11:00 - 11:30 :: The Ghost Brush by Katherine Govier

Oei is the daughter of the great Japanese printmaker Katsushika Hokusai. Long consigned to a minor role as gloomy sidekick, she is barely a footnote in the historical record. In The Ghost Brush, Oei tells her story, plunging us into 19th-century Edo, a brilliant, colourful world in which courtesans rub shoulders with poets and artists consort with warriors, and in which the arts flourish despite a repressive political regime.

Learn more about Katherine Govier

11:30 - 12:00 :: Fauna by Alissa York

The wide ravine that bisects the city is home to countless species of urban wildlife, including human waifs and strays. When Edal Jones can't cope with the casual cruelty she encounters in her job as a federal wildlife officer, she finds herself drawn to a beacon of solace nestled in the valley under the unlikely banner of an auto-wrecker's yard. Guy Howell, the proprietor, is well versed in the delicate workings of damaged beings, and he might just stand a chance at mending Edal's heart.

Learn more about Alissa York

12:00 - 12:45 :: Short but Sweet

 Taste test the debut releases from hot new names in Canadian literature

Bloom

On the day of a lunar eclipse, a Canadian physicist named Louis Slotin was responsible for a phenomenon scientists call a “bloom.” Michael Lista, a wildly engaging new voice in poetry, re-imagines this fateful day in a long poem that draws upon the still-mysterious events of May 21, 1946.

Snowmen

Charles Perth has left his comfortable life in Toronto to complete a record-setting trek across the Arctic Circle. He has trained for the cold—but nothing can prepare him for the deadly game of sabotage being played from far away by his unstable and resentful dying brother. Mark Sedore’s Snowmen won the 32nd Annual International 3-Day Novel Contest.

One Bird’s Choice

One Bird’s Choice is a hilarious memoir by former CBC Radio writer Iain Reid.  When Iain lands a job at a radio station near his childhood home, he decides to move back in with his lovable but eccentric parents on their hobby farm. What starts out as a temporary arrangement turns into a year-long extended stay, in which Iain finds himself fighting with the farm fowl, taking fashion advice from the elderly, and ultimately easing (perhaps a little too comfortably) into the semi-retired lifestyle.

12:45 - 1:15 :: Five Seconds at a Time by Denis Shackel

On a bright spring day seven years ago, Denis Shackel and his brother-in-law, Bruce MacGregor, set out to climb Mt. Ruapehu in New Zealand. Although Bruce was an experienced climber, he lost his footing as they approached the summit and fell to his death.  Stranded for the night in a T-shirt and shorts, and with temperatures plunging to     -30 C, Shackel managed to stay alive through a technique that he calls “five seconds at a time.”

Learn more about Denis Shackel

1:15 - 2:25 :: Young at Heart 

Join Alice Kuipers, Allan Stratton, Richard Scrimger and Gillian Cummings as they discuss how authors of young adult fiction find an authentic voice for their teenage characters.

Gillian Cummings has held editing positions with two Toronto magazines, and has written extensively for magazines such as Canadian Living and Style at Home. Set in Toronto, Somewhere in Blue (Lobster Press) is her first novel.

Alice Kuipers is the author of Life on the Refrigerator Door. Sold in twenty countries, it was the winner of the Saskatchewan First Book Award. In The Worst Thing She Ever Did (HarperTrophy Canada), Sophie must confront the tragedy of her past so she can face the future.

Richard Scrimger is the award-winning author of several novels, picture books, screenplays, and short stories. Me & Death: An Afterlife Adventure (Tundra Books) is a hilarious, bleak, and ultimately hopeful visit to the afterworld.

Allan Stratton is the internationally acclaimed author of many books, including Chanda’s Secrets and Chanda’s Wars. Borderline (HarperTrophy Canada) is the gripping tale of a boy whose family suddenly finds his family at the centre of an international terror plot. 

2:15 - 2:45 :: ABC Life Literacy Launch of Good Reads

Good Reads books address the shortage of engaging books for adult literacy learners—books with adult characters, perspectives, themes and subjects—that encourage reading practice, develop literacy skills, and increase reading confidence. 

Join author Maureen Jennings as she reads from her Good Reads title, Shipwreck. 

2:45 - 3:15 :: Every Lost Country by Steven Heighton

A doctor and his daughter travel to Nepal to join a climbing expedition. As they sit on the border between China and Nepal, a group of Tibetan refugees are seen fleeing from Chinese soldiers. When shooting starts, the doctor rushes toward the ensuing melee, ignoring the objections of the expedition leader, who doesn’t want to get involved.  When is it acceptable to be a bystander, and when do life and loyalty demand more?

Learn more about Steven Heighton

3:15 - 3:45 :: Practical Jean by Trevor Cole

Practical Jean is a darkly humourous and revelatory tale of an ordinary, small-town woman with the usual challenges of middle age — a do-nothing husband, a family that refuses to understand her — who realizes her fondest wish is to protect her dearest friends from the indignities of aging and illness. And that's when she decides to kill them . . .

Learn more about Trevor Cole

3:45 - 4:15 :: The Authenticity Hoax by Andrew Potter

We live in a world increasingly dominated by the fake, but people everywhere are demanding the exact opposite, heralding "authenticity" as the cure for isolated individualism and shallow consumerism. Andrew Potter brilliantly unpacks our modern obsession with authenticity. He finds that the search for authenticity often creates the very problems it's meant to solve.

Learn more about Andrew Potter

4:15 - 4:45 :: Sunray: The Death and Life of Captain Nichola Goddard by Valerie Fortney

Nichola Goddard was twenty-six years old when she became the sixteenth Canadian solder to die in Afghanistan.  She also earned herself a spot in the history books: the first female Canadian soldier to die in combat.  Sunray examines how a woman raised by self-described “left-wing hippies” came to find herself fighting – and dying – in Afghanistan.

Learn more about Valerie Fortney

4:45 - 5:30 :: Short but Sweet

Taste test the debut releases from hot new names in Canadian literature

Tiny, Frantic, Stronger

In Tiny, Frantic, Stronger, Jeff Latosik considers states of durability and longevity in an age of ephemeral mores and instant gratification. Latosik's award-winning poems have appeared in magazines and journals across the country.  

When Fenelon Falls

 A spaceship hurtles towards the moon, hippies gather at Woodstock and Charles Manson leads a cult into murder: it’s the summer of 1969. And as mankind takes its giant leap, Jordan May March, disabled bastard and genius, limps and schemes her way towards adulthood.  Dorothy Ellen Palmer is a Toronto-based writer.

God Loves Hair

God Loves Hair is a collection of 20 short stories following a tender, intellectual, and curious child as he navigates complex realms of sexuality, gender, racial politics, religion, and belonging.  Vivek Shraya is a transplanted prairie boy living in Toronto. Active in the local queer community, he’s also a musician who has toured North America. 

5:30 -6:00 :: Sheila Heti

How Should a Person Be? is a novel of many identities: it is an autobiography of the mind,

a postmodern self-help book, and a portrait of the artist as a young woman. Thrown into a quandary of self-doubt by a divorce, “Sheila” finds herself questioning how a person should be in the world. Inspired by her friend — the painter Margaux — and her untortured ability to live and create, Sheila casts Margaux as material, embarking on a series of recordings in which nothing is too personal, too ugly, or too banal to be turned into fiction.

Learn more about Sheila Heti