Reading Series … In process since 2005

Remembering Ellen S. Jaffe (1945-2022), beloved colleague and long-time friend of Draft

By Elana Wolff

Ellen and I were part of the Draft Reading Series group-reading that was held at Farside bar on Gerrard Street in Toronto on July 14, 2019. We both brought ‘mother poems’ to read, though we hadn’t coordinated ahead of time. Our late mutual friend, poet Malca Litovitz, had a word for this sort of thing: “chung”—a serendipitous coincidence that most often occurs between good friends and kindred spirits. Malca and I would often “chung”; Ellen and I “chunged” as well.

Ellen and I met and became friends over poetry. We read together at a number of poetry venues, socialized over poetry, and wrote about each other’s work. The Draft event at Farside was the last time we read together in public and I’m happy to have these photos, which now feel commemorative. The one of us together captures the upbeat mood of the occasion, Ellen’s warmth and our closeness.

When getting together wasn’t possible, we exchanged emails. We exchanged a series of emails in December, 2021 when Ellen told me she was on a new course of chemotherapy. I asked if I could come visit, she said it would be best not to meet up under the circumstances. Unfortunately, the new treatment was not to be successful. Last month, February, 2022, just before I was scheduled to depart for a two-month stay in Tel Aviv, I received an urgent phone call from Bunny Iskov of The Ontario Poetry Society. Bunny told me that Ellen was not doing well and that TOPS would like to set up a memorial award in her honour. We brainstormed and came up with the title, The Ellen S. Jaffe Humanist Award for Poetry, top prize $1,000 for a suite of poems on humanist themes that were dear to Ellen: family, community, traditions and customs, social issues, peace and the effects of war, climate change, ecological issues and the healing power of poetry. See full guidelines here

Bunny, insightfully, wanted Ellen to know about the award that TOPS was establishing in her honour, to vet the themes and guidelines, and to receive a measure of gratification from knowing that her love of poetry would continue on in her name. And this is what happened. Through a three-way exchange of emails, Ellen was fully involved in the setting up of the award and was able to ‘shep some nachas’ (Yiddish for ‘derive pride and gratification’) during a most difficult passage.  

On the eve of my departure for Tel Aviv, I asked Ellen if I could visit her upon my return to Toronto at the end of April. This time she agreed, but she must have known that her days were numbered and that our visit would likely not take place. I was deeply saddened to receive the news of Ellen’s passing on March 16^th, one day after her 77^th birthday. May her soul ascend, may her name and memory be for blessings, and may her poetry and love for poetry live on.   

Welcome to the new year and a new Draft Reading!

Welcome to the start of season 17 of Draft Reading, the first Draft of the year!

Sunday, February 27th, 3 p.m. ET on zoom.

Please register through eventbrite.

We’re hosting readings by Carlos Anthony, Samantha Garner, Tyler Pennock and Dharini Woollcombe.

Along with five authors who will be sharing brief readings: Rachel Barduhn, Darynell Beckford, Michaela Jones, Ceilidh Michelle and Sheila Murray.

Please see below for more information about the authors and performers.

Carlos Anthony writes stories and shares experiences that Black men are afraid to write about and are ashamed to talk about. Carlos opens the discussion of the vulnerability men face but hide behind because of the stereotypes associated with that vulnerability. His work has been featured in Cry Magazine and Love & Literature. When he’s not writing articles or short stories, Carlos works on his highly anticipated novel and scripts that detail his testimony.

Samantha Garner‘s short fiction and poetry have appeared in Broken Pencil, Sundog Lit, Kiss Machine, The Fiddlehead, Storychord, WhiskeyPaper and The Quarantine Review. Her debut novel, The Quiet is Loud, is published by Invisible Publishing. She lives and writes in Mississauga.

Tyler Pennock is a two-spirit adoptee from a Cree and Metis family around the Lesser Slave Lake region of Alberta. Tyler is a member of Sturgeon Lake Cree Nation. They are a Sessional Lecturer in the Indigenous Studies Department at the University of Toronto. They graduated from Guelph University’s Creative Writing MFA program in 2013, and currently live in Toronto. Their first Book, BONES was published in 2020 by Brick Books.

Dharini Woollcombe came on the arts scene as an actress. She got her first big break as a series lead, in the 90-episode television series METROPIA, which introduced the most multi-ethnic television cast ever seen in Canada. She continues to occasionally work on stage, in television, in film, and lends her voice to media projects. Her short story, “Dancing in the Light” is in the book Chicken Soup for the Soul, which is published by HarperCollins Canada. Her humorous article, “Script to Screen in Six Weeks: Do It At Your Own Risk” was published in ACTRA Toronto’s Performers Magazine. As a filmmaker, she co-wrote and co-produced the short film, SEE ME NOW, which won the ACTRA – CINEFAM Women Creators of Colour screenwriting competition and went on to win the African Channel Spotlight Award. It was selected to screen at 11 festivals in the US and Canada, including The Newport Beach International Film Festival, and the Richard Harris International Film Festival, in Ireland. Currently she is creating an experimental piece of theatre about racial identity, (with the support of the Toronto Arts Council, The Ontario Arts Council, and the Canada Council for the Arts). Between writing, painting and voice-over work, Dharini enjoys a part-time practice as a Psychotherapist.

For this afternoon’s reading of Undertone: The Colour of Hate the performers will be:

*Dharini Woollcombe
*Raoul Bhaneja
*Brigitte Solem
*Gabriella Sundar Singh

*The participation of these Artists is arranged by permission of Canadian Actors’ Equity Association under the provisions of the Dance•Opera•Theatre Policy.

Many thanks to the Toronto Arts Council, as well as our generous audiences, for funding this reading.

The Draft series is alive and well … and looking forward to Season 17

Dear friends,

We are on a short hiatus during the fall of 2021 but we look forward to resuming programming in February, 2022.

Here are the dates for the forthcoming season. Mark your calendars!

DRAFT 17.1
FEB 27 2022

DRAFT 17.2
MAY 29 2022

DRAFT 17.3
AUGUST 28 2022

DRAFT 17.4
NOVEMBER 27 2022

With best wishes from
The Draft Team

Please join us for the last reading of Season 16!

Please join us for the last reading of Season 16!

Sunday, July 18th, 3 p.m. on zoom.

Please register through eventbrite:

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/draft-166-tickets-159322962269

This very special event includes spoken word, visual art, improvised music, all together in a literary sphere. Featured writers are:

Andrea Thompson, poet, novelist, editor and educator

Jennifer Hosein , writer, visual artist, and educator

Gloria Blizzard, poet and essayist with saxophonist Michael Arthurs

We will also be joined by four additional very talented writers: Robin Pacific, H. Nigel Thomas, Carol B. Duncan and Eleni Gouliaras.

Please see below for more information about the authors and performers.

Many thanks to the League of Canadian Poets and the Canada Council for the Arts, as well as our generous audiences, for funding this reading.

Carol B. Duncan is a chronicler of human stories of migration, community and identity especially those on the margins of empire. She teaches religion and culture at Wilfrid Laurier University. Her academic work focuses on trans-Atlantic connections linking Africa, Europe and the Americas in the formation of Caribbean religious and cultural expressions. Carol has curated and co-hosted author events for the university and wider communities. Storytelling has always informed her teaching, public intellectual work and research. She was the recipient of the 2002 Arts Award Waterloo Region for literature. A published author, co-author and editor of several academic books, chapters and articles including This Spot of Ground: Spiritual Baptists in Toronto, Carol is now sharing her fiction writing. Peeny Wally, a work in progress, is a magical realism historical fictional narrative set on an 18th century plantation in the Eastern Caribbean.

Eleni Gouliaras is a Scarborough poet who graduated from York University’s Creative Writing program in 2012. Her poem Capitalism*2mg was a winner for the 2020 Power of the Poets contest. Her poem Proceed with caution is published on Pamenar Press online magazine. Her writing also appears in Feel Ways: A Scarborough Anthology, released in April 2021. She is looking forward to appearing in The Quarantine Review in August 2021. Recently, her schedule became much busier, since she is studying to become a Library Technician, but poetry always finds its way into her life.

Andrea Thompson is a poet, novelist, editor and educator. In 2005 her spoken word album, One, was nominated for a Canadian Urban Music Award and in 2019 her album, Soulorations helped earn her a Golden-Beret Award for Excellence. Thompson is the co-author of Other Tongues: Mixed-Race Women Speak Out, author of the novel, Over Our Heads, and the 2021 recipient of the Pavlick Poetry Prize. Thompson currently teaches through CAMH and the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies. She is a member of the Brick Books editorial collective and Artistic Director of Brickyard online spoken word showcase. Her upcoming poetry collection, A Selected History of Soul Speak, will be published by Frontenac House as a part of their Quartet series this autumn.

Robin Pacific spent most of the pandemic reading novels and watching Netflix. She took time out between binges to complete a Masters in Fine Art in Creative Nonfiction at Kings College in Halifax, and to write a memoir-in-essays called Skater Girl: An Archaeology of the Self. She has a twenty-five year practice as a visual artist and is new to the contemporary writing world. She’s published essays in The Literary Review of Canada, The Grapevine, and Blank Spaces. She has another Masters in Theological Studies, and a part time practice as a Spiritual Director. Robin watches Netflix in Toronto, and, for which she resides eternally in the circle of shame, Amazon Prime Videos. A lifelong feminist and socialist, she lives on the crux of many contradictions. Privilege doesn’t even begin to unpack it. The essay she will read touches on topics still infra dig to mention in public – menstruation, menopause, and the biggest taboo of them all, old age.

H. Nigel Thomas grew up in St Vincent and the Grenadines and has lived in Quebec since 1968. He is a retired professor of United States literature. He has published dozens of essays in literary journals and anthologies as well as twelve books that include six novels and three collections of short stories. His novels Spirits in the Dark and No Safeguards were nominated for the Hugh MacLennan Fiction Prize. His latest novel, Easily Fooled, has been published in 2021. The Voyage, a collection of poems, will be published in 2022. He is the founder and English-language coordinator of Lectures Logos Readings.

Jennifer Hosein is a writer, visual artist, and educator. Her debut collection of poetry, A Map of Rain Days, published by Guernica Editions in September, 2020, was longlisted for the League of Canadian Poets 2021 Pat Lowther Memorial Award. Her poems, short fiction, creative non-fiction, and a play have been published in magazines in Canada, as well as translated into Hungarian for the anthology Crystal/Kristálykert. Her artwork has appeared on book covers, in magazines, and in solo and group exhibitions in Toronto; it is also featured on the cover of A Map of Rain Days. Born in Montreal, Quebec to Trinidadian parents, she lives and works in Toronto, Ontario. You can view some of her work at YouTube: Jennifer Hosein

Gloria Blizzard, the curator of today’s presentation, is a Black Canadian woman of mixed heritage, with links to the middle passage, surrounded by European culture, living on Indigenous lands of the Americas. With deep interests in music, dance, science, race, culture and spirituality, she brings these perspectives to essays, memoir, poetry, and reviews. Her work has appeared in publications such as, CBC.ca, the Globe and Mail, THIS Magazine, HELD, Dance International, Whole Note Magazine, The Conversation. Her essay, Black Cake Buddhism, appears in The Humber Literary Review this month. She has recently completed an MFA at the University of Kings College and is working on her first full length book.

Born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, Michael Arthurs, earned his Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in composition from The University of Texas at Austin. He is also an alumnus of Humber College, William Paterson University, and The University of Louisville. Dr. Arthurs is a composer, arranger, conductor, musical director and educator and has written extensively for both professional and university jazz orchestral ensembles. He performs in Canada and internationally as a musician, arranger and bandleader and continues an extensive teaching practice.

SURPRISE! One more edition of Draft this season

Please join us for Draft 16.6

Sunday, July 18th, 3 p.m. on zoom.

Please watch this space for more details.

Please register on eventbrite

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/draft-166-tickets-159322962269

Look forward to seeing you there!

Draft 16.5 May 30th

Please join us on Sunday, May 30, to hear new work by Sonja Boon, Kern Carter, Ellen Chang-Richardson, Mark Laliberte, Sanna Wani and Andrew Wilmot.

TIME:

Sunday, May 30, 3:00 p.m.

Please register on eventbrite:

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/draft-165-tickets-153062013603

Tickets are available in a range of prices (including free). The proceeds will go directly to authors at this and future readings in the series.

The reading will take place on ZOOM.

The link will appear on your ticket and on the email you’ll receive ten minutes before the reading.

Closed-captioning will be available. Please feel free to contact us with your access needs and questions: draftreadings at gmail.com

Here is some more information on the authors:

Sonja Boon is a researcher, writer, teacher, and flutist living in St. John’s. Passionate about stories and storytelling, she is the author of What the Oceans Remember: Searching for Belonging and Home (WLU Press, 2019), a memoir that traverses five continents and spans more than two centuries. Sonja’s creative non-fiction essays appear in published collections as well as in Geist, The Ethnic Aisle, and ROOM, among others. For six years, Sonja was principal flutist and a frequent soloist with the Portland Baroque Orchestra (Oregon).

Kern Carter is a writer and author who has written and published two novels — Thoughts of a Fractured Soul and Beauty Scars. Kern is also a ghostwriter with credits in Forbes, The New York Times, Global Citizen and Fatherly.com, along with having ghostwritten several books. When he’s not penning novels or ghostwriting, Kern creates and curates stories through CRY Creative Group, his content creation brand that specializes in written storytelling.

Ellen Chang-Richardson (she/her) is an award-winning poet, writer and editor of Taiwanese and Cambodian-Chinese descent. The author of three poetry chapbooks, including snap, pop, performance (Gap Riot Press), her writing has appeared in The Fiddlehead, untethered magazine, Watch Your Head: Writers & Artists Respond to the Climate Crisis (Coach House Books), among others. She is the founder of Little Birds Poetry, the co-founder of Riverbed Reading Series, and a member of the poetry collective VII. She currently lives/works on the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg.

Mark Laliberte is an artist-writer-designer with an MFA from University of Guelph. He has exhibited extensively in galleries across Canada and internationally, curates the online experimental comics site http://4panel.ca, and edits the hybrid art/lit mag CAROUSEL. Laliberte has had pageworks, poems and other print experiments appear in publications big and small, including Ink Brick, POETRY, prairie fire, subTerrain and Vallum. Publications include ‘BRICKBRICKBRICK‘ (Book*Hug, 2010) and ‘asemanticasymmetry‘ (Anstruther Press, 2016). He is the recipient of numerous grants, including a Canada Council for the Arts ‘Digital Originals’ grant. Laliberte is a member of the collaborative writing entity, MA|DE.

Sanna Wani lives between Mississauga and Srinagar. Her poems have been published in Poem-A-Day, Arc Poetry Magazine, and Best Canadian Poetry 2020. She loves daisies.

Andrew Wilmot is an award-winning Toronto-based author and editor, and co-publisher of the magazine Anathema: Spec from the Margins. Their fiction has appeared in a variety of places, both online and in print. Further details at andrewwilmot.ca. Their first novel, The Death Scene Artist, is available from Wolsak & Wynn/Buckrider Books.

We are grateful for the financial assistance of the Canada Council for the Arts through the Writers’ Union of Canada, and the Canada Council for the Arts and the Department of Canadian Heritage through the League of Canadian Poets.

Draft 16.4 April 18th

Please join us on Sunday, April 18 for a chance to hear new and unpublished work by Farzana Doctor, Kamila Rina, Leanne Toshiko Simpson and Christine Tran.

TIME:

Sunday, April 18, 3:00 p.m.

The reading will take place on ZOOM.

Closed-captioning will be available.

Please register on eventbrite and refer to your ticket for the link.

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/draft-164-tickets-148650759423

Tickets are available on a sliding scale (including free). Proceeds go to pay authors at this and other readings in the season.

This reading is part of National Poetry Month, sponsored by the League of Canadian Poets. This year’s theme is RESILIENCE. You can read more about the authors below.

Farzana Doctor is the author of Stealing Nasreen, All Inclusive, and Six Metres of Pavement, which won the 2012 Lambda Literary Award and was shortlisted for the Toronto Book Award. Farzana is one of CBC Books Ten Canadian Women Writers You Need to Read Now and the recipient of the Writers Trust of Canada’s Dayne Ogilvie Grant. Her latest book, Seven, was published by Dundurn in 2020. She lives in Toronto.

Kamila Rina is a multi-disabled immigrant Jewish non-binary bi poet, and a sexuality, gender, and disability educator. They have been published internationally, including in Room Magazine, Breath and Shadow, Monstering, Deaf Poets Society, Carousel, Augur, Frond, Mary, and Queer Out There. Their favourite things include trees, books, vegan gluten-free blueberry pie, and radical accessibility. Find them at KamilaRina.com.

Leanne Toshiko Simpson is a Yonsei writer from Scarborough living with bipolar disorder. She is a graduate of UTSC Creative Writing and the University of Guelph’s MFA, and is currently completing an EdD in Social Justice Education at the University of Toronto. She was named Scarborough’s Emerging Writer of 2016 and was nominated for the Journey Prize in 2019. She currently teaches creative writing at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) and InkWell Workshops. Her debut novel, Infinite Snails, will be published in 2022 by HarperCollins.

Christine H. Tran is part writer, part scholar, part gamer, and all female nephew. Among other places, their work has been featured in untethered, Half a Grapefruit, The Temz Review, alt.theatre, and FEEL WAYS. They are a PhD student at UofT’s Faculty of Information and a Junior Fellow at Massey College. Christine targets their tweets for nine specific people at @thechristinet.

Here’s the description put out by the League of Canadian Poets for its National Poetry Month theme.

What does it mean to be resilient? We meet resilience in every corner we’ve been backed into, every hardship that we endure. Resilience is geographical, spiritual, historical. It’s the fight against climate change, the inner battle with mental health, the outcry for human rights and an end to systemic racism. Resilience is the backbone of generations of trauma, the silence at the dinner table, the bow to culture’s violin. Resilience is the courage to start each day anew. This NPM 2021, we celebrate, reflect on and respect the resilience that has made us who we are.

We are grateful for the financial assistance of the Canada Council for the Arts through the Writers’ Union of Canada, and the Canada Council for the Arts and the Department of Canadian Heritage through the League of Canadian Poets.

Draft 16.3 March 21 2021

Please stay tuned for another fabulous edition of Draft

March 21, 2021

3:00 p.m. on ZOOM

Hosted by Kern Carter

and featuring readings by contributors to CRY Magazine and members of The Nia Centre.

Tickets are on a sliding scale, and all the money goes to the authors.

You can learn about some of this afternoon’s contributors below — and stay tuned for more to come!

Authors from CRY

Carlos Anthony: I write stories and share experiences that black men are afraid to write about and are ashamed to talk about. I open the discussion of the vulnerability we face as men but hide because of the stereotypes associated with that vulnerability. Here’s a link to Carlos’s work on CRY.

Aisha Gallion is a Columbia, South Carolina native and music enthusiast/researcher. As a writer, she holds expertise in Black music studies in the U.S. and poetry. Much of what she pursues aims to uplift and highlight the contributions of Black folks in the arts. When she isn’t writing she’s watching tiny house tours and listening to chloexhalle. Here’s a link to Aisha’s work on CRY.

A Dominican immigrant to the US, Johanny (Joa) Ortega always wanted to write but made a detour through the Army, and motherhood and is now finding her way back to her first love. Currently pursuing an MFA on creative writing through National University in California, and two WIPs, one a speculative fiction/gothic, the other a contemporary fiction. Constantly forages her schedule for free minutes to write. Here’s a link to Joa’s work on CRY.

Authors from the NIA Centre

Helen Akey is an upcoming poet and creative writer. She is a third-year student at York University, studying Culture and Expression. As a young girl, she would journal everything that was happening in her life as a form of therapy. In grade 12, spoken word artist and activist, Faduma Mohamed, introduced her to poetry and different performance styles to further express physical, mental and emotional journeys. As she continuously gains exposure and guidance from others in the field of creative writing, she would like to share her knowledge, skills, and stories to future generations to inspire and encourage them, to use their voice to speak their truth as they navigate in their journey of life⎼⎼openly.

Rachel Barduhn is a freeverse poet and aspiring writer from Scarborough who aims to weave magic, imagination, truth and diversity into her work. As someone who faced many difficulties growing up with mental illness, she also uses her poetry to inspire and normalize complicated emotions/feelings. With her story writing, Rachel aims to create diverse characters in a positive light to show the world as it is, a place full of diverse cultures and racial backgrounds. Showing that people of colour can be included in fiction and fantasy. She has a lot to say and has decided from when she was 12 she wasn’t going to write what others wanted of her but that it starts with her in the messages she wants to bring forth.

Darynel Beckford is 24 year old, QUEERibbean Culture Writer and Digital Creator. Jamaican by birth, but global citizen by existence, he spends most of his time reflecting on things that are wrong within society and advocating for making them right. His favourite stories bring to the forefront the stories of Caribbean people, beyond the lens of the biased first world, and emphasize the true lived experiences of same. He is open to connecting with kinfolk and looks forward to interacting with you all.

Tamara Jones is a freelance culture writer and performing artist based in Tkaronto. By day, they work as a publicist and digital content creator for theatre companies, festivals, and film productions including The Theatre Centre, SummerWorks, the South Western International Film Festival, Neon, Warner Bros., and Switch Hitter Films. Their written and spoken work has been featured in and commissioned by a handful of publications including Ephemera Magazine, Adolescent Content, Lithium Magazine, Feels Zine, With/out Pretend, and The Globe and Mail. ‘Viaduct’ is their first work of fiction.

Omi is a young black writer dually located in Kitchener-Waterloo and Toronto making sense of time and space. Their writing is concerned with the Black diasporic experience of spirituality, love and dance. While completing their undergrad, they are active in organizing spaces between KW and Toronto, working to make Black communities more livable.

Muna (Warda) Youssouf is a poet and a visual artist living in Toronto. Born in Djibouti and raised in the UK, Muna is a Self-taught Artist. She was the recipient of the David Maltby Award in 2019 for her exhibition Roots, and of a Toronto Refugee Mentorship Grant, to help develop her first feature film, People from Nowhere in (2019). Her practice is engaged with themes of home, change and displacement. Muna engages her local and artistic community through production and curation of story-telling shows and art therapy events at venues across Toronto like Hashtag Gallery. Where she recently curated Roots, a group exhibition interpreting the idea of ‘roots’ through different mediums. She has exhibited at Gallery 44 (2019), Hashtag Gallery (2018-2020), Ryerson Image Center (2019) and Day’s and Atkinson’s Almhouse Photography Competition (2013) where she placed third for her depiction of the ever-changing housing hardships in London, UK. In under 2 years in the film industry, she has produced 3 shorts Confessions(2020), Emancipation of Egbert(2019) Menagerie (2019) and with over 10 credits in commercial productions as a PA, AD and art department. Nowadays, you can find her working on her short Tahira, as well as her documentary “The Power of Names”.

MORE ABOUT KERN CARTER:

Kern Carter is a full-time freelance writer and author who has written and self-published two novels — Thoughts of a Fractured Soul (novella) and Beauty Scars. A young adult novel, Boys and Girls Screaming is forthcoming from DCB publishing. Kern is also a ghostwriter with credits in Forbes, the New York Times, Global Citizen, Elle Magazine and Fatherly.com, along with having ghostwritten several books. When he’s not penning novels or ghostwriting, Kern is curating stories through CRY, his online publication that discusses the emotional aspects of being a writer or any other type of artist. He lives in downtown Toronto with his 18-year-old daughter and they get along admirably. (Kern will also be hosting and curating.)

MORE ABOUT CRY:

Our mission at CRY is simple: to build a community of emerging creatives who are connected by the power of vulnerability and creativity. We emphasize the emotional aspects of the creative process and help creatives navigate emotions with educational content, community events, as well as articles for artists expressing the joy and frustration that comes with being a creator.

MORE ABOUT NIA CENTRE FOR THE ARTS:

We are a Toronto-based not-for-profit organization that supports, showcases and promotes an appreciation of arts from across the African Diaspora.

Draft 15.7 … zooming on August 23

Image by Ron Edding

We’re proud to announce our upcoming summer virtual edition of the Draft reading series hosted by Gloria Blizzard.

Sunday, August 23, 2020
3:00 p.m

Along with Gloria, we are featuring 10 other readers presenting their newest work.

1. Gloria Blizzard is a non-fiction writer, poet and penner of songs, whose essays, reviews and articles have appeared in numerous literary publications, magazines and sound recordings. Her work can be found at gloriablizzard.com.
2. Maheen Hyder is a Pakistani poet and mental health therapist whose work focuses on cityscapes and memory as they relate to migration and has been published in Arc Poetry Magazine, The Postcolonialist, The Puritan, The Fiddlehead and Bosphorus Review of Books.
3. Bänoo Zan is a poet and poetry organizer with three books and over 200 individual poems and poetry related pieces in online and print publications around the globe. Her work can be found on Amazon.
4. Aaron Schneider is the author of the novella Grass-Fed and a founding editor at The Temz Review. His work can be purchased at Quattro books.
5. Eufemia Fantetti teaches English at Humber College and co-edits the Humber Literary Review. Her books can be found on bookshelves of both independent and major bookstores.
6. Therese Estacion immigrated to Canada when she was ten from Cebu, Philiipines. She is an elementary school educator, poet, and identify as having a disability/disabled—since 2016— due to bilateral below knee and hand amputations as a result of sepsis. Her upcoming work will be coming from Book*Hug in the spring of 2021.
7. Anuja Varghese is a Pushcart-nominated writer based in Hamilton whose work has been featured in many literary magazines and journals, and who is currently at work on a debut collection of short stories. A list of her publications can be found on anujavarghese.com.
8. Sonja Boon is a researcher, writer, teacher, and flutist living in St John’s. Her book can be found at WLU press.
9. Rita Shelton Deverell is a theatre and media artist whose play “Who You Callin Black Eh?” won the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival’s Teen Jury Award and whose 2019 book American Refugees: Turning to Canada for Freedom proves said one reviewer “We are not as nice as we think we are.” Her work can be found at Playwrights Guild of Canada’s Canadian Play Outlet.
10. Ellen. S. Jaffe is a poet and fiction writer who grew up in New York and has found a wonderful writing and personal home in Canada. For further info on her work contact her at esjaffe@outlook.com.
11. Wanda Taylor is an author, college instructor, and multi-disciplinary artist based in Toronto, Ontario. Her work can be purchased online or any major bookstore.

We welcome donations from those who are able to contribute. If not, please attend for free — you are most welcome!

The money will go straight to the brief readers, except for a small amount to cover the series costs. If you wish to send a donation, please send an e-transfer to draftseriescollective@gmail.com  

And in case you have not heard … the fine and incredibly hard-working folks at Queen Books are doing home delivery these days.

Please stay tuned for our summer online reading: August 23 at 3 p.m. on Zoom

The list of contributors will be announced soon.

If you’d like to get the jump on signing up, here’s the eventbrite link:

https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/115510435823

We hope to see you there!