Winter Update
Two main notes for this winter 2025-2026 update: workshops/events are coming up fast & please do check out my 2025 release list if you���re reading for one of the annual awards lists, best-of collections, or just on the hunt for some great fiction!
Also a good time to remind everyone my newsletter goes out every second Monday if y���all want to hear from me more often.
Shoutout to all the bookstores, shops, markets, news outlets, and readers that supported SFF/H CanLit & BC books last year���there���s been an incredible wave of support, and we���re only getting started. On a loosely related note, I���m moving toward supporting wholesale orders for booksellers outside of easy direct ordering distance, so do reach out or circle back if that���s of interest!
Dark Dreams: a winter book event series with local fantasy authors at:
Windowseat Books in Nanaimo on Thursday, February 26th from 6:30-8:00 pmFireside Books in Parksville on Friday, February 27
and���
Every year, groups of kids and teens in Canada, Korea, and around the world gather to grow their skills, invest in creativity, and have fun.
In the fall term, we play with form, experiment widely, and create (often hilarious) group anthologies. Cohorts range from beginners to advanced and grade 3/4 up to the end of high school, so while skill-building starts with introductory topics (character! setting! actually finishing something!) we often zip right past undergraduate-level studies to masterclasses by the end.
Seasonal camps (winter, spring, and/or summer), compress that experience into a joyful whirlwind of a week���think the equivalent of a sports training camp for young writers; soccer camp, but with more bedazzling, prop-building, writing sprints, and wandering around campus with notebooks in hand!)
Spring term is all about the art of the book���young writers each work toward a printed trade paperback of their work, whether a single-author collection of short pieces or a multi-chapter narrative (novel), including cover design, back cover copy, writing their own ���author bio���, etc.
This year, I���m excited to lead a cohort of teens through writing what for many of them are their first books (/novels) in a Saturday morning workshop (via Zoom���students come from a wide range of locations!)
And although a portion of our time together is necessarily spent reviewing (or introducing) foundational concepts, I always like to have a bit of a theme (for my own interest and inspiration, as much as the kids���! They get to write in any genre, though our readings and activities will mostly be on-theme���) So, we���ll be exploring sci-fi this year and ���writing the future������diving into utopias & dystopias, alternate histories & apocalypses, space & time travel and more science fiction & speculative tropes and genre conventions through a series of YA novel and short fiction readings, lessons, and guided exercises while we write our own books (novels or single-author collections) over the course of 20 weeks, from January to June (with a pause over spring break).
Feel free to reach out to the Creative Writing for Children Society directly or contact me for more information if your teen might be interested in developing their creativity and storytelling skills through a guided book-writing workshop intensive this spring (or to enquire about workshops on different days/times with the other mentors for various age ranges!)
Also on my to-do list for the start of a new year is to firm up the bookings calendar���professional development scheduling, festivals, author visits, bookstore appearances, etc. all start locking in, so it���s time to dig back through my inbox, send out new pitches, dust off the old ones, etc.
Thanks to everyone who���s reached out (& please do nudge if you don���t hear back in the next few days���inboxes do have a tendency to eat messages����)���and if you���re in need of creative education, professional development, school visits, etc. or even need recommendations for who (besides me���I lead the BC kidlit professional association & have lots of other publishing friends beyond kidlit to rec as well!) might be a good fit in your area or for your needs please do hit reply!
Quick round-up of 2025 publications for awards��� eligibility, etc:1. Geosapiology: a brief history of geogenesis, the Stones, and the Theory of Appeasement����Free to read on The Daily Tomorrow in July/Issue 3 Summer 2025 (7 parts, 3.3k words/short story serial)
����my first serial����
����SUPER weird (sentient stones? no MC? barely narrative?)����
����geopocalypse = slow slow OOPS����
����quiet but bloody but also thinky? ���Cerebral���?����
����science x politics x power - people=����
2. Crumbling of the Sandwich Generation����Free to read on Factor Four Magazine in their 50th Issue/September (900 words/flash)
�������Swallowing poison��� = metaphor for propaganda���but also keeping the peace, playing nice, going w/the flow, raised������, etc. ������
����Angry/sad/dark AF����
����Def. about ���� but also waves hands����
3. Powerhouse����������Exclusive to THE KINDREAD COAST (Black Cat Books, Oct. 2025), 6k words/short story
����������Gen-Alpha slang attempt (feel free to laugh!)����
����������Much horror, many monsters, also cryptids����
����������Nature is SO over us����
����������He likes to neg, she likes to watch (her bullies get eaten)����
Year���s Best Canadian Fantasy & Science Fiction, Vol. 3 (reprint of ���The Patron Saint of Flatliners���) & Brave New Weird: Best New Weird Horror Volume 3 (reprint of ���The Tangle (Did Not Kill Kitsault)) are eligible for most awards under anthology or other works categories, too!
*���Slime��� & ���Mistletoe��� WMG/Pulphouse releases pushed forward to 2026.
Wordcounts given above. All works are eligible for the Auroras, as well as general/international speculative awards like the Nebulas, Hugos, Stokers, etc. but NOT eligible for the Ignyte awards. Thanks for checking them out! :)
