#writing: awards, conference, contest

First a red faced apology, I think I told you that I was going to be attending the Arthur Ellis award night. Yes, well, I didn’t. The Arthur Ellis award night will take place in June, in Toronto. I won’t be there—although, I do hope to attend this event in the future. What I attended last week was the Arthur Ellis shortlist evening. In fact, during this event, I sat my second panel as a published author.

 I won’t talk to you about my butterflies. What I will do is give you a brief review of the event that was held at the Vancouver Public Library. During our panel discussion, we explored many topics such as our writing life, the state of reading and social media. I came down heavily in favour of social networking. Even though I had to admit that it can be a time suck. However, I’ve recently become involved with Google+—and I’m in love. As I live on a remote island, networking with fellow authors as well as others in the publishing industry is a challenge. Google+ enables this connecting. After our brief panel discussion, we read the names of the authors and publishers on the shortlist. If I were worth my salt as a reporter, I would have collected these names and shared them with you. Unfortunately, I’m a fiction author and not a journalist and so the most I can do is provide a link (http://crimewriterscanada.com/). Oh, yes, and I would like to introduce you to the other authors that were involved in this event.

Debra Purdy Kong (http://crimewriterscanada.com/kong-debra-purdy)

David Russell (http://crimewriterscanada.com/russell-david )

Roberta Rich

Stephen LeGault

Colleen Cross (http://crimewriterscanada.com/bios/members-lists/653-cross-c )

Photos by Byron Dyck

And in other news…

Pulled from my email inbox…

Awards

Dear Leanne,

The final tally is done and the winners for the year 2011 have been announced. I managed to get 2nd prize (for poetry) and 3rd Prize (short story) at the Interartia literary competition sponsored by the Inetrnational Art Academy and the Foundoulis Observatory in Athens Greece.

It makes this man's day.

Cheers to all,

Manolis

One-day writers’ conference

Write on the Beach

Sunday June 10

9:15 AM to 5 PM

Beecher Place, 12160 Beecher Street

Crescent Beach, Surrey

Keynote:  Transformation in the Book Industry

By Margaret Reynolds, Association of Book Publishers of BC

Presentations:

The Power of Story in Fiction & Non fiction by Lois Peterson

Poetry in Prose by Loreena Lee

Writing for Magazine by Ursula Maxwell-Lexis

Inspired to Write by Don Hunter

$60 Federation of BC members; $76 non-members (before May 10, 2012)

$75 Federation of BC members; $90 non-members (after May 10)

Students—half price

Registration:  Loreena@dragonwing.bc.ca/General enquiries:  Ben 604-535-2977

Contest

The Victoria Writers’ Society 11^th Annual Writing Competition

Categories:  fiction, creative non-fiction and poetry

Entry fee:  $15 members, $20 non-members

Deadline:  May 1^st

Details:  www.victoriawriters.ca

***
Next post:  reading:  Sleeping Tigers by Holly Robinson

Guest Post Author Manolis

How/why did you start to write?

My first writing was back in Greece at the age of 12 when I copied a 10000 verse poem, called Erotokritos. I still have it as handwritten in my possession.

How did you become an author?

I wrote my first short story back in the 60ties, in Greek if course. It is part of a book of short stories to be published someday.

What was your first published piece?

A short story, based on my first novel, Petros Spathis, published in 2008, by libros Libertad.

Where was it published?

It was published in the Canadian Fiction Magazine, in Victoria, BC, on their translation issue of summer 1976.

What did you do before embarking on your writing career? Was it an asset to your writing? How?

As an immigrant I worked in various jobs over the years and that reflects in my writing. I retired as a stockbroker back in 1998.

What inspires you?

Everything and anything although I usually concentrate on how people interact with each other. Love, Eros are very important elements in my work. These days as I mature in years my attention is evidently turned to the aging etc issues.

Please share one of your successful marketing techniques

I don’t have any specific ways. I do what others do: readings, mailing promotions, etc

Parting words

What I have discovered by writing and especially by translating Greek Poets to English, is that us immigrants spend our lives to learn the new language in order to find our footing in the new society we have chosen to live, and at the same time we forget the original language we came to the new land with. That way we never truly speak the adopted language perfectly and we don’t speak the original language perfectly any longer. Which means we speak both languages with an accent…go figure. Advantage

Or disadvantage? It depends on the way we look at it.

Some people believe it is to our advantage that we have met another world and have learned from it while others believe that missing the original and losing part of it is a heavy price to pay…

Review

Buy Link

Author links
Manolis' Blog