Authors Index

Bill Waiser is one of Canada’s foremost historians. For more than three decades, he was a history professor at the University of Saskatchewan. He is now a full-time writer and public speaker. Bill has published nineteen books, in addition to plying his trade in radio, television, and print media. He’s known for an engaging, popular style that draws on the power of stories. His most recent book, In Search of Almighty Voice: Resistance and Reconciliation, was launched at the One Arrow First Nation’s community powwow at the request of the Elders.

Katherine serves with the Royal Canadian Navy and is an ordained minister. She writes acclaimed fiction, evocative theology, and celebrates the tradition of story. Her debut, All is Well, was a finalist Crime Writers of Canada's "Best First Crime Novel 2022." She considers creativity sacred, liminal, and vital for human flourishing. Connect with her at www.katherinewalker.ca

Donald Ward sold his first story to CBC when he was nineteen-years-old and he has been writing professionally for the last forty years. His fiction is both thoughtful and humourous and always accessible no matter how fantastic his grounding premise may be. In 2004 his short fiction collection Nobody Goes to Earth Any More, won the Saskatchewan Book Award for Book of the Year, and his story “Badger” won the 2009 CBC Literary Award.

Terry Watada's previous publications include an historical work, Bukkyo Tozen: A History of Buddhism in Canada, a short fiction collection, Daruma Days, a children's biography, Seeing The Invisible, and a poetry collection, Ten Thousand Views of Rain as well as the successful, main stage play, Vincent. Watada lives in Toronto.

Tom Wayman has published more than twenty poetry collections, three essay collections, two short story collections, a collection of novellas, and a novel. He has also edited six poetry anthologies. He has been Writer-in-Residence at the universities of Windsor, Alberta, Simon Fraser, Winnipeg, and Toronto. He is a co-founder of two BC alternative post-secondary ventures: the Vancouver Centre of the Kootenay School of Writing (1984-87) and the writing department of Nelson’s Kootenay School of the Arts (1991-2002). He is currently a director of the Calgary Spoken Word Festival Society and of Nelson’s Kootenay Literary Society, where he serves on the education committee and the Elephant Mountain Literary Festival organizing committee. In March 2022 he received B.C.’s George Woodcock Award for Lifetime Achievement in the literary arts. Wayman lives in Winlaw, BC.

Joanne Weber obtained degrees in English, Library Science and Education and did graduate work at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC, where she became fluent in American Sign Language. She now teaches in the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Program at Thom Collegiate. Joanne and her husband live in Regina, Saskatchewan. The Pear Orchard was her first collection of poetry; The Deaf House is her first creative non fiction.

Joe Welsh was born in Lebret, Saskatchewan. He has worked for the Department of Social Services as well as with the Armed Forces. He presently works as a writer, actor and workshop leader in Regina.

Born in Kinistino, Saskatchewan, Marlis Wesseler attended university in Saskatoon and Regina, taught school in the North, travelled extensively and has lived and worked in Regina for over forty years. The Beech Forest is her sixth book of fiction. Award winning and often nominated, her previous books include the short story collections, Life Skills and Imitating Art, and the novels Elvis Unplugged, South of the Border, and The Last Chance Ladies’ Book Club.

Audrey Whitson's short fiction has appeared in Alberta Views, the Canadian Journal of Prairie Literature, Confluence, FreeFall, andRoom Magazine. Her first book, Teaching Places (Wilfred Laurier University Press 2003), a memoir about how the land teaches, was shortlisted for three awards. Her poetry and essays have been published in many magazines and anthologies and have won awards. Audrey grew up on a farm in northern Alberta and has worked as a social worker, consulting and teaching theologian, editor and project manager. In the 1980s she spent almost five years in the San Francisco Bay Area, working with Mexican migrant workers and Central American refugees as well as studying feminist and liberation theology at the Graduate Theological Union (and Franciscan School of Theology) at Berkeley.

Caroline Wissing has a BA in English Literature from Queen’s University as well as a diploma in Print Journalism. She became a technical editor and writer in Ottawa’s intermittently thriving software industry, where she has worked for more than 12 years. Two of her stories, “Surrender” and “Gemini”, received second and third place in Ottawa’s Audrey Jessup short crime fiction contest. Voiceless is her first novel.

Jan Wood’s poetry and flash fiction have appeared many anthologies and literary journals, winning accolades in BC, Alberta, Manitoba, and Ontario. She won the poetry award at the Word Guild Canadian Christian Writing Awards three times and was selected Poet Laureate for Utmost Christian Writers from 2008 to 2010. She is an active member of the Saskatchewan Writer’s Guild, the Ontario Poetry Society, Inscribe, and other smaller writing groups. Wood resides in Big River, Saskatchewan.

P. J. Worrell has studied at St. Peter’s College (Muenster, SK), The Banff Centre, and The Munster Literature Centre (Cork, Ireland) with Sarah Selecky, Connie Gault, Jessica Grant, Seán Virgo, Lynda Monahan, and Michele Roberts as mentors. She has enjoyed modest success in the world of publication and contests. Worrell grew up on a SK farm, attended Sunday School, and has always tried to be a good girl. Social work practise in mental health and geriatrics have provided fodder for her stories. She has one foot in Swift Current, SK and the other in a cabin at a northern lake.