Lev Grossman (The Bright Sword, The Magicians trilogy) and David A. Robertson (The Misewa Saga, The Reckoner Rises series) are world-building pros with mammoth imaginations. Alice Kuipers (Spark: On Writing for Kids & Young Adults) hosts the conversation between this dynamic genre-expanding duo and the direction it will take is anyone’s guess! (Though if we were the betting kind, we’d have money on the question “How the heck can these writers be so prolific?!”)
Lev Grossman (The Bright Sword, The Magicians trilogy) and David A. Robertson (The Misewa Saga, The Reckoner Rises series) are world-building pros with mammoth imaginations. Alice Kuipers (Spark: On Writing for Kids & Young Adults) hosts the conversation between this dynamic genre-expanding duo and the direction it will take is anyone’s guess! (Though if we were the betting kind, we’d have money on the question “How the heck can these writers be so prolific?!”)
Bestselling, award-winning author Alice Kuipers has published 14 books for kids and young adults, including Life on the Refrigerator Door, 40 Things I Want to Tell You, and the Polly Diamond series. Kuipers has had stories produced for the CBC and essays published in Bristol Review of Books and Easy Living magazine and has blogged for Today’s Parent and The Huffington Post. Her work has been published in 36 countries, and she works as a writing coach for The Novelry. Kuipers lives in Saskatoon with her family.
Website: alicekuipers.com
Instagram/Threads: @alicekuiperswriter
David A. Robertson is a two-time Governor General’s Literary Award winner and has won the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award, the Writer’s Union of Canada Freedom to Read Award, the Alexander Kennedy Isbister Award for Non-Fiction, and the Carol Shields Winnipeg Book Award. An author, editor, and speaker on Indigenous issues, mental health, and freedom of expression, his books include the novel The Theory of Crows; the memoirs All the Little Monsters: How I Learned to Live with Anxiety, and Black Water; the picture books When We Were Alone and On the Trapline; and the middle-grade series The Misewa Saga. Robertson is founder and Editorial Director of Swift Water Books, a Tundra Book Group imprint which focuses on celebrating Story and providing a platform for Indigenous writers and illustrators to share their truths. Robertson’s podcast Kiwew, won the 2021 RTDNA Prairie Region Award for Best Podcast. Robertson is a member of Norway House Cree Nation and lives in Winnipeg.
Website: darrobertson.ca https://www.darobertson.ca
Instagram/Threads: @davidrobertsonwriter @davidrobertsonwriter
My friend Dave is wide open, unflinchingly honest, and brave. So brave.”–Shelagh Rogers
The essential guide for all Canadians to understand how small and attainable acts towards reconciliation can make an enormous difference in our collective efforts to build a reconciled country.
52 Ways to Reconcile is an accessible, friendly guide for non-Indigenous people eager to learn, or Indigenous people eager to do more in our collective effort towards reconciliation, as people, and as a country. As much as non-Indigenous people want to walk the path of reconciliation, they often aren’t quite sure what to do, and they’re afraid of making mistakes. This book is the answer and the long overdue guide.
The idea of this book is simple: 52 small acts of reconciliation to consider, one per week, for an entire year. They’re all doable, and they’re all meaningful. All 52 steps take readers in the right direction, towards a healthier relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people and a time when we are past trauma. By following these steps, we can live in stronger and healthier communities equally, and respectfully, together.
Shelley Youngblut is the CEO & Creative Ringleader of Wordfest. She was the recipient of the 2020 Calgary Award for Community Achievement in the Arts and the 2018 Rozsa Award for Arts Leadership. She also won the 2008 Lifetime Achievement Award at the Western Magazine Awards. Youngblut was the founding editor of Calgary’s award-winning Swerve magazine and has created magazines for ESPN, Seventeen, Cosmopolitan, Nickelodeon, Western Living, and The Globe and Mail. She was also a former pop-culture correspondent for ABC World News Now and Canada AM.
Be Curiouser
In the spirit of reconciliation, we acknowledge that we live, work and play on the traditional territories of the Blackfoot Confederacy (Siksika, Kainai, Piikani), the Tsuut’ina, the Iyarhe Nakoda Nations, the Otipemisiwak Métis Government of the Métis Nation within Alberta District 6, and all people who make their homes in the Treaty 7 region of Southern Alberta.
