We are happy to announce Lee Kvern and Bradley Somer will be our Writers in Residence at our 2018 Banff Retreat. Lee and Bradley will be available for individual consultations at the retreat. For more information or to register, visit the 2018 Banff Retreat registration page.
Lee Kvern’s short stories from 7 Ways to Sunday have garnered the CBC Literary Prize, the Howard O’ Hagan Award for Short Story, Western Magazine Award, and Hazel Hilles Memorial Short Fiction Prize. Afterall was selected for the regional 2013 Canada Reads and nominated for the Alberta Book Awards. The Matter of Sylvie was nominated for the Alberta Literary Awards and Ottawa Relit Award.”Heavy Weight for Silence” was shortlisted for the Jon Whyte Essay Award. Sangfroid in Two Movements, semi-finalist, Tillie Olsen Short Story Award 2017. Work was produced for CBC Radio, published in Event, Descant, Air Canada enRoute, subTerrain, The Tishman Review, Globe and Mail, Joyland.ca, Foundpress.com, LittleFiction.com. Lee has served as Author-in-Residence for the Calgary Public Library, Writer-in-Residence for Alexandra Writers Centre, Writer-in-Residence for the Canadian Authors Association, and a mentor for the Writers’ Guild of Alberta’s Mentorship Program.
Bradley Somer holds degrees in Archaeology and Anthropology and spent many years tromping through the wilds of Canada and the US, the scrub brush of Australia, and along the beaches of the Caribbean looking for artifacts to fill in the hidden stories of human prehistory. He now just makes up stories because it’s easier. He is also the recipient of the 2016 Lieutenant Governor General’s award for Emerging Artist.
His writing has appeared in dozens of literary magazines and anthologies over the past fifteen years. His first novel, Imperfections, was published by Nightwood Editions in Canada. His latest novel, Fishbowl, has been published in more than fifteen countries and five translations around the world, was awarded the Georges Bugnet Award for Fiction, and longlisted for the Alberta Readers Choice Awards. Fishbowl has been well-reviewed in the Globe and Mail, The Wall Street Journal, Kirkus Reviews, The Toronto Star, Cosmopolitan UK, among others. It was also one of The San Diego Union Tribunes Best Books of 2015.