Michelle Alfano
(also known as A Lit Chick) served as an Associate Editor with the literary
quarterly Descant until 2015. Her novella, Made Up Of Arias, was the 2010
winner of the Bressani Award for Short Fiction. Her short story “Opera”, on
which the novella was based, was a finalist for a Journey Prize anthology. Her
fiction and non-fiction work has been widely published in Canada in major
literary publications including Descant, Prairie Fire, The Capilano Review, The
Antigonish Review, Event, A Room of One’s Own and in seven anthologies. She is
currently at work on two projects: a memoir entitled The Unfinished Dollhouse and
the novel Destiny, think of me while you sleep.
Sandra
Battaglini is an award winning stand-up comic, actor/writer and made her
directorial debut with Chinatown. She is the 2013 Canadian Comedy Award winner
for her solo show, Classy Lady, directed by Phil Luzi, which premiered in
Toronto in 2012. Past performances include, Hard Headed Woman (Canadian Comedy
Award Winner 2007), Small Battalion of Soldiers (Canadian Comedy Award
Nomination). She's toured with Yuk Yuks and Absolute Comedy and co-hosts one of
Toronto’s most alternative comedy nights, Family Slides and The Sal &
Sandy Show with Phil Luzi. Sandra appears in David Cronenberg's latest feature,
Maps to the Stars that premiered at TIFF in 2014. Her and comedy partner Phil
Luzi are developing a new web series with CBC and Frantic Films called
Knitterati. See more here: sandrabattaglini.net/videos
Carmela Circelli
was born in Southern Italy and grew up in Montreal. She moved to Toronto in
1976 to study philosophy. She has been teaching, on contract, in the Humanities
and Philosophy departments of York University, since 1990. She also has a private practice as a
psychotherapist in Toronto. Recently she published a philosophical memoir
called Sweet Nothing with Quattro books.
And currently she is working on a novel, tentatively titled, The Last of
the Daydreamers.
Erika de
Vasconcelos is the author of two novels, My Darling Dead Ones and Between the
Stillness and the Grove, both published by Knopf. Her work has appeared in
various publications across Canada, and been translated into several languages.
She lives in Toronto.
Josie Di
Sciascio-Andrews has written five collections of poetry: The Whispers of
Stones, Sea Glass, The Red Accordion, Letters from the Singularity and A Jar of
Fireflies. Nature and one's place in it, as well as memory and social justice
are her muse. Her poems "The Red Accordion" and "Emerald
City" were shortlisted for Descant's Winston Collins Best Canadian Poem
Prize and The Malahat Review's Open Seasons Award respectively. In 2015, her
poem "Ghost" received first prize in Toronto's Big Pond Rumours
Journal Contest. Josie is the author of two non-fiction books: How The Italians
Created Canada and In the Name of Hockey. She lives, teaches and writes in
Oakville.
Silvia
Falsaperla is a graduate of the University of Toronto and teaches English to
international students. She lived in Florence, Italy for many years where she
worked as an English teacher, travel journalist, translator and assistant to a
literary agent.
Eufemia Fantetti
is a graduate of the University of Guelph’s MFA in Creative Writing. Her book,
A Recipe for Disaster & Other Unlikely Tales of Love, was runner up for
the Danuta Gleed Literary Award and a winner of the 2014 F.G. Bressani Prize.
Michelle
Ferreira is a writer and editor of Portuguese descent currently living in
Toronto. In the past, she has worked for Dandyhorse Magazine and Descant
Magazine and continues to write and edit as a freelancer. She obtained her
honours B.A. from York and her M.A. from Ryerson, where her studies centered
around the works of the modernist Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa.
Carole
Giangrande is the author of eight books, including the award-winning novella A
Gardener on the Moon and her new novella Here Comes The Dreamer. She's also
worked as a radio journalist for CBC and her poetry has been published in Grain
and Queens Quarterly. Her novel All That Is Solid Melts Into Air will be
published in 2017.
Bianca
Lakoseljac is the author of a novel, Summer of the Dancing Bear, a collection
of stories, Bridge in the Rain (Guernica Editions, 2012, 2010), and a book of
poetry. She has taught at Humber College and Ryerson University, is the
recipient of the Matthew Ahern Award in literature, and holds an M.A. from York
University. Her writing has appeared in journals and anthologies such as
Canadian Woman Studies, York University; and 50+ Poems for Gordon Lightfoot.
She is past president of the Canadian Authors Association, Toronto, and has
served as juror for various literary contests. She sits on the National Council
for the Writers Union of Canada. Her second novel, Stone Woman, a family saga
of five women whose lives are bound by a Vietnam-War draft dodger, set in
Toronto, is being published by Guernica Editions in the fall, 2016.
guernicaeditions.com or biancalakoselac.ca.
Darlene Madott
is a family-law lawyer and award-winning writer of 7 books, whose fiction
celebrates family in anarchic ways. She
has twice won the Bressani Literary Award, once for the title story of Making
Olives and Other Family Secrets, (Longbridge, 2008), and in 2014, for her
collection Stations of the Heart (Exile Editions). “Waiting: An Almost Love
Story,” was shortlisted for the Gloria Vanderbilt/Exile short-fiction prize,
2012. “Vivi’s Florentine Scarf”, widely
anthologized, won the 2008 Paolucci Prize of the Italian American Writer’s
Association, 2012.
Tina Tzatzanis
is a teacher-librarian at an elementary school in Toronto. She is taking next
year off to complete the first draft of her first novel about a young woman in
a small Greek village during the 50s and 60s whose life, altered by the Fates,
frays into three distinct paths. She is of Greek and Irish descent and lives
with her husband, her two almost adult children and a cat that thinks she is
theirs.
Our musical
accompaniment
Nigel Barnes
I've known him
since he was a teenager growing up in Hamilton. He's 5'9" but tells
everyone that he's 6'3". Most people are polite and don't disagree, which
he finds disappointing. He's always ready to argue the point, even though he
can't get the tape measure to agree either. These days he spends as much free
time as he can with his grandson, his
companion (which, as we've learned from The DaVinci Code, literally means
spouse), and his music. I hear there's a
recording in the works, but nothing concrete yet. He may play a few of the
songs that are up for consideration for us today.
