Catherine Austen's Blog, page 4

Judging the 2022 Ottawa Book Awards

It was an honour to be on the jury of the Ottawa Book Awards this year, with fellow jurors Conyer Clayton and Faizal Deen. 

We considered more than 80 submissions in the English Fiction category, including poetry and prose for all ages. With such a talented pool of authors in Ottawa, it was difficult to narrow down the finalists to these fabulous five. 

WINNER

Masses on Radar by David O’Meara

What the jury had to say: 

David O’Meara’s Masses On Radar, his 5th poetry collection, is quite simply an astonishing book. This is high-voltage poetry, gorgeously written, edited, and arranged, as well as reflective and tender. O’Meara’s poems, his “pantomime of normal”, offer us compelling portraits, both funny and heart-rending, of the poet’s consciousness in middle age. Having the opportunity to read O’Meara’s poems is an enriching and unforgettable experience!

FINALISTS

Everyone in this Room will Someday be Dead by Emily Austin

What the jury had to say: 

Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead is a striking debut novel — both a page-turner and an impressive literary accomplishment. Emily Austin deftly combines her sharp wit with dark humor in this book grounded in the absurdity of the day-to-day life and mental health struggles of a young atheist lesbian named Gilda who winds up working at a Catholic church. Equal parts hilarious, moving, and timely, we could not get enough of the internal life and musings on death, religion, relationships, and everything in between from Austin’s main character.

Repointing the Bricks by Jacqueline Bourque

What the jury had to say: 

The elegiac poems that comprise Jacqueline Bourque’s Repointing the Bricks impressed us with their emotional and philosophical power. Bourque’s elegantly crafted and tuned writing invites readers into the thematic thresholds of “home”—birthed in the saltwater memory of a New Brunswick upbringing and recollected in a rainstorm from the open window of an Ottawa apartment. This is a deeply felt and thought-provoking poetry collection!

The Artist and the Assassin by Mark Frutkin

What the jury had to say: 

Mark Frutkin’s The Artist and the Assassin immerses the reader in Caravaggio’s Rome. Thoroughly researched, well plotted, and beautifully written, this historical novel is a poetic page-turner. Its familiar and strange world is fully realized in lush detail – we walk the streets, mix the paints, and follow the light and darkness of its volatile main characters.

Letters from Jonny by Wayne Ng

What the jury had to say: 

Wayne Ng’s Letters from Johnny is a children’s novel set in downtown Toronto in late 1970. There’s an exciting plot – a national crisis, a neighbourhood murder, a personal betrayal – but it’s the voice of 11-year-old Johnny Wang – so honest and inquisitive and full of longing – that captures the reader’s heart. This is a story we haven’t read before, one whose humour and charm will engage readers of all ages.

What a treat to read these great books and have a small hand in honouring them. 

The Ottawa Book Award ceremony was held earlier this month in Ottawa, along with the Archibald Lampman Award for poetry and the Prix AAOF de littérature jeunesse.

Check out all the finalists and winners. 

Discover the Best Books on Shepherd.com

I’m pleased to join the many authors making book recommendations on the new book discovery site, Shepherd.com. Check it out to discover the books your favourite authors recommend.

You can find thousands of recommendations for books connected by theme. (And you’ll only find recommendations – no ratings, no complaints.) Whether you’re looking for a cookbook, a romance, or an exploration of freedom of speech in ancient Greece — or anything else that suits you — you’ll find it there.

The recommendations are highly personal – reading them, you’ll get to know the authors a little bit more by the books they choose and their reasons for recommending them. So if you have a favourite author, look for them there.

You can read my list of “Best Books with Understated Siblings” here. 

And while you’re there, check out the entire sibling bookshelf.

The Shepherd.com site launched in April 2021 and it’s still in its beta stage, but over 150,000 visitors are already browsing its bookshelves each month. It will soon include genre and age pages and additional filters to help readers search for new best books. You can sign up as an author or as a reader to keep on top of progress through the Shepherd monthly newsletter. Or find them on Twitter and Facebook.

Happy reading.

Celebrating Literacy

I’m thrilled to be heading to Shawville, Quebec, next month for “Get the Word Out!,” a literacy festival hosted by the Western Quebec Literacy Council.

I’ll be joining other local artists and authors Jamaal Jackson Rogers, Robin Blackburn McBride, Seymour Hamilton, Katharine Fletcher, and Venetia Crawford for a day of poetry, stories, workshops and presentations on all good things, literary-wise.

Check out the full author lineup (and share this poster if you’re in the area!):

It’s happening on Saturday, September 10th, 2022 at Mill Dam Park (74 Clarendon Street), Shawville, Quebec. Here’s the day’s schedule:

Author Readings:

10:30 am.: Katharine Fletcher11:30 am: Venetia Crawford12:30 pm: Jamaal Jackson Rogers1:30 pm: Seymour Hamilton2:30 pm: Catherine Austen (that’s me!)3:30 pm: Robin Blackburn McBride

Workshops:

11:00 am: “Creating Community: Write what you Know” with Katharine Fletcher1:00 pm: “Poetry and the Art of Spoken Word” with Jamaal Jackson Rogers3:00 pm: “Five ways to Start a Story” with Catherine Austen (me again)

Plus there will be all-day info sessions with many community organizations, and places for the kids to play. Here’s a schedule poster — please repost it if you’re in the area.

I pass through Shawville regularly on the way to my cabin. It will be a treat to spend the day there and get to know more than the Canadian Tire store.

If you are in Western Quebec, come by for a fun day. And bring some stories to tell.

Hope to see you there!

Short Stories

The Autumn 2021 issue of The Dalhousie Review, released in Spring 2022

I’m thrilled to have a short story in the latest issue of The Dalhousie Review — my first one in its pages. The magazine was founded in 1921 and is still in print after 100 years. Amazing.

My story, “Down the Drain,” is about a writer on the brink of madness. (Over the brink by the story’s end.) It’s a piece I’ve read at two regional writers’ meetings to warm reception and assurances that the story is both funny and full of pain. Like life. Like the writing life, certainly.

I’d link to it here, but The Dalhousie Review is a print journal, and you need a subscription to read it. (So subscribe!)

I love a print journal. I switch my subscriptions regularly to support as many as I can. I don’t fully read all that I subscribe to, for lack of time. And I don’t have enough bookshelf space to keep them all so I pass them on to other writers. But I love them anyway. It’s nice to hold a literary journal in your hands.

I love an online journal, too. I’m used to easy access to free stuff and I like the act of clicking almost as much as turning pages. So I’m thrilled to have another story coming out this season in Carousel, another longstanding Canadian literary magazine (since the 1980s), and one that became exclusively online in 2020.

The latest issue of Carousel.

I’ll keep you posted when that story — “Sadistic Romance Writers” — comes out. It’s another one directed at writers, a comedic piece about boredom and the search for new stories at any cost.

I still write for young people. I’m writing a story for Blue Met right now, on the theme of numbers — I’ll link to that when it’s out this fall.

In the meantime, if you’re looking for a litmag to publish your work, there are dozens of great ones out there, both print and online. I used to keep a list here on my website, but the best, most comprehensive and regularly updated list I’ve found is this one:

The CBC’s “Guide to Canadian Litmags”

(The CBC’s “Guide to Young Writers’ Contests” is also fab.)

So check those out. Write. Submit. Repeat. Good luck!

Thank-you, Canada Council for the Arts!

I was fortunate to receive a Research and Creation grant from the Canada Council for the Arts last year, funding the past 8 months of dedicated writing time so I could draft a new teen novel. And today I drafted the final scene of the book. Hurrah! 

There’s a ton of revision yet to do, but getting that first draft completed is the biggest hurdle for me. Or if not the biggest, the first. You don’t get anywhere until you’re over that one. So this is a huge milestone to celebrate.

The book is a love story between two young artists, one snug in school and one struggling to pay rent and raise a child. They inspire and delight each other until envy ruins everything and the student “borrows” the barista’s work and passes it off as her own. He wasn’t doing anything with it anyway and her own work lacked passion and her professor was demanding something original and – well, that’s one way to cause a breakup. 

She doesn’t get away with her plagiarism. He finds out. The school finds out. Her parents find out. The world finds out. Her shame is public and unbearable. But one needs passion to make good art, and the root of passion is suffering (at least linguistically), and in the fiasco that follows, she finally finds something to say as an artist. 

And him? Can he forgive her? Could you really forgive something like that? And does he even have time for a relationship, with a kid to raise and a GED to earn and newfound fame for his artwork, thanks to her public shaming?

To answer those questions, you’d need to know more about him, and this blog post is only so long, so you’ll just have to wait to read the book. But before that can happen, I have to revise the manuscript, and before I can do that I need to put it away for a while so I can see it fresh. So you might want to find a few other books to read in the meantime. 

But this is definitely the time to say thank you to the Canada Council for the Arts for supporting me in writing this book. It’s a financial boon, of course, but it’s also a vote of confidence, and both were essential to complete the draft. This is my first attempt at a novel in verse (so there’s going to be a lot of revision!), so along with daily writing time these past months, I’ve been studying poetry. And I’m getting a little better at it. 

Want to know more about the Canada Council for the Arts? Here goes:

The Canada Council for the Arts contributes to the vibrancy of a creative and diverse arts and literary scene and supports its presence across Canada and around the world. The Council is Canada’s public arts funder, with a mandate to “foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts.” The Council’s grants, services, initiatives, prizes, and payments support Canadian artists, authors, and arts groups and organizations. This support allows them to pursue artistic expression, create works of art, and promote and disseminate the arts and literature. Through its arts funding, communications, research, and promotion activities, the Council fosters ever-growing engagement of Canadians and international audiences in the arts. The Council’s Public Lending Right (PLR) program makes annual payments to creators whose works are held in Canadian public libraries. The Council’s Art Bank operates art rental programs and helps further public engagement with contemporary arts through exhibition and outreach activities. The Council is responsible for the Canadian Commission for UNESCO, which promotes the values and programs of UNESCO to contribute to a future of peace, reconciliation, equity, and sustainable development.

Pretty awesome, huh? Thank you!

MYAIF: More Fun for Young Writers in Ottawa/Gatineau

Hey kids, I know you’re hustling to get your poems, stories, and graphic narratives finished in time to enter the Ottawa Public Library’s Awesome Authors Youth Writing contest. Some of you might even be prepping for tomorrow’s Awesome Author teen workshops or fondly remembering the pre-teen workshops of the past few weeks (thanks — I had a blast). But why not sign up for even more writing and illustrating fun this season?

Registrations are open for MASC’s annual Young Authors and Illustrators Festival (aka MYAIF).

Virtual once again this year on account of Covid, the Festival will be one day of online fun and virtual workshops with seven Canadian children’s authors: JustJamaal ThePoet, Vikki VanSickle, Sarah Raughley, Brian McLachlan, Catherine Austen, Jeff Ross, and Angela Misri. (Yes, I am one of the seven — but you can sign up with someone else for the breakout sessions. No hard feelings.)

The Festival will take place on April 23, 2022. It’s open to young writers and artists in grades 6, 7, and 8. (Registration is limited and you should sign up by March 4th.)

Read the day’s schedule, presenter bios, and registration information on the MASC website. You’ll find a video and glowing testimonials from kids who attended in previous years. It’s a seriously fun event.

So take a moment to learn more and sign up. Then get back to those stories, poems, and graphic narratives because the deadline for Awesome Authors is February 25th, just one week from today.

Good luck, and I hope to see you at MYAIF.

Awesome Authors 2022 is on!

The Ottawa Public Library’s Awesome Authors Youth Writing Contest is back! Young writers of the nation’s capital, get to work on your poems, short stories, and comics. You could win publication, glory, cold hard cash!

Learn all the details from the Awesome Authors page on the OPL website.

I’ll be judging English fiction in the 9-12 age category again this year — and I want to read your story!

Other judges this year are Apollo the Child; Amelinda Bérubé; Pierre-Luc Bélanger; and Éric Péladeau. Check everyone out on the Ottawa Public Library’s YouTube channel.

All judges are offering virtual writing workshops to help you get started, from January 29th through February 19th. Find the full schedule and registration links on the OPL Awesome Authors page.

Entries are judged in two age categories (9-12 and 13-18), two languages (English and French) and three genres (poem, short story, comic). Ambitious writers can submit one (but only one) of everything. The contest deadline is February 25th, 2022.

Be sure to read all the rules before submitting. And check out the winning pieces from past years anthologized in Pot-pourri, published annually by the Friends of the Ottawa Public Library Association.

Good luck!

Launching Squirrels

My new picture book has just been released and you are invited to the virtual launch:

When the Squirrels Stole my Sister

Written by Catherine Austen and Illustrated by Sean Cassidy

Published by Fitzhenry & Whiteside 

Launched via Zoom on November 16th at 7pm EST

RSVP the publisher: tdettman@fitzhenry.ca (I hope to post the direct Zoom link closer to the day.)

No snacks or live music, alas, but there will be stories, artwork, and clever squirrels. 

Please join us to celebrate the birth of this book. Thanks!

So yes, this is “launching squirrels” in the sense of “book launching.” No actual squirrels will be launched at this event. If you want another kind of squirrel launching, check out minute 16:30 of Mark Rober’s Backyard Squirrel Maze if you haven’t seen it yet. (And if you haven’t yet, you obviously aren’t googling squirrels often enough.)

Alas, there will be no ninja squirrels at the book launch.

Halloween Student Stories

It’s almost Halloween. To build the spooky atmosphere — and also to encourage creative writing — I’m offering these nine read-alouds, spooky stories written by students aged 11-17, all featured on my Cabin Tales podcast last October. They range from silly fun to gory terror, ideal for this time of year.

First is the shortest story of the batch: 11-year-old Jacob Tremblay’s take on a classic babysitting scare, “Bat, Axe, Racket.”

Next is an ominous tale by talented American student writer, Prisha Mehta, “The Music Box,” first published in Blue Marble Review.

Third is a futuristic fright by Ottawa student writer, Owen Fitzpatrick, “Ear to Ear,” first published in Pot-pourri 2019 and podcasted with permission of the Friends of the Ottawa Public Library Association.

Fourth is a comedic Halloween story by Quebec student writer Kaylee Williams, “Demonic Yoga.”

Fifth is another comedic demon story, this one from Ottawa student writer, Sarah Ham: “Deliverance,” first published in Pot-pourri 2017 and podcasted with permission of the Friends of the Ottawa Public Library Association.

Sixth, a comedic ghost story that was superfun to read aloud by teen writer Olivia Li, “Air B&B.”

Now it gets a little scarier….

Seventh is a creepy historical Halloween story by Gatineau student writer Olivia Beauchamp, “The Duskmire Forest.” (PG)

Eighth is a classic horror story by Gatineau student writer Lexi-Jade McCowan, “Minutes to Sunrise.” (Definitely PG)

And finally, a macabre monster story from Ottawa student writer, Aleina Wang, “The Monster of Feyre,” first published in Pot-pourri 2019 and podcasted with permission of the Friends of the Ottawa Public Library Association. (PG)

Now that you’ve heard the spooky tales of these fab young writers, why not write your own?

You’ll find lots of writing advice on the Cabin Tales podcast and on my Workshops page. Have fun. And Happy Halloween.

My Latest Picture Book

It has been a long time coming! My new picture book, When the Squirrels Stole my Sister, illustrated by Sean Cassidy, will be published by Fitzhenry and Whiteside this fall. Just in time to stock up on nuts.

Here’s the blurb:

My sister tamed a squirrel with peanuts until it ate out of her hand…. So begins a tongue—in—cheek tale of taming gone wrong. When a genius squirrel launches a daring winter storage plan, big sister ends up high in the oak tree with a new furry family. But what will happen when her nuts run out? It’s little sister to the rescue! (In her own ingenious way.)

Check out the lovely cover. (Thanks, Sean!)

You can read about the book’s development in an earlier blog post here.

Or forget the past and just go pre-order your copy today.

Happy Autumn!