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Tag: Festivals

Good Times with the Vancouver Writers Festival

by Chelsea
Events + Graphica + Vancouver / October 22, 2010

The Vancouver International Writers & Readers Festival is in full-swing, bringing a line-up of superstar authors to our city. Raincoast is very excited that beloved cartoonist and author Lynda Barry has arrived today and is in town for (count 'em) THREE Writers Fest events.

Lynda's latest book Picture This: The Nearsighted Monkey (Drawn and Quarterly) is a graphic-memoir-how-to for drawing and self-expression, and is sure to inspire some facinating conversations and audience participation this weekend.

The Festival's opening reception was on October 19th at Performance Works on Granville Island. I went with one goal in mind: to meet Emma Donoghue, since I had just finished Room and couldn't stop talking about it to everyone in sight.

After a cruise of Dockside Restaurant’s delicious buffet (risotto nuggets, where have you been all my life?), I spotted Emma, which turned out to be fairly easy: she’s tall, a redhead, and was wearing a very eye-catching coat.

Mission accomplished! That's Emma Donoghue in the middle, and Inge Siemens (Sales Rep for HarperCollins) on the right.

The Writers Fest organizers throw a good party... too good, maybe. To keep back-row revellers from chatting during the welcoming address from Anne Giardini (Chair of the Board) and Hal Wake (Artistic Director), they hired a Scottish "Shusher" to prowl the audience and publicly shush (and shame) anyone talking out of turn. S/he was actually a little scary, so everyone was on their best behavior.

We had to get a picture together, of course; that's Doug Findlay (Sales Rep for HarperCollins) on the left.

Congratulations to the Vancouver International Writers & Readers Festival for another fabulous year. Enjoy the events, everyone (just don't talk when you're not supposed to, or you'll have the Shusher to contend with)!