After over 20 years of diversified experience in accounting, education, and administration GWYNN SCHELTEMA decided to stop counting beans and start counting words. Since then, Gwynn has been a columnist, magazine article writer, ghost writer and a fiction editor for Lichen Arts & Letters Preview literary journal. Her award-winning fiction and poetry have appeared in literary magazines and anthologies and, Ten of Diamonds was published in 2021 by Glentula Press. Her latest poetry collection Everchild was published by Aeolus House in 2023. Gwynn co-hosts and co-produces Word on the Hills radio series on Northumberland 89.7FM and writes, edits, coaches and teaches creative writing. At present however her focus is on the preparations for NFOTA24 which she leads. This year the festival will take place in September again and Gwynn is here to tell us all about it.
Sher Leetooze
Join us for an encore presentation of interviews with Sher Leetooze we made last year. Sher wanted to write all through school, and to that end submitted material to the annual High School Year Book. In 1994 she published her first local history book and it was an instant success. Sher went on to publish the history of all the other townships in the former county where she lives. From this sprang other books, WW1 Nursing Sisters, Clarington’s Home Children, and a History of the Churches of Old Durham. In between these she wrote a trilogy following the people known as Bible Christians from England to their new homes in Canada. Sher then went on to compile genealogy source books, gardening books, wild plant books and a couple of cook books. Her latest endeavour has been in the world of fiction – a book of short stories, a novella, The Queen’s Pawn and a novel just about ready to go to the printer called Finding Sean McRory.
Felicity Sidnell Reid
Meet Felicity Sidnell Reid. While Felicity taught high school English, History, ESL and Drama for the TDSB, she also wrote poetry and short stories, two mystery novels with a friend, designed costumes for university, school and amateur dramatic societies and directed school plays. She is the author of ESL is Everybody’s Business (with Frances Parkin) and a series of textbooks for language learners. Her books include: Alone: A Winter in the Woods (Hidden Brook Press, 2015, e-book in 2020), The Yellow Magnolia (Glentula Press 2021)and The Many Faces (Aeolus House, 2022 e-book 2023). Her poetry, short fiction and memoir have been published in anthologies, journals and collections. She is the co-producer and cohost of Word on the Hills in which the hosts interview area writers and invite them to read from their work. This programme has been running on Northumberland 89.7 FM for eleven years. She is presently secretary of the Board of Directors for Northumberland Festival of the Arts, 2024.
Allan Briesmaster
Our guest this week is Allan Briesmaster. He is a poet, freelance editor and publisher who’s been active on the Toronto-area literary scene for many years. He has been a workshop leader and reading series organizer and was a partner in Quattro Books in 2006-2017. He currently operates his own small, independent press, Aeolus House, specializing in custom-designed, limited-edition books of poetry.
The most recent of Allan’s nine poetry collections are The Long Bond: Selected and New Poems, from Guernica Editions in 2019, and Windfor, from Ekstasis Editions in 2021. His new book Later Findings has just been released. He has read his poetry, given talks, been on panels, and hosted events at venues from Victoria to St. John’s. He is a Life Member of The League of Canadian Poets and of The Ontario Poetry Society.
Donna Wootton
This week we talk with Donna Wootton about her new novel, The Age of Privilege. Donna is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers. She is a member of TWUC (The Writers Union of Canada), PEN International, and SOTH (Spirit of the Hills – Northumberland). Her book about her late father, who was a charter inductee in Canada’s Lacrosse Hall of Fame, is called MOON REMEMBERED. It was published in 2009 and is archived in Trent University’s Library. Most recently her poetry was published in The Divinity of Blue (a collection from CCLA-Canada Cuba Literary Alliance), The Beauty of Being Elsewhere (a travel anthology), and Musings from the Heliconian Club. Her novels include Leaving Paradise (2008), What Maisie Missed (2018) and Isadora’s Dance(2021). Now her new novel is being released by AOS Press.
Jennifer Bogart
This is an encore presentation of an interview with Jennifer Bogart. Jennifer is a writer, with three adult novels and two middle-grade books to her credit. For many years she was a publisher and editor at Morning Rain Publications and then became the owner of Let’s Talk Books, Cobourg’s independent book store. The store was featured in a Globe and Mail article in 2019 and is now celebrating its ninth year in business. She frequently hosts writers, whose books she admires and arranges very successful readings for them, as well as organizing a number of book clubs at the store for readers of different genres.
Gwynn Scheltema
After over 20 years of diversified experience in accounting, education, and administration Gwynn Scheltema decided to stop counting beans and start counting words. Since then, Gwynn has been a columnist, magazine article writer, ghost writer and a fiction editor for Lichen Arts & Letters Preview literary journal. Her award-winning fiction and poetry have appeared in literary magazines and anthologies and, Ten of Diamonds was published in 2021 by Glentula Press. Her latest poetry collection Everchild was published by Aeolus House in 2023. Gwynn co-hosts and co-produces Word on the Hills radio series on Northumberland 89.7FM and writes, edits, coaches and teaches creative writing. At present however her focus is on the preparations for NFOTA24 which she leads. This year the festival will take place in September again and Gwynn is here to tell us all about it.
Antony di Nardo
Word on the Hills welcomes Antony di Nardo to talk about the poetry event, WOW, scheduled for September 15th as part of the Northumberland Festival of the Arts and his own work. Antony has written seven books of poetry. His work appears widely in journals and anthologies across Canada and internationally, and has been translated into several languages. His long poem suite May June July was winner of the Gwendolyn MacEwen Poetry Prize for 2017 and was short-listed for a National Magazine Award. He spent the last years of a teaching career in Beirut where he launched his first book of poetry Alien, Correspondent in 2010. He is an active member of the League of Canadian Poets and the Cobourg Poetry Workshop. The winner of the inaugural Don Gutteridge Poetry Award, Through Yonder Window Breaks has been published by Wet Ink Books. His latest collection Forget – Sadness – Grass was released by Ronsdale Press.
Rodney Robert Brown
This week we are interviewing Rodney Robert Brown. He is a writer and fine artist of traditional realism, having exhibited paintings in New York, Philadelphia, New Jersey, Ottawa, Vancouver and Toronto. For nearly two decades, he has worked as an actor, teacher and coach, mostly in New York, and belongs to the Screen Actors Guild and other performer unions in the United States and Canada. Although he has written various works, including essays, poetry and a screenplay, his novel, Powerless to be Born, is his first published book. It is a work of literary fiction and is in the collection of the U.S. Library of Congress. Rodney believes that all of the arts are connected, and he utilizes his knowledge and experience in each to enhance his work in the others. His reading and study interests are art, history, literature, and philosophy.
Drama at NFOTA24: episode 1
This week, Word on the Hills is delighted to have four playwrights with us to tell us about the plays they have written and will be presenting this September at Northumberland Festival of the Arts NFOTA 24. Anne Page has been a performer, writer and producer in and around the Canadian theatre scene for many years. Anne has a deep connection with Cobourg. Her parents grew up, met and married here and though they moved away frequently returned to spend time with their extended families. Peter Paylor’s plays will be produced this year in Brockville, Belleville, Elliot Lake, Port Hope, Sault Ste. Marie, and Wilberforce and Cobourg . Peter is Artistic Director for River & Main Theatre Company at Theatre in The Wings in Belleville. For over thirty years, Marcia Johnson has been a Toronto-based theatre artist, who also works in audiobooks as a director and narrator. She has written numerous plays which have been performed by companies across Canada including Stratford. At the end of last year, she was in the first cohort of playwrights to take part in the Slaight Playwrights Residency at the Banff Centre. Sean Carthew is a long-term Port Hope resident. He is the Founder and artistic Director of Port Hope’s Ontario Street Theatre, which has produced, created and performed well over 250 productions in and around Northumberland County. Sean will have two plays performed at the Port Hope Arts Festival in August and one, Go Fish, at NFOTA.
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