The Whistler Writers’ Festival holds online and in-person events, including audience favourites: the Literary Cabaret, Saturday Night Gala, Sunday Brunch, publishing workshops, and the winner of the Whistler Independent Book Awards.
AUGUST 28, 2021: Whistler, BC — Tickets for the 20th anniversary edition of the Whistler Writers Festival go on sale August 31, 2021 with online, in-person and hybrid format events including festival favourites like the Saturday Night Gala, featuring Thomas King in Conversation with Tanya Talaga. The festival runs Oct. 14-17, 2021.
“Last year we went entirely online, and this year we’re offering a mix of formats to ensure events are both accessible and right-sized as we ease back into hosting in-person gatherings,” said Stella Harvey, the festival’s founder and artistic director. “This also means we can reconnect with our Whistler community and local readers and writers, who have supported us since 2002. I couldn’t be happier to also have guests return, and to reconnect with our visitors and guest authors.”
For 2021, the festival offers 13 reading events and 16 workshops. Some events, like the Literary Cabaret will hold a lively, in-person watch party, and be streamed online. Workshops will be held online or in-person, and online tickets for most workshops and reading events are affordably priced at $10. In-person ticket prices vary, and events are held at venues including the Fairmont Chateau Whistler and the Whistler Public Library. This year, A Walk to Lost Lake and Back returns to the program and features Howard White (Here on the Coast), Darrel J. McLeod (Peyakow: Reclaiming Cree Dignity), Gail Anderson-Dargatz (The Almost Wife) and Alix Ohlin (We Want What We Want), with moderator Grant Lawrence (Dirty Windshields).
“Being able to bring back events we couldn’t offer last year, as well as in-person and “watch” events like the Literary Cabaret, the Sunday Brunch, and a special food and cocktail tasting event is such a pleasure and really speaks to how everyone continues to work hard to help our province return to a semblance of normal,” Harvey said.
As usual, the festival hosts Speed Dating: Pitch Your Book/Idea to Publishers and Insights from Insiders: Trade Publishing in Canada today. Both events will be online this year and sell out quickly.
Here are details on some of the festival's most popular featured events.
Friday, Oct. 15 — Celebrating 20 Years of Stories: Tasting & Watch Party
MMMMMMmint – Cyprus Cuisine with A Happi Twist 5 – 5:45 - Learn to make Cypriot appies and a cocktail featuring locally grown mint and sample at the live event!
The Literary Cabaret, 6-7:15 p.m. Held at the Fairmont Chateau Whistler as a watch party, and online, it’s a night of words and music. Host Stephen Vogler brings his band West Coast Front back to the stage to perform with a host of writers beamed in via Zoom for a night of improvisation, innovation and rich storytelling embellished by sweet and soulful sounds. Guest authors include Cedar Bowers, Ivan Coyote, Adrienne Drobnies, Leanne Dunic, Ted Goodden, John Gould, Cornelia Hoogland, Sadeqa Johnson, Shaena Lambert, Mary Lawson, Annette Lapointe, Darrel J. McLeod and Zoe Whittall. The winners of the Whistler Independent Book Awards will also be announced.
Saturday Oct. 16 — Saturday Night Gala 6-7 p.m. Join moderator and Ojibwe author Tanya Talaga (All Our Relations: Finding the Path Forward) in conversation with award-winning novelist and short-story writer Thomas King, author of The Back of the Turtle, The Inconvenient Indian and Indians on Vacation. His latest novel is Sufferance, a sly and satiric look at the fractures in modern existence. Sufferance is a bold and provocative novel about the social and political consequences of the inequality created by privilege and power — and what we might do about it.
Saturday Oct. 16 — Thrills, Chills and Authors Who Kill: A Murder Mystery and Discussion with Five Thriller Writers, 1:15 p.m. – 2:30 p.m. Amber Cowie investigates five new thrillers by award-winning authors Gail Anderson-Dargatz (The Almost Wife), Linwood Barclay (Find You First), Bill Deverell (Stung), Joy Fielding (Cul-de-sac), and Linden MacIntyre (The Winter Wives). This online suspense session is packed with dark secrets, sabotage, high-stakes trials and of course, murder. Attendees will be able to participate in a ‘whodunit’ fanfiction crime story based on one of the authors’ characters. One winner will take home all five featured books.
Sunday Oct. 17 — The Sunday Brunch, 11 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.
Join moderator Alix Ohlin at the Fairmont or online for an insightful, wide-ranging conversation that delves into nuanced fictional stories and non-fiction subject matter involving a magical being who struggles against his nature; a forbidden union between two enslaved men; stories of characters negotiating distance; a meditation on the socio-political and economic forces that created African-Nova Scotia; and a view of the global refugee crisis brought down to the level of a child's eyes. Featuring Eden Robinson (Return of the Trickster), Robert Jones Jr. (The Prophets), M.G. Vassanji (What You Are), George Elliott Clarke (Where Beauty Survived: An Africadian Memoir) and Omar El Akkad (What Strange Paradise)
Visit www.whistlerwritersfest.com for tickets on August 31, 2021.
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ABOUT THE WHISTLER WRITERS FESTIVAL
The Whistler Writers Festival celebrates its 20th anniversary with an in-person/online hybrid event October 14-17, 2021. The festival brings together very best Canadian and international authors for a thought-provoking weekend packed with digital readings, workshops, speaker panels, music, webinars and more. Tickets go on sale August 31, 2021. For tickets, information and news visit www.whistlerwritersfest.com.
The Whistler Writers Festival is run by the Whistler Writing Society, which also provides the Whistler Writer in Residence and Authors in the Schools programs. This year, the society launched the 2021 BIPOC Scholarship for emerging or experienced writers in Sea to Sky.
Find us on social media:
instagram.com/whistlerwritersfest
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