Find out more about my memoir No Letter in Your Pocket
I was delighted to spend a half-hour yesterday interviewed by Matthew DiBiase, a Pennsylvania-based author, on his podcast The Packaged Tourist Show. When he first contacted me via LinkedIn, I assumed he was someone trying to market tourism packages, which is not my form of travel at all. But no, he explained that he likes…
If you want to learn more about notable authors who lived on BC’s Sunshine Coast, come to the Tale Trail Experience at Roberts Creek Hall on Nov. 10. I’ll be giving a presentation about M. Wylie Blanchet, the author who wrote the west-coast adventure nonfiction The Curve of Time. It has recently been on BC’s…
CANCELLED DUE TO ATMOSPHERIC RIVER: Due to nearby flooding and road closures, we had to cancel this event. We apologize for any inconvenience. It will be rescheduled in the new year. Watch for a post in 2025 providing new event details. I’ll be part of the Oct. 19 event “From Pain to Power,” a two-author…
Want to hear my stories of solo travel in India, from touring the Taj Mahal under curfew to visiting an exorcism temple? Come to my reading “A Story of Thriving Empowerment” at Powell River Public Library in qathet Powell River, BC. It’s on Thursday, Oct. 3, from 2 to 3 pm. I’ll focus on my…
In the spring 2024 issue of BC BookWorld, reviewer Steve McClure writes of my memoir No Letter in Your Pocket: “Conn’s soul-baring honesty and writing skills compel you to keep reading and keep learning. The arc of her narrative …. is one that anyone with the slightest amount of empathy will be drawn in by…
If you’re looking for a fun kids’ event, come to my author reading of Six Stinky Feet and a Sasquatch on March 9. I’ll be at Village Books and Paper Dreams in Bellingham, WA. at 11 am. There will be lots of audience participation and a Q&A. Books will be available for sale and signing….
It was a delight to be one of five BC authors who read short memoir excerpts Feb. 21, as a Canadian Authors, BC Chapter Zoom event. Topics ranged from poignant reminiscences of a mother and her sudden death to a Lancaster fighter pilot who survived two years of duty in the Second World War. One…
My memoir No Letter in Your Pocket recently appeared in the “New & Notable” book section (winter 2024 issue) of Goucher Magazine in Baltimore, MD. That feels like a birth notice, of sorts, because Goucher College is where I began to birth this book, in their creative nonfiction MFA program. Lynn Satterfield, Goucher’s director of…
It was a treat to interview Andreas and Kendra Tize, owners of Secret Cove Marina in Halfmoon Bay, BC. I got to luxuriate, albeit briefly, in their 5,000-square-foot float home and discover the cozy seafood restaurant The Upper Deck. (I knew Andreas as the Roberts Creek rep for the Sunshine Coast Regional District.) Their marina…
I look forward to introducing my memoir No Letter in Your Pocket to my local Sunshine Coast, BC community on Saturday, April 15. My informal book launch (not the official one in Toronto on May 28) will be held at 7 pm at the Sunshine Coast Cultural Centre in Sechelt. I’ll discuss the book, its…
Artesia Coffeehouse attendees will get a sneak preview of my memoir No Letter in Your Pocket on April 7 at the Sunshine Coast Arts Centre in Sechelt, BC. I’ll be giving a seven-minute reading from my memoir about my visit to the erotic sandstone temples in Khajuraho, India in 1991. This will be from chapter…
I’m delighted that I’ll be joining seven other authors from publisher Guernica Editions on Sunday, May 28 to launch my new memoir in Toronto. Join us at Supermarket Bar in the city’s Kensington area at 3:30 pm. You’ll hear me read short excerpts from No Letter in Your Pocket: How a daughter…
I really enjoyed being interviewed on Om By the Beach, a European podcast hosted by Josef Schinwald. Our one-hour discussion about Being on a Spiritual Path covered many areas, from Buddhist concepts of compassion, forgiveness, and no-self to writing about trauma, coaching others about writing about their trauma, and my memoir No Letter in Your…
I’m delighted to present new literary material, inspired by a painting by Gibsons artist Paula O’Brien, at the inaugural Arts & Words event in Davis Bay on Aug. 12 and 13. My Aug. 12 reading, in the 10:30 to noon time slot, is generously sponsored by Canada Council through the Writers’ Union of Canada. The…
I profiled and photographed Candace Campo, co-founder of Talaysay Tours and a shishalh Nation member, for the winter 2022 issue of Sunshine Coast Life Magazine. Each year, her First Nations ecotour company hosts visitors from around the globe, introducing them to Pacific Northwest Indigenous culture, history, ancestors, local flora and fauna, and the spiritual significance…
Rocket launchers blast through a night sky as clashing rebel groups exchange fire in India’s contentious Kashmir region. My then-partner and I huddle on the bow of a cozy houseboat on Dal Lake. Find out what it was like to be there under curfew in my travel essay Two Realities. It appears in the debut…
Hello Everyone, The Burnaby Writers’ Society is sponsoring me as a featured writer on Zoom, Sunday, Sept. 19, starting at noon. I’ll be reading short excerpts from three sources: my essay “A Slow Good-bye,” a visit to the Taj Mahal from my memoir No Letter in Your Pocket (Guernica Editions 2023), and my picture book…
REGIONAL SPOTLIGHT: SUNSHINE COAST — I’ll be one of six authors reading a 10-minute selection on Zoom on Feb. 11, sponsored by the Federation of BC Writers. My excerpt is from the chapter “Assault” in my memoir No Letter in Your Pocket, to be published in 2023 by Guernica Editions. Free event runs from 7…
Few people realize how much the Mafia shaped the economy of Havana for more than 30 years. While visiting Cuba’s capital in October-November 2016, I relished the chance to learn more about the country’s illegal past. My December 9, 2016 travel feature Havana Travel article 2016 (Coast Reporter) reveals some tidbits of…
It wasn’t Sam McGee’s fiery demise in Lake Lebarge, but I knew that Stewart River in the Yukon was the right spot to honour her memory. Before writer friend Janet Collins died in the summer of 2013, she made an innovative request to those who later attended her memorial. To find out how I fulfilled her…
My newly completed memoir, No Letter in Your Pocket: Twenty Years Healing a Family Secret, provides adventurous tales of my seven months in India in 1990-1991. This revealing book interweaves denial about a primal family relationship with adventure, romance and spiritual exploration. From its highs—describing a successful climb of the 20,000-foot peak Stok Kangri—to its…
My travel essay “Bird Sanctuary,” which describes World Heritage Site Keoladeo National Park near Bharatpur, appears in the anthology Emails from India: Women Write Home. Published in the fall of 2013 by Seraphim Editions in Ontario, this book features the writing of 28 female contributors from across North America, along with several Europeans….
As a Camino de Santiago pilgrim in Spain in June 2013, I sought out some of Ernest Hemingway’s favourite haunts in Pamplona. As I wrote: “It was easy to imagine the expatriate writer arm-wrestling over one of the many patio tables or downing too many absinthes or whiskeys in fading Spanish light. . .” Click…
My feature “Workshop inspired by El Camino pilgrimage” appeared in the Sept. 27, 2013 issue of Coast Reporter on British Columbia’s Sunshine Coast. The piece promoted my workshop “Twelve Gifts of the Camino,” inspired by my 800-kilometre pilgrimage through France and Spain in May and June 2013. Click this 12 Gifts of the Camino link to read…
For centuries, the medieval labyrinth in France’s Chartres Cathedral has attracted millions of visitors and Camino de Santiago pilgrims like me. I described my mixed feelings in walking this historic pathway in my travel feature “The wonders of the labyrinth.” This piece appeared in the Sept. 13, 2013 issue of The Coast Reporter on…
For the next two to three months, I’ll be writing a series of weekly posts, with photographs, about my 800-kilometre walk along the El Camino in France and Spain. Each week, I’ll feature a new topic, from “creating sacred space” to “the Roman road.” I look forward to a lively discussion with readers. If…
With special permission to carry 60 pounds of medical supplies, I set off for Cuba with a group of friends in October 2011. We were delighted to distribute these much-needed materials to small clinics in Cuba’s Trinidad region and to provide clothes and school supplies to local communities. Click here to read my Cuba Travel Article “From the Coast…
I wrote short items to accompany a photo essay of the challenges pregnant women face in Haiti. The piece is meant to increase public awareness of the activities of Doctors Without Borders in Haiti. These photo-and-caption combinations were part of the content used in my course Photography and Writing for the Digital Age. A photographer and…
I taught a one-day workshop “Prose on the Road: The Art of Travel Writing” for the Sechelt, BC campus of Capilano University from 2008 to 2010. The course offered engaging hands-on exercises, query tips, and a great bibliography. For more information, see Teaching.
During a trip to Martha’s Vineyard, Mass. in the summer of 2009, I visited Chappaquiddick Bridge, the infamous site where Ted Kennedy’s aide, Mary Joe Kopechne, died 40 years earlier. My travel article “Martha’s Vineyard inspires” recounts my trip to this popular location and my doubts regarding the Chappaquiddick Bridge incident (Coast Reporter, Sechelt, BC, July…