Adam Bunch is the author of The Toronto Book of the Dead and The Toronto Book of Love, the host of the Canadiana documentary series, and the creator of The Toronto Dreams Project. His writing has appeared in The Toronto Star, Spacing Magazine and The Huffington Post, and his work popularizing Canadian history has been recognized with an honourable mention for a Governor General’s History Award.
Hailing from Kingston, Jamaica, and raised in Toronto, Tanya Turton is an award-winning entrepreneur, storyteller, wellness educator, and mental health advocate. Using storytelling, safe space, and education, Tanya has created safer spaces for Black women, LGBTQ community members, and youth to feel heard, seen, and witnessed. Over the years she has launched two initiatives: Adornment Stories, a grassroots non-profit for Black women and femmes navigating mental health challenges by using beauty and digital storytelling to transform their experiences; and NiaZamar: Redefining Beauty, an educational platform where Tanya shares a wealth of knowledge in fields of self and collective care and intersectional wellness. Her writing can be found in Shameless magazine, providing safe space and guiding tools for self-love. Her work centres on early engagement mental health initiatives and intersectional frameworks of engagement.
André Forget was born in Toronto and raised in Mount Forest, Ontario. He is the former editor-in-chief of the Puritan and a contributing editor at Canadian Notes & Queries. His writing has appeared in a variety of publications in Canada and the United States, including Maisonneuve, the Walrus, and the Outline. In the City of Pigs is his first novel. He splits his time between Toronto and the United Kingdom.
Xue Yiwei received his BSc in Computer, his MA in Literature, and his PhD in Linguistics. He is an acclaimed author of twenty books in Chinese, including six novels, six collections of short stories, six collections of essays. King Lear and Nineteen Seventy-Nine, his latest novel, was published in 2020. His works have been translated into English, French, German, Italian, Swedish and Mongolia, among them Dr. Bethune’s Children (a novel) and Shenzheners (a collection of short stories) have met with international recognition. He currently lives in Montreal, Canada.
Victoria Hetherington worked as a butcher and an artist’s model before graduating to writing just about anything you can imagine for money. Their debut novel, Mooncalves, was a finalist for the Amazon First Novel Award 2020. Victoria lives in Toronto.
Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia is a lawyer, academic, and writer. She holds a doctorate in law from Dalhousie University and works in the areas of health, gender and violence against women and children. Cheluchi divides her time between Lagos, Nigeria and Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Tara McGowan-Ross is an urban Mi’kmaw multidisciplinary artist and writer. She is the host of Drawn & Quarterly’s Indigenous Literatures Book Club, a critic of experimental and independent Montreal theatre and an editor for Insomniac Press. She is the author of Girth and Scorpion Season. She lives in Montreal.
Bob Ramsay is a communications consultant, writer and founder of the speaker series RamsayTalks. He was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2015 and the Bernier Medal from the Royal Canadian Geographic Society in 2017. He lives in Toronto, Ontario.
Brian Bradley is a Hamilton-based biographer and author of Outrageous Misfits: Female Impersonator Craig Russell and His Wife, Lori Russell Eadie. He is currently at work on two follow-up books, including a biography of a prominent Canadian activist. Brian is also a journalist at the Toronto Star where he works for the Public Editor, is a podcast producer and dabbles in feature writing.
Michelle Parise is an award-winning journalist, writer and performer. She has worked for the CBC for more than two decades, in everything from children’s television to music programming and documentary making, as well as at the helm of many national radio programs. She’s also a soccer player, parent and champion campfire builder. The daughter of Italian immigrants, she was born and raised in Toronto where she still lives today.