Lindsay Wong: The Woo-Woo
In this jaw-dropping, darkly comedic memoir, a young woman comes of age in a dysfunctional Asian family who blame their woes on ghosts and demons when they should really be on anti-psychotic meds.
Lindsay Wong grew up with a paranoid schizophrenic grandmother and a mother who was deeply afraid of the “woo-woo” — Chinese ghosts who come to visit in times of personal turmoil. From a young age, she witnessed the woo-woo’s sinister effects; when she was six, Lindsay and her mother avoided the dead people haunting their house by hiding out in a mall food court, and on a camping trip, in an effort to rid her daughter of demons, her mother tried to light Lindsay’s foot on fire.
The eccentricities take a dark turn, however, and when Lindsay starts to experience symptoms of the woo-woo herself, she wonders whether she will suffer the same fate as her family.
At once a witty and touching memoir about the Asian immigrant experience and a harrowing and honest depiction of the vagaries of mental illness, The Woo-Woo is a gut-wrenching and beguiling manual for surviving family, and oneself.
Yugumalleq: A film by MFA Candidate Kavelina Torres
Congratulations to MFA Candidate Kavelina Torres, whose short film Yugumalleq / Shades of Life will air in United States Indian Country and on PBS stations across the US on August 5th, 2018 at 4:30 pm PST (7:30 pm EST).
Kavelina Torres
Kavelina is a Sundance Native Film and an Alaska Native Playwright’s Program alumna. Her film, Yugumalleq, resides with First Nations Experience (FNX) for PBS television programming. Her play, Something in The Living Room, debuted in April 2018 Vancouver, BC, to raise funds for safe injection sites.
2018 New Shoots Anthology Launch
We can’t stop reading the anthology!
A fabulous time was had by all at the 2018 New Shoots Anthology Launch!
Every year the Creative Writing Department partners with the Vancouver School Board and we send MFA’s into secondary schools as New Shoots Mentors. From December to May, New Shoots Mentors work with students as they explore every genre of writing imaginable (and a few more). In June, we publish an anthology of the students’ work and celebrate their accomplishments at a launch party. This year we were joined by Jen Sookfong Lee and Wayde Compton.
Jen and Wayde read their work alongside the fantastic New Shoots students, as did two of our MFA Mentors, Meagan Black and Andrew Dasselaar. These writers brought their poems, fiction and nonfiction to life, cheering each other on, and we ate almost all the cake.
Wayde Compton (right) with our New Shoots Student readers
Thanks to all of the mentors, students, teachers, families and friends of New Shoots for coming out and making this event such a celebration!
To all new and returning MFA’s who live in Vancouver: in September we will be looking for New Shoots Mentors for 2018-2019… You’ll be hearing from us!
More pictures follow (photo credits: Olga Holin). Continue reading “2018 New Shoots Anthology Launch”
Jennifer Chen: Super
All eyes are on Beata Bell, descendent of the great Frances E. Shaw. Bets are placed on which amazing power she will inherit. Flight? Telekinesis? Super hearing? Only Beata Bell remains stubbornly, infuriatingly, and inexplicably normal. Sidelined, she must face the painful reality that she might never live up to everyone’s expectations. But the Super world can’t seem to leave her alone! When a new villain threatens the city, Beata is launched into a whirlwind of mystery, danger, and conspiracy. With a totally normal skillset, she must exhaust all her wits and courage to save her friends—and to survive.
Natalie Morrill: The Ghost Keeper
Winner of the HarperCollins/UBC Prize for Best New Fiction, this powerful, sweeping novel set in Vienna during the 1930s and ’40s centres on a poignant love story and a friendship that ends in betrayal.
In the years between the two world wars, Josef Tobak builds a quiet life around his friendships, his beloved wife, Anna, and his devotion to the old Jewish cemeteries of Vienna. Then comes the Anschluss in 1938, and Josef’s world is uprooted. His health disintegrates. His wife and child are forced to flee to China. His closest gentile friend joins the Nazi Party—and yet helps Josef escape to America.
When the war ends, Josef returns to Vienna with his family and tries to make sense of what remains, including his former Nazi friend who, he discovers, protected Josef’s young female cousin throughout the war.
Back among his cemeteries in Austria’s war-shattered capital, Josef finds himself beset by secrets, darkness and outward righteousness marred by private cruelty. As the truth is unearthed, Josef’s care for the dead takes on new meaning while he confronts his own role in healing both his devastated community and his deepest wounds.
The Ghost Keeper is a story about the terrible choices we make to survive and the powerful connections to communities and friends that define us. Here is a finely accomplished novel that introduces an exciting new voice to our literary landscape.