A first look at the gritLIT Readers and Writers Festival in Hamilton this coming weekend
An extraordinary array of award-winning authors — including two Scotiabank Giller Prize winners — will be visiting downtown Hamilton next weekend as part of the 14th annual gritLIT Readers and Writers Festival, April 12 to 15 at the Hamilton Plaza Hotel. You probably know Linden MacIntyre from his years as host of CBC’s “Fifth Estate,” but you may not know that in 2009 he won the Scotiabank Giller, Canada’s most prestigious literary award, for his novel “The Bishop’s Man,” as well as 10 Gemini Awards and a bunch of others.
MacIntyre takes part in the opening discussion “Strangers Among Us” on Thursday, April 12 at 7 p.m., with Toronto Book Award finalist Carrianne Leung (“That Time I Loved You”).
MacIntyre’s latest novel, “The Only Café,” is about a man’s search for his roots in Lebanon.
MacIntyre will also participate in “Know Your Father” with Trillium Book Prize winner
Pasha Malla (“Fugue States”) on Saturday, April 14 at 2 p.m.
CBC fans will also take note that “As It Happens” host Carol
Off — MacIntyre’s wife of 18 years — will also be holding court at gritLIT.
Off is the author of several books including “Bitter Chocolate: Investigating the Dark Side of the World’s Most Seductive Sweet.”
Off will participate in the panel discussion “Journalism in the Time of Fake News,” along with CBC reporter Raffy Boudjikanian, Spectator columnist Susan Clairmont and Spectator editorin-chief Paul Berton. Saturday, April 14 at 6:30 p.m. Toronto-based writer Michael
Redhill’s novel “Bellevue Square” was the winner of the 2017 Giller.
Redhill will join Governor General’s Award for Fiction finalist Kathleen Winter (“Lost in September”) for the session titled “Another Time, Another Place” on Saturday, April 14 at 8:15 p.m.
Redhill will also conduct the “Crafting Realistic Dialogue” writing master class on Sunday, April 15 at 9:30 a.m.
While the Giller maybe the best-known fiction award in Canada, the RBC Taylor Award is its equal in non-fiction.
This year’s winner is Tanya
Talaga for “Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death and Hard Truths in a Northern City.”
A Toronto Star reporter and
National Newspaper Award winner, Talaga will be featured in the topical “Where We Go from Here: Truth Talk” on Friday, April 13 at 7 p.m.
Veteran Canadian iconoclast Judy Rebick will join Talaga and
Kamail Al-Solaylee (“Brown”) for “How to Make a Better World,” a discussion on social
activism in writing on Saturday, April 14 at 3:30 p.m.
Rebick, former president of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women, will also participate in “By Her Own Rules” with CBC talk show host
Andrea Bain on Sunday, April 15 at 1 p.m.
There are more than 35 authors involved in this year’s gritLIT in 21 events — including a free pre-festival LitLive Reading of poetry, fiction and memoir on Sunday, April 8 at 7:30 p.m. in the Staircase Theatre, 39 Dundurn N., featuring writers Arif Anwar, Lesley Belleau, David James Brock, Kasia Jaronczyk, Melissa Kulpers and Ruth Marshall.
The festival ends Sunday, April 15 at 4:30 p.m., with a “Drafts and Drafts” event where authors Kathleen Winter, Pasha Malla, Sachiko Murakami, Amanda Jernigan and Showey Yazdanian read from works-in-progress over beer or soft drinks.