PAPER CHASE: Winnipeggers looking for a few good novelists

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This article was published 09/04/2011 (5642 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A prominent Winnipeg editor and writer are teaming up with a pair of B.C. authors to produce a collective novel.

Marjorie Anderson and Deborah Schnitzer, noted for organizing the University of Winnipeg’s Carol Shields symposium in 2009, have formed a publishing venture called Unlimited Editions.

They have announced plans to publish a 13-chapter novel, hinging on a tragic accident at downtown university campus, with each chapter penned by a different writer.

So far, B.C. writers Jack Hodgins and Gail Anderson-Dargatz have signed aboard. But Anderson is beating the bushes for more.

The idea of a collective novel goes back a long way. In 1969, an American version called Naked Came the Stranger became a brief media sensation.

But Anderson claims this is the first such effort to issue an open call for contributors.

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TD Canadian Children’s Book Week, celebrating books for children and the imperative of reading, will be held April 30-May 7.

Approximately 30 authors, illustrators and storytellers will tour Canada, giving presentations on this year’s theme, “Changing the World, One Child at a Time.”

Manitoba will host two award-winning Canadian artists: young-adult author Mahtab Narsimhan, who will visit Morris, Portage la Prairie, Brandon, Clandeboye and East Selkirk; and storyteller Jennifer Cayley, who will visit Flin Flon.

Both will also give public readings at libraries and schools in Winnipeg.

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Winnipeg’s Aqua Books has chosen its writers-in-residence for the spring and summer seasons.

Local fiction writer Keith Cadieux and singer-songwriter and poet Marcel Desilets will both give performances and lead workshops between May and August.

Aqua has had writers-in-residence occupy its three studios since 2008, including local young-adult author Anita Daher, playwright Carolyn Gray, and the late crime writer Michael Van Rooy, all winners of the John Hirsch Award for most promising Manitoba writer.

Three emerging writer-in-residence slots have also been carved out for April, July and August, to be filled by Bowen Smyth and Chadwick Ginter and visual artist and writer Rob Fordyce. The positions are intended to help those selected work towards their first book.

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