Ontario Scene Presents Close to Home with Rhonda Douglas, Helen Humphreys and James Bartleman

Hosted by Carleton University’s Susan Birkwood

In Person Fiction

Admission

Free

Tuesday

Apr , 2015

6:30pm

Eastern

Christ Church Cathedral

414 Sparks Street • Ottawa

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Ontario Scene Presents Close to Home with Rhonda Douglas, Helen Humphreys and James Bartleman

Absorbing, richly characterized, and marked by smart, delightful twists and turns, the novel’s fruitful visitation of war and its aftermath never fails to captivate. If there is such a thing as a cultural vocabulary of war, Humphreys adds welcome new words to it.

National Post

From our bedrooms to the boardroom, from battlefields to hospital waiting rooms, conflict is our constant companion. We welcome three acclaimed Ontario authors for a session on war, peace, and the spaces between the two.

In her collection Welcome to the Circus, Ottawa’s Rhonda Douglas offers ten strikingly original stories that explore love and escape. Helen Humphreys, winner of Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, presents The Evening Chorus, a brilliant, beautiful evocation of place and a natural history of both war and the human heart. And in Exceptional Circumstances, former lieutenant-governor of Ontario James Bartleman plots a turbulent thriller set in 1970 and based on events he witnessed first-hand.

The Authors

Helen Humphreys

Helen Humphreys is an acclaimed and award-winning author of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. She has won the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, a Lambda Literary Award for Fiction and the Toronto Book Award. She has also been a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, the Trillium Book Award and CBC’s Canada Reads. Her most recent work includes the novel Rabbit Foot Bill and the memoir And a Dog Called Fig. The recipient of the Harbourfront Festival Prize for literary excellence, Helen Humphreys lives in Kingston, Ontario.

James Bartleman

James Bartleman is the former lieutenant governor of Ontario and the bestselling author of the novel As Long as the Rivers Flow and The Redemption of Oscar Wolf. A member of the Chippewas of Rama First Nation, he is also a retired ambassador and a member of the Order of Canada. He lives in Perth, Ontario

Rhonda Douglas

Rhonda Douglas is the author of Welcome to the Circus (Freehand Books, 2015) and Some Days I Think I Know Things: The Cassandra Poems (Signature Editions, 2008). Her writing has won awards from The Malahat Review, Arc Poetry Magazine, Prairie Fire, and Room Magazine. Her work has also been published in The Fiddlehead, The Antigonish Review, Exile: The Literary Quarterly, and The New Quarterly. In 2012, Rhonda received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia. Originally from Grand Bank, Newfoundland, Rhonda now lives in Ottawa, Ontario. Find her on Twitter @shallicompare.