Vote for Edmonton Public Library’s Alberta Readers’ Choice Award by May 31, 2012
The Edmonton Public Library’s third annual Alberta Readers’ Choice Award is back and it’s better than ever. This year, readers will have a tough job choosing between five outstanding books all written by authors residing in Alberta. Online voting is now open and you will have until midnight on May 31 to cast your ballot. Who will win Alberta’s only readers’ choice award? It’s up to you…vote today! Winner announced at the 2012 Alberta Literary Awards Gala on June 9, 2012. Read more 
Alberta Book > Writing the City: Poets Laureate of Edmonton, 2005-2013
The Edmonton Arts Council, on behalf of Edmonton City Council, has produced a new collection, Writing the City: Poets Laureate of Edmonton, 2005-2013. Edited by Douglas Barbour (poet, reviewer, and Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Alberta), this anthology features works written by Alice Major, E.D. Blodgett, Roland Pemberton
(Cadence Weapon), and Anna Marie Sewell during their tenure. Read more
Alberta Book > Empire of the Beetle by Environmental Journalist Andrew Nikiforuk
Chosen as a Globe & Mail 100 best book of the year in 2011 and published in partnership with the David Suzuki Foundation. Calgary-based journalist, Andrew Nikiforuk’s Empire of the Beetle: How Human Folly & a Tiny Bug are Killing North America’s Great Forests (Greystone Books, September 2011) is up for the 2012 Wilfred Eggleston Award for NonFiction at the upcoming Alberta Literary Awards on June 9, 2012, Exposing some startling connections between beetles and humans, one of North America’s foremost environmental writers investigates the continent’s massive forest die-off. burn away like a fire that can’t be put out. Drawing on first-hand accounts from entomologists, botanists, foresters, and rural residents, award-winning journalist Andrew Nikiforuk investigates this unprecedented beetle plague, its startling implications, and the lessons it holds.
Judy Schultz former food writer for the Edmonton Journal wins $10,000 Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Prize.
Judy Shultz former food writer for the Edmonton Journal has been named a contender for this year’s Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Prize. Judy Schultz is nominated for Freddy’s War, which tells the story of a young Canadian man who is captured and taken as a prisoner of war in China during the Second World War. The annual Edmonton book prize was created in 2004, and was awarded in Edmonton on Monday night at the Mayor’s Celebration for the Arts, where the winner receives $10,000. Also nominated for the prize were Wendy McGrath for Santa Rosa (NeWest Press) and Dawn Dumont for Nobody Cries Bingo (Thistledown Press). Read more
Alberta Magazine Award Winners for 2012
The winners of the 2012 Alberta Magazine Awards were announced at the Alberta Magazine Excellence Gala on March 22, 2012 in Calgary. Showcase awards were handed out to seven Alberta magazines with Avenue Calgary taking the award for best digital presence. Achievement Awards were handed out with United Way’s WE Magazine awarded best new magazine in Alberta. Read more
“The Spoken Word Workbook” for Poets Who Teach by Alberta’s Sheri-D Wilson and Others Now On Sale
Explore the history of spoken word and oral story telling traditions as you work your way through this collection of insightful and instructive essays, poems, and exercises. Interactive exercises by twenty-seven top professional spoken word artists explore specific facets of the art of spoken word. These exercises address history, writing, and performance–and will help lead the reader/participants on a creative journey of self discovery. Edited by Sheri D Wilson ( also director of the Calgary/Banff Spoken Word Festival) and published by the Banff Centre Press in March 2011. Read more
Alberta Book Spotlight: 10 Alberta Women Artists Featured in “Mistresses of the Modern”
Focusing on the work of ten women artists, all born by the end of 1918, the exhibition Alberta Mistresses of the Modern: 1935-1975 shines new light on the establishment of modernism in the province. Working largely in Edmonton and Calgary, the work of these artists reveals the important role that women played in the development of modernism, particularly early forms of abstraction, in Alberta. Of the ten-member “Calgary Group,” whose 53 oil paintings were featured in an exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery in 1948, four of the artists were women, including: Marion Nicoll, Janet Mitchell and Dorothy Willis. Of that group, only Marion Nicoll is still well recognized today for her commitment to modernism. The exhibition Alberta Mistresses of the Modern demonstrates, however, that there were many more women artists in this pioneering generation who contributed to Alberta’s cultural roots and the formation of a vibrant visual arts community in the province, and who were decidedly modern. Read more
Edmonton’s Food Girl Jennifer Cockrall-King Launches Food and the City on March 22, 2012
Food and the City examines alternative food systems in cities around the globe that are shortening their food chains, growing food within their city limits, and taking their “food security” into their own hands. Award-winning food journalist Jennifer Cockrall-King sought out leaders in the urban-agriculture movement and visited cities successfully dealing with “food deserts.” What she found was not just a niche concern of activists but a global movement that cuts across the private and public spheres, economic classes, and cultures. She describes a global movement happening from London and Paris to Vancouver and New York to establish alternatives to the monolithic globally integrated supermarket model. Read more
The 2012 Corus Entertainment Distinguished Lecture “Stories about Storytellers” Edmonton, March 2, 2012
Prepare to meet Alice Munro, Pierre Trudeau, Robertson Davies, Alistair MacLeod, Mavis Gallant, Hugh MacLennan, Peter C. Newman, Brian Mulroney, Morley Callaghan, John Kenneth Galbraith, Paul Martin, James Houston, Peter Gzowski, W.O. Mitchell, and many more. MacEwan’s School of Communications invites you to hear Douglas Gibson, the 2012 Corus Entertainment Lecturer. This free public event is scheduled for March 2, 2012 in the Haar Theatre at the Centre for Arts and Communications at MacEwan University. The address is 10045 156 Street. There will be a reception at 5:00 p.m. with the lecture at 6:00 p.m. and dessert and networking to follow. Admission is free. There is no need to RSVP. Read more
Kevin Taft Launches “Follow the Money: Where is Alberta’s Wealth Going?” with Short Film by Tom Radford
(Edmonton, CNW, January 18, 2012) How is it that a province as wealthy as Alberta is running deficits and says it must cut public services? Where is Alberta’s huge wealth really going? Those are two of the central questions that author Kevin Taft attempts to answer in a hard-hitting, fact-filled new book called “Follow the Money,” released today in Edmonton. Taft is a best-selling author and former leader of the Alberta Liberal Party. The book exposes the “big lie” that spending on public services in Canada’s richest province is out of control and that Alberta can no longer afford to fund things like education and health care at current levels. Oil is selling at $100/barrel, Alberta’s economy is booming, and still the government is cutting services and running deficits. Read more
2012 Alberta Literary Awards Open for Submissions until December 31, 2011
The Alberta Literary Awards were created by the Writers Guild of Alberta in 1982 to recognize excellence in writing by Alberta authors. Entries are judged by an independent jury recruited by the WGA. Submissions are evaluated on originality, creativity, and quality of writing, as well as appropriate fit within a category. Prizes of $1500 will be awarded for books published in 2011 at a gala event in the summer of 2012. Read more
Alberta Book Spotlight > “Talking Music: Blues Radio and Roots Music” by Holger Petersen
Just in time for the music fans on your Christmas list is Talking Music: Blues Radio and Roots Music, a book of interviews of famous musicians by Edmonton’s Holger Peterson founder of Stony Plain Records. Holger Petersen is a veteran Canadian broadcaster and is known to legions of fans nationally through his weekly Saturday Night Blues on CBC Radio which just celebrated its 25th anniversary on the network. Talking Music is a collection of 19 in-depth interviews with artists ranging from guitarist Ry Cooder, Rolling Stones bassist Bill Wyman, Fleetwood Mac’s Mick Fleetwood, gospel star Mavis Staples, Sun Records’ founder Sam Phillips and singers Lucinda Williams, Maria Muldaur and Bonnie Raitt. Talking Music is receiving a warm reception across Canada and beyond. Read more
Marilyn
Jones is a corporate and social media advocate for individuals, small businesses
and nonprofit organizations in Alberta. She lives in Edmonton, Alberta,
Canada and is the proprietor of RiverCity Productions. You can contact her
by phone at 780-695-5675 or by email at marilyn@mediamag.ca.