Dangerous Acts at the Kingston Writers Festival

This week I am at the Kingston Writer’s Festival, interviewing three Young Adult authors for a panel entitled Dangerous Acts: every act has a consequence. The festival was correct to label the panel dangerous. In each of the three novels the characters take on courageous acts, some borne out of necessity and others out of misguided or adolescent angst. I’m looking forward to a stimulating and engaging conversations with three amazing authors: Deborah Ellis, Maggie Devries and Nancy Lee. There are things I want to ask each of them about their books, their writing and about the dangerous lives of girls and women. 

Deborah Ellis is an internationally-acclaimed, award-winning author, feminist and peace activist. Her many books explore themes of social justice and courage, such as her Breadwinner series, which details the lives of Afghan girls and women. She has also written numerous nonfiction books of interviews with Iraqi, Israeli and Palestinian children. More recently she has written interviews with Indigenous children throughout the US and Canada.

Ellis’ most recent book is Moon at Nine, the story of a teenage girl, Farrin, who falls in love with another girl during the 1980’s in Tehran. The Shaw has been overthrown and the country is run by a deeply religious government, where revolutionary guards monitor every aspect of life.  When Farrin meets Sadira, a new girl at her school their friendship quickly becomes a romance. It is against the law to be gay in Iran and the punishment is death.

This novel had me griped all the way through especially since it was based on real life events.

Nancy Lee says she is not the kind of writers who worries about keeping her characters safe. This is true. Instead she sends her characters out into the wilds to see how they fare.  

Lee’s first book, the collection of short stories, Dead Girls, was a darkly carnal collection that dealt with the complexities and sadness of desire. It was named a best book of 2002 by The Vancouver Sun, The Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail and others.

Nancy Lee’s latest book, The Age, tells the story of Gerry Cross, a teenage misft, who is estranged from her father, at odds with her mother and adrift in the teenagehood of 1984.  Gerry’s anxiety about the threat of nuclear annihilation leads her to be involved with a group of activists planning to detonate a bomb at a downtown peace rally.

Lee is a master writer, and her descriptions had me immersed in the eighties. 

Maggie de Vries is the author of ten award-winning books for children and teens, and the memoir for adults Missing Sarah: A memoir of loss. This book is about de Vries’ adopted sister Sarah who disappeared from the streets of downtown Vancouver and whose DNA was found on serial killer Robert Picton’s farm. We do not know the names of almost any of the sex-workers who were victims of Picton, but in this memoir, de Vries introduces us to her charismatic sister Sarah, giving her a voice, and a name. Missing Sarah was a Governor General’s award nominee and won the Vancouver book Award, among others. 

In her new YA novel, Rabbit Ears, de Vries imagines an alternative fate for her sister Sarah. Devries says, “I wanted to tell a story about a girl that went through what my sister went through, but survived.” Told from the point of view of two sisters, Beth and Kaya, the two girls struggle as Kaya begins hanging out in the notoriously dangerous streets of Vancouver’s East Side, and turns to prostitution and drug use.

I read Rabbit Ears with fear and trepidation, but despite its strong subject matter, de Vries writes so beautifully that I thoroughly enjoyed the book.