2025 Ireland Writing Retreat
2025-05-18 00:00 - 2025-05-27 23:59 (America/New_York) | Doolin, Ireland, Doolin, County Clare, Ireland
May 18-27, 2025 join a small group (12 maximum) of writers focused on making a connection with Land. This retreat, in Rural Ireland (Doolin, County Clare) is at a UNESCO geopark and a town that has created a cooperative to promote ecotourism that contributes to their way of life rather than destroys it. Retreat is 10 days with 4 writing workshops with Irish writers, 2 meals/day included (with 1 left out so you can explore the village’s farm-to-table and sea-to-table offerings), and more. Please see: https://www.nature-culture.net/ireland-retreat-2025preview (note prices of $1500-$2500 are in USD). Co-led by QWF member Lis McLoughlin, and Irish Rural Writing Collective founder and director Ryan Dennis.

UNMET Book Launch Halifax
2025-05-18 13:00 - 14:30 | Halifax Central Library, 5440 Spring Garden Road, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3J1E9, Canada
The book launch for the poetry collection UNMET (Biblioasis) by stephanie roberts at the Halifax Central Library with Annick MacAskill.

Poetry Launch with Terese Mason Pierre
2025-05-18 13:00 - 14:30 | Halifax Central Library, 5440 Spring Garden Road, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3J1E9, Canada
Join us on May 8th at 7pm in launching Terese Mason Pierre’s poetry collection, Myth! Local poets Faith Paré and Misha Solomon will also be reading some of their work for us. Please register to let us know you’ll be attending.

World Premiere of Michaela Di Cesare's play Mickey & Joe (Good. Bad. Ugly. Dirty)
2025-05-18 20:00 - 22:00, 2025-05-20 20:00 - 22:00, 2025-05-21 20:00 - 22:00, 2025-05-22 20:00 - 22:00, 2025-05-23 20:00 - 22:00, 2025-05-24 14:00 - 16:00, 2025-05-24 20:00 - 22:00, 2025-05-25 14:00 - 16:00 | Mirella & Lino Saputo Theatre, 8370 boul lacordaire, Montreal, Quebec, H2K 4K2, Canada
150 years (give or take) after the “unification” of Italy, a forgotten player finds herself trapped in limbo with her sworn enemy. Dirty Mickey, hailing from the dark Southern underbelly of an otherwise glorious country, was a soldier in the resistance. Joe was the golden boy of the Risorgimento (literally, resurrection), forever remembered as a political hero. What will happen when Mickey, an outlaw who was silenced, murdered and erased for his benefit, comes after his legacy today? This contemporary spaghetti western challenges our collective memory, or collective amnesia.

Novel Essentials: The Art & Craft of Long-Form Fiction
2025-05-19 18:00 - 20:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
Have you had an itch to write a novel, but haven’t known how to tackle such a large project? Now is the perfect time to dust off your ideas! This workshop is a boot camp for budding writers eager to turn their novelistic dream into a reality. From iron-clad structures and story tropes to the ins-and-outs of how character motivation pushes a great plot, this 10-week intensive workshop will impart professional tips and tricks-of-the-trade essential to bringing long-form fiction to life.

The workshop will focus on practical knowledge not covered in a typical writing workshop: initial idea development; a deep dive on novelistic structure; how to build the perfect plot; character development and motivation; scene development; and how to handle secondary and tertiary characters, to name a few. Each week, you will learn one or more essential techniques and/or theories, as well as participate in short, practical exercises that will help you build your novel. As you master the elements, you will have opportunities to develop and workshop your original novel concepts.

While an emphasis will be placed on long-form writing, all writers looking to master essential elements of fiction writing are encouraged to attend. You do not require prior workshop experience or an idea for a novel to take this workshop. Participants interested in developing fiction of all kinds are more than welcome!

L. E. Sterling (Erin Vollick, also published under L. E. Vollick) is the author of numerous novels spanning contemporary, Young Adult, fantasy, science-fiction, dystopian and romance genres. Her hit series, the True Born Trilogy, was optioned for television, and True Born, the first novel in the trilogy, was recognized internationally with the 2017 Athena Award® in Young Adult literature. With a B.A. and M.A. in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Literature, Sterling taught creative writing and literature for many years. She has appeared at BookCon NYC, the LA Times Festival of Books, and Ad Astra.

Craft Meets Magic: The Alchemy of Short Fiction
2025-05-21 17:45 - 19:45, 2025-05-28 17:45 - 19:45, 2025-06-04 17:45 - 19:45 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
Is there an art form more maddening than the short story? Demanding the complexity of a novel, the lyricism of a poem, and the economy of a joke, the work is tedious and the rewards (for most of us) are slim. Still, for us cursed few, the short story is an addictive nut to crack. After all, there’s little more thrilling than the prose of a writer who can do more with a handful of pages than most can do with 300. The complexity of a novel! The lyricism of a poem! The economy of a joke!

Join us, if you dare, for an 8-week workshop where participants will share and critique each other’s work with an eye towards craft. Specifically, we will ask ourselves questions like, “What are characters made of?” “How is a plot built?” “Do I really need to describe everything?”

Equally important to studying these questions will be putting them aside, as we celebrate and cultivate the magic that makes art artin the first place–that intangible whatever that defines our passion for fiction. After all, what else do we have to keep us warm as we trudge through draft to draft?

As time allows, we’ll also read stories by published authors like ZZ Packer, Donald Barthelme, Jhumpa Lahiri, Joy Williams, and George Saunders. Participants will be asked to read and prepare responses to a short story (distributed from me by email) prior to our first meeting.

Frankie Barnet is the author of Mood Swings (McClelland & Stewart), which was a finalist for the Grand prix du livre de Montréal; Kim: A Novel Idea (Metatron); and An Indoor Kind of Girl (Metatron). Her work has appeared in places such as PRISM International, EVENT, Joyland, The Erotic Review, and Biblioasis’ Best Canadian Short Stories Anthology. She has an MFA from Syracuse University and lives in Montreal.

"The Sustainability Class" - book launch / lancement du livre
2025-05-22 19:00 - 20:00 | Librairie Pulp Books & Cafe, 3952 Wellington Street, Montreal, Quebec, H4G1V3, Canada
Join us in welcoming Vijay Kolinjivadi & Aaron Vansintjan to Pulp Books on May 22 for an enlightening conversation about their book The Sustainability Class, building an ecological future, and how “lifestyle environmentalism” has made cities more unsustainable and inaccessible to the working class. Hosted by Quebec Solidaire’s MNA for Verdun, Alejandra Zaga Mendez, this will not be an evening to miss! // Nous vous invitons au lancement de Vijay Kolinjivadi et Aaron Vansintjan le 22 mai prochain pour une conversation enrichissante sur leur livre, The Sustainability Class. Les auteurs discuteront de la construction d’un avenir écologique avec l’honorable Alejandra Zaga Mendez, députée pour Verdun. Bref, une soirée à ne pas manquer! Début de l’événement à 19h / ouverture des portes à 18h45

Soliloquies Launch, 29.2
2025-05-22 19:00 - 21:00 | Cardinal Tearoom, 5326 St Laurent Blvd, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Soliloquies Anthology is launching their 29.2 issue!
Hear readings by contributors, as well as our featured readers Morgan Gordon and Jade Palmer.

Poetry Launch: Christine Wu and Jessica Bebenek
2025-05-22 19:00 - 21:30 | QC
Thursday, May 22, 2025, 7:00–9:30 pm ETmai/son (DM hosts for address)

Join Christine Wu and Jessica Bebenek for the Montreal launch of their poetry collections, Familial Hungers by Wu (Brick Books) and No One Knows Us There by Bebenek (Book*hug Press).

Featuring guest reader Liz Howard and musical guest Andrew Whiteman.

BYOBAdmission is free. All are welcome to attend.

Message Jessica Bebenek at @notyrmuse or Christine Wu at @homemadepoem on Instagram for the address.

About No One Knows Us There

In this stunning debut collection, Bronwen Wallace Award finalist Jessica Bebenek presents two distinct and moving portraits of early womanhood. The first is that of the devoted, caregiving granddaughter navigating hospital hallways and the painful realities of palliative care. The second is that of a woman a decade older, compassionately looking back on her younger self. In this second half, Bebenek rewrites poems from the first, honouring unimaginable loss and turning it into genuine healing.

Jessica Bebenek is a queer interdisciplinary poet and educator from Tkaronto (Toronto) who now splits her time between Tiohtià:ke (Montreal) and an off-grid shack on unceded Anishinaabeg territory. She works as a risograph printer and bookmaker at Concordia University’s Centre for Expanded Poetics, where she organized the international Occult Poetics Symposium. In 2021, Bebenek was a finalist for the Writers’ Trust of Canada RBC Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Writers. Her writing has been nominated for the Journey Prize and Pushcart Prize, and she is the author of eight poetry chapbooks, including I Remember the Exorcism. No One Knows Us There is her first book of poetry.

About Familial Hungers

Bittersweet, numbingly spicy, herbal and milky, Familial Hungers is a lyric feast. Ginger scallion fish, Sichuan peppercorns, ginseng tea, Chinese school and white chefs – the reader’s appetite is satiated with these poems’ complex palate. There are the bubbling expectations for immigrant daughters, the chewy strands of colonial critique, and dissolving crystals of language loss. Wu relentlessly searches the grocery shelves for the hard-to-digest ingredients of identity and belonging, offering us her nourishing honesty and courage pulled from the marrow.

Christine Wu is a Chinese-Canadian poet who was born and raised on the territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh (Vancouver, BC). She has a BFA in Creative Writing from the University of Victoria, a MLIS from Dalhousie University, and a MA in English from the University of New Brunswick. In 2023, she was the winner of the RBC PEN Canada New Voices Award and in 2022, she was shortlisted for the RBC Writers’ Trust Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Writers. She now lives and writes in Kjipuktuk (Halifax, NS) in Mi’kma’ki.

Festival Montréal Mystère / Montréal Mystery Festival
2025-05-23 00:00 - 2025-05-24 23:59 | Grande Bibliothèque de Montréal, 475 Boul. de Maisonneuve E., Montréal, Quebec, H2L 5C4, Canada
Montréal is gearing up for the Montréal Mystery book festival, slated for May 23-24, 2025. For the second year, this trailblazing festival of mystery and thriller literature will be held at the Grande Bibliothèque, located in the vibrant heart of Montréal.

Over 20 distinguished authors from Quebec, the rest of Canada, the United States and Europe will converge for this two-day festival, bringing with them a myriad of tales filled with intrigue, suspense, and mystery. Montreal Mystery is a bilingual event, accommodating both English and French-speaking audiences, reflecting the rich linguistic diversity of the city.

Book presentation of The Last Dance of Mary Kelly
2025-05-24 08:00 - 17:00 | QC
E. David Brown’s new novel The Last Dance of Mary Kelly is being released on May 13th. It is available as both an e-book and print book on Amazon and Orca as well as other sites. On May 24th from 11 to 3 he is doing a presentation at the Chapter Indigo on the West Island in the shopping centre across from the Fairview Mall.

Shut Up & Write! with QWF (Virtual)
2025-05-24 10:00 - 12:30 | Online – Please RSVP to receive a Zoom link
Saturday, May 24, 2025, 10:00 am–12:30 pm ETOnline via Zoom—RSVP below to receive the Zoom link

Looking for some dedicated, quiet writing space?

Register below to do all that writing you’ve been meaning to do. Using the Pomodoro technique, participants write in 25-minute bursts, with 5-minute breaks in between.

This event is for QWF members only. Not a member? Learn about becoming a member.

The Zoom link will be sent out a day or two before the session.

Please note that these sessions are designed for silent writing, rather than discussing or getting feedback on work.

10:00–10:25: Writing 110:25–10:30: Break10:30–10:55: Writing 210:55–11:00: Break11:00–11:25: Writing 311:25–11:30: Break11:30–11:55: Writing 411:55–12:00: Break12:00–12:25: Writing 5

To receive the Zoom link, RSVP below. You will receive the Zoom link a few days before the session.

Note: RSVPs for virtual Shut Up & Write! sessions close 24 hours before the session begins. If there is no option to RSVP, RSVPs are closed.

Dreamwork Salon (Online)
2025-05-25 13:00 - 15:30 | Online via Zoom
This experiential workshop offers an introduction to the practice of group dreamwork. It’s for anyone who’s interested in their dreams, and open to new ways of working with them in a group context —no particular experience required. Centring creativity and collaboration, I’ll present a number of ways to work with dreams, inspired by Montague Ullman’s “dream appreciation,” Jungian dreamwork, and more. Together, we’ll apply these techniques to the dreams that group members bring; registration is capped at six so that everyone who wants to share will have a turn. Sign up, and learn about other group dreamwork offerings, at bit.ly/dreamsalon or write to Heather White at groupdreamwork@gmail.com.

Quist Issue 2 Launch
2025-05-29 13:30 - 21:00 | Librairie Pulp Books & Cafe, 3952 Wellington Street, Montreal, Quebec, H4G1V3, Canada
Thursday, May 29, 2025, 7:00 pm ETLibrairie Pulp Books & Café

Join us May 29th at 7pm for an evening of art, poetry and prose as we launch Quist Issue 2 at Librairie Pulp Books & Cafe!Our event will host readings by our wonderful contributors as well as a display of our amazing art featured in this issue!Our Issue 2 Launch Readers

Adrien Thibault

Aisha Nyerere

Alyssa Grace

hudaoun

Jessy Lafrenière

Jibreel Khan

Laura Verardo

Lynne Zreik

Olivia Tan

This is a free, all ages event—everyone is welcome to join! We can’t wait to see you there!

Shut Up & Write! with QWF (In Person)
2025-05-30 12:30 - 15:00 | QWF Office, 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3, Westmount, QC, H3Z 1X4, Canada
Friday, May 30, 2025, 12:30 pm–3:00 pmFree, In PersonQWF Office (Room 3, 1200 Atwater Ave., Westmount)

Register for the session by filling out the RSVP form below.

Looking for some dedicated, quiet writing space?

Join us for an in-person Shut Up & Write session at the QWF office!

Do all that writing you’ve been meaning to do, and meet a few of your fellow QWF members. Using the Pomodoro technique, participants write in 25-minute bursts, with 5-minute breaks in between.

This event is for QWF members only. Not a member? Learn about becoming a member.

Please note that these sessions are designed for silent writing, rather than discussing or getting feedback on work.

12:30–12:55: Writing 112:55–1:00: Break1:00–1:25: Writing 21:25–1:30: Break1:30–1:55: Writing 31:55–2:00: Break2:00–2:25: Writing 42:25–2:30: Break2:30–2:55: Writing 5

To register, RSVP below.

Getting to the QWF Office

Our office is located on the top floor of the Atwater Library and Computer Centre, in Room 3.

Address: 1200 Atwater Avenue, Room 3Westmount, QC H3Z 1X4

Closest Metro: Atwater Station

Closest Bus lines: 24, 63, 90, 104, 138, 144, 150

Accessibility:

The QWF Office is fully accessible by wheelchair from the side entrance on Tupper Street. Once inside, there is an elevator to the second floor, where the QWF office is.

Learn more about the office location and accessibility.

If you registered and can no longer attend, please email john@qwf.org to notify us.

Dreamwork Salon (In Person)
2025-06-01 13:00 - 15:30 | Surya Montreal, 903 Rue Saint-Zotique Est, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

2025 QWF Mentorship Reading
2025-06-01 14:00 - 16:00 | Centre Sanaaq, 1200 Rue du Sussex, Montreal, Quebec, H3H 0E3, Canada
RSVP

Join us for the 2025 QWF Mentorship Reading!

For four months, eight emerging writers and one emerging translator have worked to hone their craft through the QWF Mentorship Program. Each has received one-on-one guidance from a professional mentor to help them transition to the next stage of their careers. Now, their journey culminates in a public reading where each mentee will present an excerpt from their work in progress.

This year will feature our first-ever Youth Mentorship pair, a pilot project organized through our Writers in the Community program. With nine readers, it will be our largest mentorship reading yet. Don’t miss it!

Featuring:

Cameryn Cappellazzo, mentored by D. W. Wilson in Fiction

Kat Mulligan, mentored by April Ford in Fiction

Tamsyn Farr, mentored by D. M. Bradford in Poetry

Jade Palmer, mentored by stephanie roberts in Poetry

Shelly Bahng, mentored by Gerald Wexler in Screenwriting

Ray Resvick, mentored by Jacob Potashnik in Screenwriting

Christopher Beaunoyer, mentored by Luba Markovskaia in Literary Translation (Jean Antonin Billard LTAC/QWF Mentorship)

Afreina Noor, mentored by Kama La Mackerel in Spoken Word (Mairuth Sarsfield Mentorship)

Thaia:iake Lazare, mentored by L.E. Sterling (Inaugural QWF Youth Mentorship)

RSVPs are required due to limited space.Everyone who RSVPs will be put on the event guest list. If there are extra seats available the day of the event, people who have not RSVPed will be admitted at the door on a first-come, first-served basis.

Accessibility: The Centre Sanaaq is a universally accessible public building. Room 3 is on the second floor, accessible by stairs or elevator. People using adapted transport can ask to be dropped off at the paratransit drop-off zone in front of the main entrance, near the outdoor access ramp.

About the QWF Mentorship Program

The QWF Mentorships are designed to help promising emerging writers make the transition to the next stage of their careers. Over a period of four months, each mentee received one-on-one guidance and support from a professional writing mentor. Now, their journey culminates in a public reading where the mentees present an excerpt of their works-in-progress. Learn more about the QWF Mentorship Program.

RSVP

Headlight Anthology Issue 26: Edge Launch
2025-06-01 19:00 - 23:00 | la courtepointe, 220 Rue Villeray, Montreal, H2R2B5
Come celebrate the launch of Issue 26 of Concordia’s graduate literary journal, Headlight Anthology. The evening will feature readings from this issue’s contributors, as well as an open mic portion at the end of the night.
Featuring readings by:
Rebecca Hister
Bryan Lee
Rebecca Lawrence Lynch
Inuya D’Vorah Schultz
Xander Simmons
Kyra Sutton
Nicky Taylor
Doors open at 6:30. An entry fee of $5 is suggested, but no one will be turned away for a lack of funds. Copies of Issue 26 will also be sold!

Aborted at Montreal Fringe 2025
2025-06-05 22:30 - 2025-06-14 22:00 | O Patro Vys, 356 Mont-Royal Av E, Montreal, Quebec, H2T 1P9, Canada
Aborted is a metaphorical, poetic play exploring a young woman’s/daughter’s life as she revisits a particular day in her life and the years that led to it. Through nonlinear storytelling, she steps beyond self-protection to uncover buried memories, revealing her own pain and suffering in the process.
Auteur.trice.s / Playwright.s: Espérance Love
Metteur.euse.s en scène / Director.s: Anne-Marie St-Louis, Espérance Love
Interprètes / Performer.s: Rose Doresca, Amanda Benn

Shut Up & Write! with QWF (Virtual)
2025-06-07 10:00 - 12:30 | Online – Please RSVP to receive a Zoom link
Saturday, June 7, 2025, 10:00 am–12:30 pm ETOnline via Zoom—RSVP below to receive the Zoom link

Looking for some dedicated, quiet writing space?

Register below to do all that writing you’ve been meaning to do. Using the Pomodoro technique, participants write in 25-minute bursts, with 5-minute breaks in between.

This event is for QWF members only. Not a member? Learn about becoming a member.

The Zoom link will be sent out a day or two before the session.

Please note that these sessions are designed for silent writing, rather than discussing or getting feedback on work.

10:00–10:25: Writing 110:25–10:30: Break10:30–10:55: Writing 210:55–11:00: Break11:00–11:25: Writing 311:25–11:30: Break11:30–11:55: Writing 411:55–12:00: Break12:00–12:25: Writing 5

To receive the Zoom link, RSVP below. You will receive the Zoom link a few days before the session.

Note: RSVPs for virtual Shut Up & Write! sessions close 24 hours before the session begins. If there is no option to RSVP, RSVPs are closed.

The Neighbourhood: An Immersive Journey Through Beaconsfield
2025-06-08 13:00 - 16:00 | Windermere Park, Beaconsfield, Quebec, Canada
Event Moved to: June 8, 20251:00-4:00 pm ETMeet at Windermere Park, BeaconsfieldFree, Open to All

You’re invited to put on your headphones and experience The Neighbourhood.

Inspired by real community voices from Beaconsfield and Montreal West, The Neighbourhood is an immersive audio journey blending fiction and memory. On June 7, join creator Stephanie Merulla as we listen to and experience The Neighbourhood together, available in English and French.

The walk will begin in Windermere Park and continue to Beaurepaire Village. Experience Beaconsfield like never before with these exciting immersive stories created by Stephanie Merulla, inspired by the voices of local residents.

In case of rain: The tour will be moved to Sunday, June 8

Produced in partnership with Bibliothèque publique de Beaconsfield, Montreal West Public Library, and the Quebec Writers’ Federation as part of the “One Planet, Countless Wor(l)ds” project series. Made possible with the support of the Conseil des arts de Montréal, the English-Language Arts Network, and the Government of Canada.

*Due to weather conditions on June 7, this event has been moved to Sunday, June 8, 1 pm.
