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Final Draft
Fall 2020. Skye-Larke Productions asked me to be one of the authors featured in the second series of Final Draft. The first series of Final Draft aired on Eastlink and was so successful it went national. Josephine Cresswell took this picture of me during the shoot at my home. It was a lot of fun. Series 2 of Final Draft will be aired in 2021 |
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Canada Council Digital Initiative Grant
In July, I was really pleased to find out that I was a recipient of one of the Canada Council for the Arts, Digital Initiative Grant. This grant was to help in-person performers acquire the skills to transition to on-line presentations. With the help of my granddaughter tutor, I made an on-line illustrated video presentation of a reading from Piper. It was aired live on my Author Facebook page on August 20th, 2020.
Piper Book Launch
Piper was launched at Evergreen House, the home of the Dartmouth Heritage Museum. There were sprigs of heather for everyone, Scottish airs played on the harp by Cris Sonntag, tea and shortbread cookies and a reading of the chapter in Piper where the settlers discover the terrible cramped accommodations in the hold of an old rotting ship named The Hector. Thank you so much to Nimbus and the Dartmouth Heritage Museum for sponsoring the launch and to everyone who came out.
Piper was launched at Evergreen House, the home of the Dartmouth Heritage Museum. There were sprigs of heather for everyone, Scottish airs played on the harp by Cris Sonntag, tea and shortbread cookies and a reading of the chapter in Piper where the settlers discover the terrible cramped accommodations in the hold of an old rotting ship named The Hector. Thank you so much to Nimbus and the Dartmouth Heritage Museum for sponsoring the launch and to everyone who came out.
Piper Book Signing
Great Book signing event at Dartmouth Book Exchange. November 17, 2018. Thank you Sue for the amazing and delicious cup cakes.
Port Joli Writer's Retreat For many years Jan Coates, Jill Maclean, Marcia Barrs and myself have gone on a Writer's Retreat to Port Joli. We write and talk, drink wine and go for wonderful long beach walks on a pristine beach. This year (2016) a bear shambled by, Vicki Grant cycled by and PM Justin Trudeau jogged by our cottage!!. We are pictured with a flag, which we made out of a dark pink Rubbermaid lid, a white towel and a red paper napkin. It was hastily constructed when we heard the Prime minister may be in the neighbourhood. |
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Photo Shoot
Loretta Migani (illustrator) and I on a selfie photo shoot for promotion
purposes of Explosion Newsie. We are sitting on the rocks on the
Dartmouth side of the harbour. In the background is Halifax. It is a
sparkling Fall day and hard to imagine the devastation caused by the explosion in this very area, just over one hundred years ago.
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Explosion Newsie, Book Launch took place on November 6th, 2015 in the beautiful Evergreen House, home of the Dartmouth Heritage Museum. It was the perfect venue as it overlooked Halifax Harbour, the location of the explosion.
My heart felt thanks go out to the museum who were wonderful hosts. They provided a vintage top hat for the book-draw and served us tea in china cups. Loretta's original illustrations were on view. It was a wonderful afternoon.
My heart felt thanks go out to the museum who were wonderful hosts. They provided a vintage top hat for the book-draw and served us tea in china cups. Loretta's original illustrations were on view. It was a wonderful afternoon.
Opening of the new Halifax Central Library
Carrie Muller asked me to join her in a piratical reading of The Terrible Horrible Smelly Pirate at the opening of the wonderful new Central Library in Halifax, 2014
Word on the Street 2014
A windy, splashy and fun reading of Bluenose Adventure on board Theodore Tugboat at Halifax Word on the Street,
    Research
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Read by the Sea - Wordplay (2013)
My reading of the Terrible Horrible Smelly Pirate was followed by a piratical craft (paperbag pirates) and some swashbuckling paperbag pirate puppet shows. The artist in the picture is Maegwin Halsey. The Terrible Horrible Smelly Pirate
launch party at Alderney Gate Library. (May 2008) My book was dedicated to my grandchildren, Quinn and Maegwin. I got the biggest surprise of my life when they turned up at the launch all the way from Hong Kong!!! I'm seen here in pirate attire with amazing co-author Carrie Muller and fantastic illustrator Eric Orchard. Mom's in the Navy
Research for Mom's in the Navy published by the Naval Association of Canada. (2019) Illustrated by Lin Lau, involved a tour of the Halifax Dockyard. This included hair-raising climbs up and down the extremely long vertical ladders of a submarine. It was quite an experience! I also toured a frigate. |
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Beach Clean-ups
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Taking part in the annual McNab's beach clean-up where approx.400 bags of garbage are collected every year, plus the concern about beach plastics all over the world inspired Carry and me to write The Terrible Horrible Smelly Beach. This long-awaited sequel to The Terrible Horrible Smelly Pirate and will be published by Nimbus in Summer 2012. It's a fun picture book and not a bit preachy. It is however a good start for pre-school conversations on the environment.
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Wildfire
May 2019. This month was the three year anniversary of the Fort McMurray wildfire, which in a few scary hours turned my daughter's house and many, many others into piles of ash.. I visited the city researching my Young Adult novel Wildfire. Evidence of the fire is still very visible. I was shocked to see for myself how close to the road the fire actually came.
Piper
With a grant from Access Copyright, research for my historical novel, Piper took me to Pictou, Nova Scotia to explore the Hector for Piper my children's novel about the voyage of the Hector. It was published by Nimbus Publishing, Spring 2018. This is a full-sized replica of the original old, rotting, over-crowded ship that brought the first Scottish settlers to Nova Scotia.
Bluenose Adventure
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Research for Bluenose Adventure included a visit to the Fisheries Museum in Lunenburg. Ralph Getson, the curator told me some of the gut-wrenching, funny, and amazing stories he'd heard from retired fishermen who'd actually
been throaters, headers and flunkeys on fishing schooners in the 1920s. |
Skye
I love research and the places it takes me and the stories I discover. For Skye, a novel (that didn't actually make it to publication) I visited Rob Woods, an ex-library colleague, on his Alpaca Farm and
helped with the shearing.
I love research and the places it takes me and the stories I discover. For Skye, a novel (that didn't actually make it to publication) I visited Rob Woods, an ex-library colleague, on his Alpaca Farm and
helped with the shearing.
