Past Events
2024June
Sat
1
Book Signing for John Connolly's Connections
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM
Perfect Books
John Connolly's collection of short stories in Connections explores the euphoria of newfound love, the agony of loss, and the darkness some may be capable of when they’re pushed to the brink. Relationships have the power to profoundly impact our lives - in ways we never could have anticipated - and take us to places we least expect.
Sat
1
Book Launch for Suyi Davies Okungbowa's Lost Ark Dreaming
5:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Art Engine at Arts Court
Launch for Nommo Award-winning author Suyi Davies Okungbowa's newest book, Lost Ark Dreaming. This this high-octane post-climate disaster novella brings us the brutally engineered class divisions of Snowpiercer meets Rivers Solomon’s The Deep.
Book Signing for John Connolly's Connections
Perfect Books
John Connolly's collection of short stories in Connections explores the euphoria of newfound love, the agony of loss, and the darkness some may be capable of when they’re pushed to the brink. Relationships have the power to profoundly impact our lives - in ways we never could have anticipated - and take us to places we least expect.
Book Launch for Suyi Davies Okungbowa's Lost Ark Dreaming
Art Engine at Arts Court
Launch for Nommo Award-winning author Suyi Davies Okungbowa's newest book, Lost Ark Dreaming. This this high-octane post-climate disaster novella brings us the brutally engineered class divisions of Snowpiercer meets Rivers Solomon’s The Deep.
Book Launch for Stephen Maher's The Prince
St. John the Evangelist Church
The Ottawa Writers Festival presents Stephen Maher as he launches his new biography of Justin Trudeau entitled The Prince.
For tickets please visit https://writersfestival.org/events/spring-2024-in-person-events/book-launch-the-prince
Book Launch for Don Butler's Norman's Conquest
Perfect Books
Join us in-store with Don Butler for the launch of his newest book Norman's Conquest, the much anticipated follow-up to A Life of Bliss.
Book Launch for Bill Waiser & Jennie Hansen's Cheated
Library and Archives Canada
Perfect Books will be at Library and Archives Canada to welcome Bill Waiser and Jennie Hansen with their newest work, Cheated: The Laurier Liberals and the Theft of First Nations Reserve Lands.
Book Launch for Sarah Pothecary's Strabo's Geography
Perfect Books
Join us in-store with Sarah Pothecary who will introduce her brilliant new Strabo’s Geography: A Translation for the Modern World.This is a lively new translation of Strabo’s complete Geography—an encyclopedic guide to the ancient world of the first century CE—connecting it with the world of the twenty-first century. This truly will be an event not to be missed.
Book Launch for Scott Mainprize's The First Few Feet in a World of Wolves
Perfect Books
Scott Mainprize will introduce his novel entitled The First Few Feet in a World of Wolves, a fictionalization of the time the author spent teaching in Aupaluk.
Book Launch for Jann Everard's Blue Runaways
Perfect Books
We join award-winning writer Jann Everard, and her debut short story collection about love and loss with Blue Runaways.
Book Launch for Terry Mosher's Montreal Expos: A Cartoonist's Love Affair
Perfect Books
An avid fan of the storied Montreal Expos throughout the team's 36-year existence, renowned Canadian political cartoonist Terry Mosher (pen name Aislin) has put together a tribute of some of his favourite baseball sketches, newspaper clippings, and photographs, and of course, anecdotes from a number of Montreal's virtuoso sports reporters in Montreal Expos: A Cartoonist's Love Affair.
Book Launch for Ben Berman Gahn with The Years Shall Run Like Rabbits
Perfect Books
Ben Berman Gahn will be joined by local authors Manahil Bandukwala and Mahaila Smith to launch his new Science Fiction novel, The Years Shall Run Like Rabbits.
Book Launch for Maggie North's Rules for Second Chances
Perfect Books
Join us in-store with Maggie North to launch her new romance novel Rules for Second Chances. Brimming with heart and heat, Rules for Second Chances explores the hardest relationship question of all: can true love happen twice...with the same person?
Book Launch for Peter Edwards & Kevin Loring's Lytton
Perfect Books
Bestselling true-crime author Peter Edwards and Governor General's Award-winning playwright Kevin Loring will be at Perfect Books to launch their new Non-Fiction book Lytton: Climate Change, Colonialism and Life Before the Fire. From these two sons of Lytton, BC, the town that burned to the ground in 2021, comes a meditation on hometown―when hometown is gone.
Book Signing for Elizabeth Balangue-Langfried's ABC of Ottawa
Perfect Books
Elizabeth Balangue-Langfried will be in-store to sign copies of her children's book ABC of Ottawa; a colorful children's picture book that describes the history, culture, demographics, architecture, and everyday life in Ottawa, the capital of Canada.
July
Book Launch for Alexander Boldizar's The Man Who Saw Seconds
Perfect Books
Join us in store with Alexander Boldizar to discuss his second book The Man Who Saw Seconds. Exploring the nature of time, the brain as a prediction machine, and the tension between the individual and the systems we create.
Book Launch for Gloria Blizzard's Black Cake Turtle Soup
Perfect Books
Gloria Blizzard joins us this evening with her new book of essays entitled Black Cake Turtle Soup, and Other Dilemmas, a diasporic collection of essays on music, memory, and motion. These musings of wayfinding speak to anyone exploring issues of belonging - to a family, a neighbourhood, a group, or a country.
Book Launch for Adrienne Gruber's Monsters, Martyrs, and Marionettes: Essays on Motherhood
Perfect Books
Book*hug Press and Perfect Books present the Ottawa launch of Monsters, Martyrs, and Marionettes: Essays on Motherhood by Adrienne Gruber. With special guests Brecken Hancock, Ben Ladouceur, and Katherine Leyton.
Jagjeet Sharma Book Signing for Measure of a Woman
Perfect Books
Jagjeet Sharma will be in-store with us to sign copies of her new book of poetry released earlier this year entitled Measure of a Woman. The masculine and the feminine are equally divided within yourself, within oneself. It is about the struggles and challenges a Wo/man faces day in and day out in any part of the world.
Book Launch for Spencer Gordon and Jess Taylor
Perfect Books
Spencer Gordon and Jess Taylor will be at Perfect Books to launch their new books, repectively, A Horse at the Window, and Play. With a unique blend of contemporary storytelling and psychological fiction, Play is a haunting, riveting novel that reminds us of both the beauty and danger of imagination. A Horse at the Window is a genre-bending collection of dramatic monologues shining a light on the anxious, self-directed gaze that defines contemporary consciousness.
August
Book Signing for Scott Mainprize 's The First Few Feet in a World of Wolves
Perfect Books
Scott Mainprize will be in-store to sign copies of their new novel entitled The First Few Feet in a World of Wolves, a fictionalization of the time the author spent teaching in Aupaluk.
Book Launch for Jade Wallace's Anomia
Perfect Books
Join us in-store with Jade Wallace to introduce their new novel Anomia. Beneath the familiar surface of this missing-persons novel lies an unparalleled experiment: the creation of a folkloric alternate reality where sex and gender have been forgotten.
Book Launch for Susan Wadds' What the Living Do
Perfect Books
Join us at Perfect Books along with Susan Wadds to launch her new novel What the Living Do, which tells a heartfelt and gripping story that speaks of survival and hope, of how one woman rises above the scars of a traumatic childhood. She is accompanied by author Mary Simmerling and her novel We've Been Put Through Fire & Come Out Divine.
*Cancelled* Book Signing for Judy LeBlanc's Permission to Land: A Memoir of Loss, Discovery, and Identity
Perfect Books
CANCELLED
Judy Leblanc will be in-store to sign copies of her new book Permission to Land: A Memoir of Loss, Discovery, and Identity. After the death of her mother, Judy embarked on a personal journey of discovery and reconciliation with her known but unacknowledged Coast Salish ancestry on her mother’s side.
Book Launch for Maurice Crossfield 's Townships Noir Trilogy
Perfect Books
Maurice Crossfield will join us at Perfect Books to discuss the first two books in his Townships Noir Trilogy, along with Amy Tector and her Dominion Archives series.
Book Launch for Courtney Bates-Hardy's Anatomical Venus
Perfect Books
Join us at Perfect Books along with Courtney Bates-Hardy who will be here to launch her new novel, Anatomical Venus. It is a visceral collection of poems that invoke anatomical models, feminine monsters, and little-known historical figures.
September
Signing for Barbara Leimsner's Quitting the Master Race
Perfect Books
In Quitting the Master Race, Barbara Leimsner confronts the past to discover how one ordinary man—her adored German papa—became thoroughly indoctrinated with Nazi ideology during the Hitler years.
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ The Capital of Dreams with Heather O’Neill
Carleton Dominion-Chalmers Centre
Join us for the launch of our Fall season with The Capital of Dreams, a breathtaking dark fairy tale of survival and betrayal from the vivid imagination of Heather O’Neill. Hosted by Lucy van Oldenbarneveld.
Book Launch for Gerald Lynch's Plaguing Jake
Perfect Books
In equal parts Joyce and Hemmingway local author Gerald Lynch's new mystery, Plaguing Jake, heralds a powerful return to literary storytelling and captures and essential Canadian narrative.
Book Launch for David O'Meara's Chandelier
The Rainbow Bistro
Award-winning local poet David O’Meara launches his debut novel Chandelier, in which he captures one family’s precarious balance between misery and hope.
Ottawa International Writers Festival Proof with Beverley McLachlin
Fairmont Chateau Laurier
From Beverley McLachlin the former Chief Justice of Canada and #1 bestselling author of Full Disclosure, comes Proof, a razor-sharp thriller featuring defense attorney Jilly Truitt as she defends a high-profile mother accused of kidnapping her own child. Hosted by Charlotte Gray.
Book signing for Don Butler's Norman's Conquest
Perfect Books
Don Butler will join us in store to sign copies of his new mystery novel Norman's Conquest.
Plan 99 Poetry Series Double Book Launch
The Manx Pub
Double book launch for Manahil Bandukwala's Heliotropia and Jake Byrne's Daddy, two brand new books of poetry.
Poetry Reading with Susan Atkinson, Margo LaPierre, and Callista Markotich
Perfect Books
Join us in store for a poetry reading with Susan Atkinson and her new book All Things Small, Margo LaPierre's new chapbook, and Callista Markotich's debut collection Wrap in a Big White Towel.
Fawn Parker Book Launch for Hi, It's Me
Perfect Books
Join us in store for a launch of What We Both Know by Fawn Parker, the Scotiabank Giller Prize–longlisted author. Best described as Women Talking meets Study for Obedience, this novel is a stunning depiction of fresh grief.
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ The Siege with Ben Macintyre
Southminster United Church
Join us for a deep dive with bestselling author Ben Macintyre on his latest book, The Siege: A Six-Day Hostage Crisis and the Daring Special-Forces Operation that Shocked the World.
Perfect Books 30th Anniversary — Customer Appreciation Day!
Perfect Books
We are celebrating our 30th birthday with a customer appreciation day, all day long! Want to know what we have in store for you? You'll have to pop in to find out. ;)
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ The Knowing with Tanya Talaga
Library and Archives Canada
We are honoured to present an evening with Tanya Talaga, the critically acclaimed and award-winning author of Seven Fallen Feathers. Her new book, The Knowing, is a riveting exploration of her family’s story and a retelling of the history of the country we now call Canada. Hosted by Joy SpearChief-Morris.
October
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ John Newlove Poetry Awards and the Ottawa Poets Laureate
Club SAW
Our evening begins with the 2024 Bywords John Newlove Poetry Awards, followed by readings from the newly appointed City of Ottawa Poets Laureate. Don't miss the launch of Biblical Invasion BC by Nnadi Samuel, the 2023 recipient of the John Newlove Poetry Award. Hosted by Amanda Earl, the evening also features readings by this year’s award recipient and honourable mention—to be announced at the reading—plus music by Princess Unlucky.
Jane Cooper launches What Ukrainian Elections Taught Me about Democracy
Perfect Books
Join Jane Cooper, author of What Ukrainian Elections Taught Me About Democracy, in conversation with fellow McGill-Queen's University pressmate Rhonda Gossen, author of Twelfth of February.
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ Poetry Cabaret with Amanda Earl, Christine McNair and Sandra Ridley
Club SAW
Following quickly on the heels of the Poets Laureate reading and the John Newlove Poetry Awards, we are pleased to present three giants of Ottawa's poetry community: our poetry cavalcade continues with readings from Amanda Earl, Christine McNair, and Sandra Ridley. Hosted by David Currie.
Lola Reid Allin launches Highway to the Sky
Perfect Books
Join Lola Reid Allin reading from Highway to the Sky: An Aviator's Journey (Simon and Schuster Canada), a book that is both memoir and feminist aviation history, that details the author's experience from unwanted child to successful pilot.
Plan 99 presents Caroline Anderson, Pasha Malla, and Shannon Robinson
The Manx Pub
Don't miss this iteration of Plan 99, featuring three fantastic authors launching their latest books:
Pasha Malla, All You Can Kill (Coach House Books)
Caroline Anderson, A Way to Be Happy (Biblioasis Books)
Shannon Robinson, The Ill-Fitting Skin (Press 53)
Book Signing with Michael McMullen, author of Garbage Boy
Perfect Books
Drop in to grab a signed copy of Garbage Boy by Michael McMullen!
Kevin Hearne launches Candle & Crow
Perfect Books
Don't miss local SFF legend Kevin Hearne launching Book Three of the Ink and Sigil Series, Candle & Crow!
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ Invisible Prisons with Lisa Moore and Jack Whalen
Library and Archives Canada
Join us for an evening of riveting nonfiction as we welcome multi-award-winning author Lisa Moore back to the Festival stage with Invisible Prisons: Jack Whalen's Tireless Fight for Justice. It tells the shocking true story of a teenaged boy who endured abuse and solitary confinement at a reform school in Newfoundland, but survived through grit and redemptive love. Hosted by Sara Power.
Ashley-Elizabeth Best launches Bad Weather Mammals
Perfect Books
Join us for a night of daring poetry as Ashley-Elizabeth Best launches Bad Weather Mammals (ECW Press) alongside local poets Ellen Chang-Richardson and Conyer Clayton, hosted by Margo LaPierre.
Book Signing with Rod Carley
Perfect Books
Stop by and have your copy of the theatrical and outrageous novel RuFF signed by Rod Carley!
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ In Winter I Get Up at Night with Jane Urquhart
Southminster United Church
In luminous prose, and with exhilarating nuance and depth, Jane Urquhart charts an unforgettable life in her new novel In Winter I Get Up at Night, while also exploring some of the grandest themes of the twentieth century—colonial expansion, scientific progress, and the sinister forces that seek to divide societies along racial and cultural lines. Hosted by Lucy van Oldenbaneveld.
Book Signing with Andi Vicente and Allan Matudio
Perfect Books
One Box (Fernwood Publishing) is a lovely children's book about family and reunification, telling the story of a Filipino family sending supplies to their loved ones across the world. Stop by, chat with author Andi Vicente and illustrator Allan Matudio, and grab your copy!
Coltrane Seesequasis launches Secrets of Stone
Perfect Books
Join Kegodance Press author Coltrane Seesequasis as he launches his debut YA fantasy book, Secrets of Stone, the first in a four part series! An exciting new release that is not to be missed.
Colin Morton launches Scar Atlas
Perfect Books
We welcome local poet Colin Morton with his latest book, Scar Atlas, personal reflections on healing, hurts, the pandemic, and snapshots of life in the Ottawa valley.
Ottawa International Writers Festival ~ A Most Extraordinary Ride with Marc Garneau
Library and Archives Canada
Join us for the Ottawa launch of A Most Extraordinary Ride: Space, Politics, and the Pursuit of a Canadian Dream, a captivating and inspiring memoir by Marc Garneau, Canada's first man in space.