Queer BC Authors to Watch this Fall
by Lindsay Marsh © 2020 What’s On Queer BC
Two spirit, trans and queer authors and poets explore identity, racism, oppression, family history, addiction, spirituality and the never-ending tides of change in this list of good reads for the upcoming winter months. So curl up and Get Out!
Cicely Belle Blain
Activist and poet Cicely Belle Blain describes themselves as a Black/mixed, queer femme from London now living on the traditional lands of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. They are known for founding Black Lives Matter Vancouver and are the CEO of Cicely Blain Consulting, a social justice-informed diversity and inclusion consulting company.
They debuted Burning Sugar this past September, a collection of poems that explores Black identity and histories while exploring the roots of racism and systemic oppression. The reader is confronted by the everyday impacts of racism and colonization on Black bodies. Black queer self-love is an act of resistance, as displayed throughout these poems as it disrupts, questions, and advocates for its right to live free of prejudice.
CBC Books recognized Burning Sugar as “Canadian Poetry Collections to Watch For.”
Available at Arsenal Pulp
Jillian Christmas
Jillian Christmas is a queer, Afro-Caribbean writer, educator, and spoken word activist living on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples where she works at Cicely Blain Consulting. She served for six years as artistic director of Vancouver's Verses Festival of Words and has won numerous Grand Poetry Slam Championship titles.
Her debut book, The Gospel of Breaking, is described as incantatory and disarming. Christmas has created a collection that is defiant as it is gentle, that reflects family history, queer lineage, and the political landscape of a racialized life.
Jaye simpson
Jaye simpson identifies as an Oji-Cree Saulteaux non-binary trans woman who is resisting and residing on Musqueam, Tsleil-waututh, and Squamish First Nations territories. Their first collection of poetry and prose, it was never going to be okay, is due out this month. Within its pages, simpson addresses intergenerational trauma, Indigeneity, and queerness.
As a kind of love letter to trans Indigenous peoples, simpson’s poetry plays a critical part in decolonizing our minds, our practices, and our future. If you want to spend sticky, sweet time with queer Indigenous love, kinship, and loss, dive into simpson’s lyrical mastery.
Join the October 8 Adopt an Author online event
Available at Harbour Publishing
Smokii Sumac
Two-spirit, transgendered poet and educator Smokii Sumac has been shortlisted for the 2020 Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ emerging writers. Smokii is a proud member of the Ktunaxa nation in Kimberly, BC, a Ph.D. Candidate at Trent University, and a faculty member at College of the Rockies.
His 2018 debut book of poetry you are enough: love poems for the end of the world won the Indigenous Voices Award for poetry. This transformative collection shares works from his two years of writing poetry almost daily and that reflect laughter and pain while Sumac deals with subjects such as addiction and depression, finding community, and ultimately, finding home.
Available at Kegedonce Press
Jen Currin
Award-winning poet Jen Currin was born and raised in Portland, Oregon but now resides on unceded Coast Salish territories. She teaches in the Creative Writing and ACP Departments at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.
The twenty stories in Currin’s debut collection of short fiction, Hider/Seeker, chart the complex relationships of LGBTQ+ characters as they navigate spirituality, sometimes addiction, and always, the never-ending tides of change. There is suffering in these pages, as characters ease loneliness with sex, which is mistaken for love. The stories, rooted in the contemporary Pacific Northwest, look at themes of self-healing after abuse and failed relationships, as Currin skillfully explores the balance between certainty and the unknown.
Hider/Seeker was recognized as one of The Globe and Mail‘s top 100 books of 2018.
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