of a shellshocked, alcoholic WWI veteran searching for booze and a birthday gift for his mother. It made the Globe and Mail state, “This book merits a media frenzy,” and that it did. It was also shortlisted for the prestigious Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Donaldson’s follow-up novel is a venture into “literary mystery.” The Case Against Owen Williams (Vagrant Press) tells the story of Owen Williams, a quiet soldier stationed with a garrison of conscripted men dubbed “the Zombies,” who are unwilling to serve overseas. When a teenage girl is found dead in a gravel pit after a dance, Owen Williams was the last person reported to have seen her. What follows is a novel that “explores the circumstances of a wrongful conviction and the gaps in the justice system that allow it to flourish.”

The quality and diversity of these four books are certainly evidence enough that there is an established and budding crime scene here in Atlantic Canada.

Lisa Harrington remembers when she got the call. She had noticed the cool kids at the back of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia (WFNS) workshop in Halifax, swaggering with the confidence of professionals in a world of nervous new writers.

Now, she was being asked to join their elite group, the Scribblers. Harrington accepted on the spot and today is preparing for Nimbus Publishing’s fall 2010 launch of Rattled, her first novel. Her fellow Scribblers include Jo Ann Yhard, author of the best-selling The Fossil Hunter of Sydney Mines (Nimbus), Cynthia d’Entremont, author of the dark mystery Unlocked (Word Alive Press), and whose next novel, Oak Island Revenge, has been recently accepted by Nimbus Publishing (watch for it late next year) and Daphne Greer, who had a short story included in Nimbus’s A Maritime Christmas. Joanna Butler, Graham Bullock and Jennifer Thorne make up the rest of the group and are all closing in fast on the promised land of publication. All were unpublished when they joined the Scribblers.

Patrick Murphy, managing editor of Nimbus, says he generally gives a slush pile manuscript 120 seconds to wow him and sometimes, he doesn’t even get past the cover letter. If it’s a book from a Scribbler, that changes everything.

“Absolutely. I know there are other possibilities from that group and we certainly have our eye on those people,” he says. “It does give aspiring writers a leg up.”

A Scribblers manuscript will be polished and know its audience and publisher, he says, putting it heads and shoulders above its competition.

Atlantic Books Today sat down with Harrington and Yhard to find out what turns a writing group into a powerful platform for publishing. The Scribblers started seven years ago when a founding core of six finished a WFNS workshop and didn’t want the experience to end. Members have come and gone over the years, but the mission statement remains the same: get published.

Harrington was asked to join a few years ago when the group went hunting for new members at a writing workshop. The Scribblers meet every Thursday at 7:00 p.m. and take turns reading and critiquing the latest chapter in their book. That slays one of the biggest dragons faced by unpublished writers—the lack of deadline that kills so many projects.

“If you’re holding the gun to your head, you know you’re not going to pull the trigger,” Harrington says. “People do it, but I can’t imagine doing it by yourself. It’s way better when you have six other voices.”
“When we don’t meet, we don’t write,” Yhard adds.

Meetings last up to three hours and are held year-round, apart from Christmas and summer breaks. The bracing dissection of the writing liberates new authors from a second albatross: without an audience, an author can’t know how a reader will react to the writing.

“It’s a trust thing,” Yhard explains. “Breaking in new members takes a little bit of commitment.”

Feedback can be technical advice about writing that’s “too convenient,” too clichéd, relies on too much action inside of dialogue and repetitive sentence structure, or it can be major revisions such as changing the point of view. When a project is completed, one or two members do a full read and edit.

“You can’t be a princess about your writing,” Harrington says. “It always makes it better. You’re just so many steps ahead when it’s done. [Publication] was always the goal for all of us. Not to do exercises or stretch your mind.”

Harrington’s book is a mystery and the group helped make sure the clues matched the puzzle and the twists popped off the page convincingly.

Wary of book clubs that turn into snack clubs, the Scribblers stay focused on writing. The chat before a meeting officially starts turns to tips on markets for writing or interesting articles on the craft.

“We’re not into each other’s personal lives. We don’t want to hear about the kids. It’s like Law and Order: we stick to the story,” Harrington says.

That also reminds the group of their identities as writers, not just parents, spouses or office employees.

“We don’t think of ourselves as hardcore, but I guess, comparatively speaking, we are,” Yhard says.

The other thing the group does well is celebrate success, be it d’Entremont’s winning the WFNS’s Joyce Barkhouse Writing for Children Prize in 2006 or Harrington inking the deal for Rattled. The first thing Yhard did when she got her acceptance letter was e-mail the Scribblers. The custom is for the lucky writer to bring the champagne to a special meeting of the group.

“It’s just an amazing feeling,” she remembers. Harrington took a more low-key approach. At the first meeting after her good news, she plunked a bottle of bubbly on the table.

“We went, ‘What!’” says Yhard, and started the celebrations all over again.

Success means a slight gap has opened up in the group, as some are working on projects that have publishing deals awaiting them and others are still working to get in the door. “Everyone tries to be happy for everybody and genuinely are,” Harrington says. “You just hope it’s going to happen for everybody. It’s hard, because you want it, too.”

“Everybody wants it so badly,” Yhard agrees.

While the Scribblers are all operating in the same general genre of writing for children or young adults, other writing groups take a different approach. Kathy Mac teaches creative writing at Saint Thomas University in Fredericton, New Brunswick, and is a member of four writing groups. She’s also the author of the Roseway Publishing poetry collections The Hundefräulein Papers and Nail Builders Plan for Strength and Growth.

The Wolf Tree Writers has been meeting monthly for twenty years and Mac’s been on board for eight. Some members are published and some have no ambition to publish. The group’s goal is to support writing as a creative outlet. Stand and Deliver Poetry Workshop does what it says on the tin, meeting weekly at STU to develop performance poetry skills, while the “mostly defunct” Halifax Poetry Workshop gathers annually when its members are all in Halifax. The new Word Shop in Fredericton came out of a STU creative writing class.

 “They’re very different, but they’re all based at heart on you bring your work, you pass it out and you get feedback,” Mac says. “The ambition is to make the work better. It’s also a support group.”
Her Halifax group provided a vital boost when her writing dreams were flat-lining. “Those four or five women were my audience,” she says.

In her vast experience, five to seven members is the magic range. More than that and you need very long meetings just to cover everyone. Fewer than that and you won’t get enough feedback to make it worthwhile.
“You can see [new writers] realizing the discrepancy between what they thought they’d written, what they thought they were communicating and what people were actually getting out of it,” she says of how groups work.

Mac recommends the “sandwich” approach of saying nice things before and after critical comments. Even then, her groups tend to question the writer’s decision and discuss other approaches, rather than bluntly say it’s wrong.

“Writing is a craft. You learn it, you learn it and you learn it— and it’s hard,” she says.

Kathy Mac, author of The Hundfraulein Papers and Nail Builders for Strength and Growth (Fernwood Publishing) Photo: David Smith

Lisa Harrington, author of Rattled (Nimbus Publishing)

Philip Riteman is one of the last remaining Holocaust survivors in Atlantic Canada. Some sixty-five years after his liberation from the Nazi concentration camps, Riteman has created a stirring account of his experiences called Millions of Souls: The Philip Riteman Story as told to Mireille Baulu-MacWillie (Flanker Press).

Born in Shershev, Poland, Philip Riteman arrived in Newfoundland in the years immediately following World War II. After thirty-five years of living and working in St. John’s, the married father of two boys relocated to Bedford, Nova Scotia in 1980.  Recently he spoke with ABT’s Stephen Patrick Clare about his past, present and future.

ABT: What motivated you to write a book about your Holocaust experiences, and why now?

PR: You know, almost all of my life I never wanted to talk about what happened to me as a young man. A lot of us are like that. Me, I kept everything inside of me for over forty years until I started speaking to young people about it in 1989. Even then it took me another twenty years to get it down on paper. I suppose that I can finally accept that there is some value in what I have to say for others, and that it might make a difference to someone else by sharing what I went through. And another reason that I wrote the book is because I got sick and tired of hearing about those people who deny that the Holocaust ever happened. Imagine such a thing. I lost my father and mother, my five brothers and two sisters and countless aunts and uncles because of the Holocaust. I know it happened—I was there—and I wanted to tell my side of the story before it was too late.

ABT: What were some of the challenges of putting a book like this together?

PR: I have spent most of my life trying to push these memories out of my head, so not wanting to push them away felt very unnatural for me. It took some getting used to.

ABT: What was it like working with (coauthor) Mireille Baulu-MacWillie?

PR: She was so wonderful. I first met her at a Holocaust conference in late 2007. I had been asked by dozens of people through the years to write a book and tell my story, but I had always said no. She was very persistent, however, and I finally said yes. And so she started coming over to my home twice a week and we would have these very intense three-hour conversations about my experiences. This went on for six months.

ABT: How did she respond to what you were telling her?

PR: She was very professional about everything and asked me a lot of very good questions. But I guess that when you spend that much time with someone, sooner or later the walls come down. There were some things I told her that shocked her and brought her to tears. That was not my intention, but it will happen when you start getting into the details.

ABT: Was the process therapeutic or liberating for you in any way?

PR: I don’t know… no, not really. I wish I could say it was, but I have learned that you never really get over something like this.

ABT: Has your wife read the book?

PR: Yes she has, but there is really nothing there that she hasn’t heard before. Maybe a few small details here and there, but nothing more.

ABT: How about your two sons?

PR: No, they haven’t read it, but again, it is nothing new to them. They were born in Newfoundland and they are Canadian citizens of a different generation. It cannot possibly hold the same kind of meaning for them that it does for me. That is not to say that they do not care or are not interested in the Holocaust, only that they cannot ever truly know what it was like to experience something like that for themselves. And, god-willing, they never will.

ABT: Do you think there is any danger of this kind of thing happening again?

PR: I would be lying if I said I was not concerned about the state of the world. Having experienced that kind of evil first-hand, and having witnessed how cruel and horrible people can be to each other, I know that it is possible. Such an experience would be far worse today however, if only because we now have weapons of such massive scale that the results would be catastrophic. You know what they say, that if we are unwilling to learn from our history then we are doomed to repeat it.

ABT: Are you still bitter from your experiences?

PR: Am I bitter? I suppose that it is more appropriate to say that this kind of experience never really leaves you. I dream of it all the time. Many of my waking hours are filled with thoughts of it. I still shudder every time that I hear a train pass in the distance, or see a tall smokestack. I am an old man now and I have had a long and full life, but still the memories won’t leave me be.

ABT: How have you learned to live with it?

PR: You just do. It is a little like living with a chronic ailment or a missing limb I suppose. I must admit that there were many times when I thought I could not live with it anymore, and I have considered taking my own life on several occasions.

ABT: What has kept you going?

PR: I am going to tell you a story. My first year here in Halifax, when I bought my home in Bedford, we had a tremendous snowstorm. Having lived in St. John’s for thirty-five years I had seen some pretty bad weather, but this was something else. We were completely snowed in. Anyway, so I look out my living room window and what do I see? It is my neighbours shoveling and plowing my driveway and front walk. Later I go over and knock on their door and I am crying and thanking them. It has been all of these little acts of goodness that have helped to restore my faith in humanity.

ABT: Have most of your experiences here in Atlantic Canada been good ones?

PR: I would say so, yes. I have had to put up with some silly stuff here and there—Canada didn’t let Jews in after the war and that’s how I ended up in Newfoundland—but it has been mostly good.

ABT: Does that kind of prejudice still exist?

PR: Yes, I believe it does, though it is much more hidden today.

ABT: So now that you have written your first book at the age of eighty-nine, what else do you have planned?

PR: Well, I want to write another book! This time I am going to write about my experiences after the war, coming to Newfoundland and travelling all across Atlantic Canada as a salesman. Oh the people I met in all of these small communities. They were so wonderful, so many of them. I am pretty sure that it will be a happy story.

Philip Riteman receiving an Honorary Degree

This season give the gift of reading with local flavour.

Atlantic Canadian Books for the Holidays has over 140 new titles for everyone on your gift list.

Pick up a copy at your local bookstore or download one here.

Fill out a ballot to win a beautiful basket of books. Details inside.

Book publishing in Atlantic Canada is a growing industry but publishers say they’ll need strong provincial support to compete nationally in the digital age.

Nova Scotia’s publishing industry is the largest in the region and the province is seeing increased sales with new publishers springing up, but the available provincial funds aren’t expanding.

Suzanne Alexander, publisher, Goose Lane Editions and Dan Soucoup, Ninbus General Manager

The Atlantic Publishers Marketing Association invites you to bring your book idea or simply your curiosity to Pitch the Publisher at this year’s Word On The Street Festival in Victoria Park, Halifax.

On Sunday, September 26 from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Pitch the Publisher will offer potential authors a unique opportunity to present their book ideas to a panel of Atlantic-based publishers. Panelists will give suggestions and feedback on how to develop book ideas or manuscripts for publication.

This is your chance to catch the attention of a publisher who might be interested in publishing your work, so sharpen up your presentation skills, draft your pitch and come out to Word On The Street!  Pitch sessions are organized by literary genres (e.g. children’s, fiction and non-fiction/biography).

The sessions are free and open to all and sponsored by Transcontinental Printing. Come listen to the pitches and the ensuing discussion as panelists discuss the kinds of books they have chosen to publish and why.
 
Registration will open on September 13, 2010. Space is limited. To book a time for your pitch please email apma.admin@atlanticpublishers.ca or call (902) 420-0711. Pitches will also be accepted from the audience the day of the event should time permit.

View the press release here.
 

After ten years indoors, the Halifax society is returning to its roots and will once again be hosting the free festival at an outdoor venue. Victoria Park is the perfect place with its central location and unique park features such as the fountain, trees, and pathways; and of course, poet Robbie Burns. Festival organizers are grateful for the co-operation of the HRM Civic Events team and the Spring Garden Area Business Association, who have both supported bringing the festival back to the street. There is a plan to move exhibitors indoors should the weather be prohibitive. The event runs from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm and admission is free.

This event is funded, in-part, through contributions from all three levels of government. The remainder of the funding needed to host the festival each year is raised through sponsorships and charitable donations. Partnership opportunities are available for local businesses whose community investment policies align with the organization’s mission.
 

Highlights of this year’s event:  
 
The festival will again look to celebrate Canadian and Atlantic Canadian talent. The day’s events will include readings, panels, debates and interactive discussions with nationally and locally recognized authors, illustrators and  publishers.
 
Back by popular demand - ‘Pitch the Publisher’ returns. Aspiring authors can ‘pitch’ their story or book idea to a panel of seasoned publishers and glean professional insight on their story concepts.  This star session is programmed in tandem with the Atlantic Publishers Marketing Association.
 
Always a family-favourite, the children’s area provides an opportunity for parents and kids to read, relax, and listen to favourite authors and storytellers. There will be plenty to do witha variety of onsite crafts and entertainment.
 
A new addition to the festival is an area showcasing reading and writing through the use of ‘digital’ tools. With the rise in digital technology, the festival will highlight a variety of interactive tools such as e-readers, internet services and audio books.
 
There will be multitudes of booksellers in the marketplace and a few special performances. Watch for program updates in the coming weeks at www.thewordonthestreet.ca/halifax
 

Learn what’s new in Atlantic Canadian books with the Atlantic Summer Reading Guide, available now! Discover 100 great books for the cottage, beach or backyard.

Pick up a copy at your local bookstore or download a pdf version. Then take a break with a good book!

Buy a featured title for the chance to win a beautiful basket of books. Fill out the ballot within the guide and present it to one of the participating locations listed on the back of the guide for your chance to win! One winner per Atlantic Canadian province. The contest closes Friday. September 10. 

Don't forget about Atlantic Author Day on Saturday, June 26th. Many of the authors featured in the Summer Reading Guide will be signing books all over Atlantic Canada. Check back on Monday June 14 for a complete schedule of events or check for details at your local bookstore.

If you enjoyed Helene Hanff’s 84 Charing Cross Road, recording the 20 year correspondence between a brash New York journalist and Frank Doel, buyer for an independent London bookstore, and opine such places don’t exist in the real world, opine no more. They do.

Ryan Turner

photo: James Cripps, Soul Development

Atlantic Book Awards hosts Berni Stapleton and Costas Halavrezos 

The field guide Birds of Newfoundland by Ian Warkentin and Sandy Newton, published by Boulder Publications of Portugal Cove, NL won the APMA Best Atlantic-Published Book Award. Administered by the Atlantic Publishers Marketing Association (APMA), the prize goes to the Atlantic Canadian publisher of the printed book that best exemplifies publishing activity in Atlantic Canada. The prize, sponsored by Friesens Corporation, awards the publisher with $4,000 and the writer with $1,000. Prizes for the runners-up--co-authors David A. Francis and Robert M. Leavitt and publisher, Goose Lane Editions (A Passamaquoddy-Maliseet Dictionary / Peskotomuhkati Wolastoqewi Latuwewakon) and novelist Trudy J. Morgan-Cole and publisher, Breakwater Books (By the Rivers of Brooklyn)--are sponsored by Hignell Book Printing who bestow a $1,000 printing credit to each publisher and $250 to each author. The prize was presented by Doug Symington, Director of Sales at Friesens Corporation.

With the spirit of the Olympic Games still lingering in the air, Atlantic Canadian authors, illustrators and publishers will now take their turn at the podium. The 2010 Atlantic Book Awards and Festival springs to life on Saturday April 10 and runs until Sunday April 18 with free literary events in all four Atlantic Provinces.

Festival details will be available at atlanticbookawards.ca, as well as on the Atlantic Book Awards Society  Facebook page and Twitter account (twitter.com/atlbookawards). In addition, look for a Festival brochure at local bookstores in early April.

The awards ceremony, naming winners in the categories of fiction,  non-fiction, poetry and children’s literature, is always a highlight of the festival. Held on Wednesday, April 14 at Alderney Landing Theatre in Dartmouth, N.S., the soiree will be cohosted byNewfoundland playwright, comedienne and author Berni Stapleton and Costas Halavrezos, host of CBC Radio’s Maritime Noon. The doors open at 6:00 p.m. with a silent auction in support of the festival before the show kicks off at 7:00 p.m. Booksellers will be on hand and cash bars will be open all evening. “The Atlantic Book Awards Society was delighted by the success of last year’s festival, and the 2010 Book Awards and Festival promises to be even bigger and better,” says Heather MacKenzie, Board Chair of the Atlantic Book Awards Society.

Bigger and better it certainly will be. Earlier this year, the Society announced that the three awards administered by the Writer’s Federation of Nova Scotia (The Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award, The Evelyn Richardson Memorial Non-fiction Award and the Atlantic Poetry Prize) along with the Ann Connor Brimer Award for Children’s Literature,will once again be part of theAtlantic BookAwards and Festival.The 2010 festival is particularly special as both the Brimer and the Raddall Award, the region’s richest literary prize, celebrate  their twentieth anniversary this year. In total, thirteen awards will be presented, including the two HRM Mayor’s Awards—for Excellence in Book Illustration and for Literary Achievement—for which there are no shortlists.

Mark your calendars and don't miss the chance to show your support for the contendersand see who is crowned the champion of their field at the 2010 Atlantic Book Awards ceremony on April 14.