Writing Life: A Canadian Student’s Guide to Thinking, Writing and Researching

by John Van Rys

Based on the successful text, The College Writer, Writing A Canadian Student’s Guide to Thinking, Writing, and Researching is built upon the belief that good writing is an important skill, not just for academic success, but beyond into life as well. Bringing together a rhetoric that introduces the writing process, a selection of readings, guide to doing quality research in the internet age and a handbook, these four sections offer students a comprehensive guide to writing. This edition incorporates Canadian essays, by students and professionals, critical thinking and an overall emphasis on reading as a foundation to improving one’s writing skills. Between two covers Writing Life offers students a comprehensive guide to writing for postsecondary and beyond.

Paperback

Published March 19, 2014

About the author

John Van Rys lives on a hobby farm outside Dunnville, Ontario, Canada, with his wife April, dogs, cats, horses, Cayuga ducks, and free-run egg-laying hens, as well as two of his adult children, their partners, two granddaughters—and, just to keep things interesting, his mother-in-law. He’s had short stories published in The New Quarterly, The Dalhousie Review, Agnes and True, Blank Spaces, and Solum Literary Journal. His story “Excavations” won the 2022 Prairie Fire MRB Short Fiction Contest. His first book-length collection, the story cycle Moonshine Promises, was published in 2021 by Wipf and Stock. His debut novel, Milksop, was published May 2026 by Chicken House Press.