Spring Update

Festival season is on the horizon! As another term draws to a close, summer fun is launching with two awesome local(ish) festivals in the calendar:

Parksville Museum Storyteller Festival

I���ve coaxed a bunch of awesome mid-island friends into joining me for a lit takeover of the Storyteller Festival hosted by the Parksville Museum throughout June. Join:

me for A Trip Through Time & Terroir: A Parksville Museum Sensory Writing Workshop: a hands-on workshop-meets-tour for beginner through to advanced writers on June 5 from 1-3pm. Register here!

Dove Cavanaugh King, Kathleen Lawless & Reyna writing as Carissa Harper & I for Stars In Their Eyes: Mid-Island Romance Authors Spill the Tea: a sweet-and-spicy romance fiction panel on June 11 from 1-2:30 pm. Register here!

Kate Gateley, Kim Bannerman & I for Magic, Mystery & Mayhem: Local Settings Through the Looking Glass: a fun-filled fiction panel showcasing fantastical stories set in and around the island on June 19 from 1-2:30 pm. Register here!

Plus: Kim Bannerman will be returning on June 20 at 2pm for an author talk featuring her Circus Salmagundi series, Dream of Fairyland: Circus History in 1920���s BC. And be sure to check out the dozens of other fantastic events on the festival lineup!

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Not in (or visiting) the mid-island region in June? No worries! There���s something for everyone with the���

Canada Fiction Fest

This two-week extravaganza encourages us to #ReadCanadian for the summer by showcasing over a hundred authors and books across dozens of panels, readings, and promotions. Join me for:

Climate Change Fiction: Reckoning and Resilience, a panel discussion with Margaret Sweatman, Alanna Rusnak, Jason Pchajek and hosted by Steve Hugh Westenra on June 24th, 6:30pm EDT/3:30pm PDT/7:30pm ADT. Register here!

Fantasy Authors 3, a group reading with Trinity Cunningham and Rachel A. Rosen, hosted by N.P. Thompson. Register here!

And don���t miss the full festival lineup and giant CanLit bookshelf!

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In other news, I���m less than a month out from wrapping up another Creative Writing with Children term. Spring means books, and it���s always fun (& sometimes a little nerve-wracking!) to see their novels or single-author collections coming together at this point! We���ve waded through a half-dozen Science Fiction and Science Fantasy titles on our ���Writing the Future��� reading list, and I���ll send them off into their summer adventures with a few dozen more to (hopefully, lol) choose from. Dystopian is definitely having a resurgance!

I���m also pretty much wrapped with the ���Songstress��� WIP���just nitpicking and shifting things back and forth depending on my mood at this point, sigh���which means it���s time to start working on next steps. Luckily, my summer is looking less overbooked than usual this year, so I���ll be filling it with next steps (or maybe sequel drafts???) Since I took a step back from short fiction to focus on the next series, there���s not much to announce on that front. Some earlier pieces still on submission (markets are doing poorly in light of the flaming dumpster to the south���), a couple of pieces lined up for publication but without firm dates, a few drafts I should probably finish one of these days���

While there���s a lot that could be said about the polycrisis, I actually can���t afford the time to cover it all, so best I can do is express sympathies to those suffering and a kick in the pants to those pretending none of it���s happening. You can���t fix it all (not all at once), but you can make a difference, actually.

Finally, as this continues to be an ongoing challenge in our (and all?) industries, a statement on A.I.: NO. @#$% no, even. I do not, have not, will not use generative AI in any part of my process. I come up with my own bizarre ideas, thank you very much, write them as weird as I want, and slap together visuals when forced using my own limited skills and the tools available. Given the level of AI-infiltration, it���s certainly present in some of the tools I use (ugh, Word, Canva, etc.), but I have it switched off wherever possible and/or avoid generative/LLM-based tools. This is another huge topic I don���t really have time to write an essay about, but it���s not ecopunk to use AI, y���all. I want existing life on this planet to have a future. I want clean air and water and affordable, clean power for all of us. I want to disempower fascists and the surveillance state. I want existing and future generations to have jobs and use their own brains and skills (UBI is a good idea, for sure, but that���s not the direction any of this is going.) Plus, the whole thing is a massive lie and bubble from start to finish (there���s no ���intelligence���, it���s a tool built on stolen work, crapping out garbage and making humanity worse based on a series of enormous marketing myths.)

Plus, it���s deeply uncool, y���all. Stop it. Be human. Make human stuff. Defy the fascists & save the planet. You know the assignment. <3