www.ajfotheringham.com/

I am a Canadian author based in Montreal, Quebec, and my passion is writing. I began scribbling stories and poetry at the age of nine and I am still going strong. I’ve had a life-long love of words. I used this skill to build a career in journalism, communications, translation and publishing.

I am the author of The Lamb’s Bay Mysteries, a nine-book cozy mystery series based in the fictional town of Lamb’s Bay, a coastal community whose charming atmosphere hides a series of secrets. My latest series is The Bailey Summers Mysteries in which a Montreal journalist uses her skills to solve mysteries while on assignment. Both series are available on amazon in e-book and paperback versions.

I have also written A Journey to the Five Senses, a do-it-yourself-at-home writers’ retreat book which is available on amazon. And for those looking for a seasonal treat there is Special Delivery, Christmas Tales and Memories.

I am a graduate of McGill University (BA) and Seton Hill University’s Writing Popular Fiction program (MA). I enjoy reading, writing and holding creative writing workshops.

Annaporter.ca

Anna Porter is the author of 13 books, the two most recent are Gull Island, a psychological thriller, and In Other Words: How I Fell in Love with Canada One Book at a Time, a memoir of her wonderful and challenging life as a book publisher.  Ghosts of Europe: Journeys Through Central Europe’s Troubled Past and Uncertain Future, won the Shaughnessey Cohen Prize for Political Writing. Kasztner’s Train, the True Story of Rezso Kasztner, Unknown Hero of the Holocaust was the winner of the 2007 Writers’ Trust Non-Fiction Award and of the Jewish Book Award for Non-Fiction. She has written six mystery novels, one of which, Bookfair Murders, was made into a television movie, and a strange childhood memoir, The Storyteller.

She has written numerous newspaper and magazine articles on a broad range of topics, including Solidarity in Poland, Hungarians, Slovaks and Czechs, Farley Mowat, Doris Anderson, the Roma, the book business, Dracula and the rise of fascism in Europe.

She is co-founder of Key Porter Books, a company with a wide-ranging list that included Farley Mowat, Allan Fotheringham, Howard Engel, Joan Barfoot, Fred Bruemmer, Norman Jewison, George Jonas, Margaret Atwood, The Right Honourable Jean Chretien, Sylvia Fraser, Modris Eksteins, John Keegan, Martin Gilbert, Irving Abella, Josef Skvorecky, Italo Calvino, William Trevor, Conrad Black and Janet Lunn.

She has served on numerous corporate and charitable boards, including Alliance Communications, the Empire Company, The Shaw Festival, and the Canada Council for the Arts.

She is an Officer of The Order of Canada and has been awarded the Order of Ontario.

Website: Annaporter.ca

Self-proclaimed logophile and devourer of books, Ashley Holloway is a nurse, writer, and editor who teaches writing classes and healthcare leadership in Calgary, AB. She writes in a variety of genres with work appearing across Canada and the US and has co-authored three books. Ashley serves as Editorial Director at Unleash Creatives and her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.

cindijacksoneditor.com/

Cindi Jackson is a professional editor and graduate of the SFU Editing program. She is a former Canadian police officer with a background in criminology and psychology. As an editor, she specializes in developmental, structural, and line edits as well as proofreading of novel-length manuscripts and short stories. Cindi loves crime, mystery, thriller, police procedurals, historical, and mixed-crime genres. She also edits memoir. Cindi has been a juror for the Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence for the past two years and counts it as an honour and a privilege.

darrowwoods.substack.com

Darrow Woods used to wear a collar, and now he carries a badge. For thirty-five years he served as an ordained minister and spiritual director, a career that took him to rural, suburban and inner-city settings all over Canada. Before that he worked construction, helped run a pizza joint, was a chauffeur and car washer, and had a stint as a railway brakeman. Long before that, with unnamed co-conspirators, he ran an underground newspaper in his high school.

Until he got serious about writing fiction, he used to run marathons for fun. Well, fun may be an overstatement.

thebcreview.ca

Ginny Ratsoy, Professor Emerita at Thompson Rivers University, developed an interest in crime fiction in her role as reviewer for the British Columbia Review (https://thebcreview.ca/). In fact, one of those reviews was spotted by CWC, who then invited her to adjudicate their awards.

In addition to reviewing crime fiction, she teaches it periodically– to a savvy group of later-life learners who are members of the Kamloops Adult Learners Society (www.kals.ca). KALS is a vibrant independent educational organization dedicated to delivering an array of low-cost, non-credit courses that is celebrating its 20^th anniversary in 2025.

This photo shows Ratsoy accepting the 2024 Margaret Cleaveley Award for instruction in Canadian Literature from KALS.

Particularly drawn to cozy mysteries penned by female authors with a strong sense of place, Ratsoy hopes to continue adjudicating for CWC in the future.

jefriend.com

Janice Friend is the author of four crime/thriller novels, writing under J E Friend. Her last novel, Restitution, was the final in The Trans-Canada Killer Series. She lives in the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia and is currently working on two more novels, one at the editing stage and the other is three quarters written.

She wrote a children’s picture book for her grandchildren titled My Grandma Lives in the Box, which is about video chatting with grandchildren. She enjoyed the process, but will stick to crime novels.

Janice is also the moderator of a local writer’s group, she prefers to call herself The Keeper of the Key, as she holds the key to the meeting room at the local library allowing them to meet outside of regular library hours.

She has been a juror/judge for several awards and literary programs, enjoying the opportunity to read the works of aspiring and established authors.

jotreggiari.com

Jo Treggiari was born in London, England, and raised in Canada. She spent many years in Oakland, California and New York, where she trained as a boxer, wrote for a punk magazine, and owned a gangster rap/indie rock record label. Her novel Ashes, Ashes, a YA post-apocalyptic adventure published by Scholastic Press and also Germany’s Ars Edition, was a multiple award nominee and bestseller. Her novella Love You Like Suicide, was released as a limited, collector’s edition of the long-running punk zine Cometbus. Her acclaimed psych-thriller Blood Will Out, was published by Penguin Teen in 2018. Her 2019 novel The Grey Sisters was short-listed for the Governor General’s Literary Award, as well as being a Crime Writers of Canada shortlist nominee, and a finalist for the Ann Connor Brimer Award. Her newest book, a YA thriller Heartbreak Homes, a finalist for the 2023 Dartmouth Books Awards, the 2023 Ann Connor Brimer Children’s Literature Award, and the winner of the Crime Writers of Canada Juvenile/YA Fiction Award, was published by Nimbus Publishing in October of 2022. Jo lives with her two children in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia (the unceded, traditional territory of the Mi’kmaq) where she co-owns a curated, spirited, independent bookstore Block Shop Books.

www.jotreggiari.com

mysteryfactory.com

As a mystery plot consultant, I help writers turn the overwhelming chaos of ‘what to write next’ into an immediately actionable, direction forward.

Whether you're stuck in the middle of a manuscript, wrestling with motive, or just getting started, I offer practical, story-specific guidance rooted in over 35 years of experience and more than 100 mystery plots written for stage and page.

Our sessions are fast-paced and collaborative. I ask targeted questions to uncover what’s missing or misaligned, then help you move forward. You might gain clarity on the three layers of mystery structure, insight into character dynamics, or a strategy for creating and hiding clues your protagonist can find. You leave inspired and eager to keep writing.

Want to go it alone? Check out my books Clue Trail: From Whodunnit to Solution (5 diagrams) & The Mystery Bones Method Diagrams (9 diagrams) for a visual system of plotting.

MurderInCommon.com

June Lorraine Roberts is a Flash Fiction writer of crime fiction, whose stories have been featured by Mysterious Ink Press (UK), Punk Noir Magazine, and Akashic Books.

As the founder of MurderInCommon.com, a website about crime fiction books and authors, she features debut and mid-list writers worldwide. Murder in Common is #29 on the FeedSpot Top 100 Crime Fiction websites.

June Lorraine is a graduate of the London School of Journalism, a member of Sisters in Crime, and the Short Fiction Mystery Society. She has served as a Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence Judge, Derringer Judge, Bouchercon Panelist, and has read at Noir at the Bar. As time permits, she beta reads for crime fiction authors.

Karim’s extensive healthcare experience includes analysis of human chromosomes using classical banding method as well as FISH (Fluorescent in situ Hybridization), privacy education and P1 license (paralegal - non-practising) through LSO (Law Society of Ontario). His interests include AI, forensic genetics genealogy, learning about art crime/fraud reading novels and writing.

He’s a member of CWC (Crime Writers of Canada) and ITW (International Thriller Writers) and is working on his first novel and trying to learn what a guitar is all about!

www.facebook.com/lizwestbrooktrenholmwriter

Liz Westbrook-Trenholm has worked as a library assistant, home maker, literary critic, commentator, arts educator and federal public servant. She also reads widely and writes occasional short fiction to keep the cobwebs out. Her writing has included mainstream, sci-fi and fantasy short fiction aired on CBC radio and published in anthologies and magazines. It also includes over eighty comedic murder mystery scripts produced by Calgary entertainment company, Pegasus Performances (the most memorable being an historical railroad mystery performed aboard a private vintage train from Calgary to Banff for Warren Buffet’s eightieth birthday.) While most of her published stories fall into the genre of science fiction and fantasy, many are spiced with elements of mystery.

An eclectic reader across genres and styles, Westbrook-Trenholm’s reading list always includes mysteries, from the rich complexity of PD James, Anne Perry, John Banville, Ann Cleeves, Jussi Adler-Olsen, Max Seeck, Charles Todd or Louise Penny and more traditional and cozies from the United Kingdom, Scandinavia, India, Australia, New Zealand and, emphatically, from Canada. What writers we have! This became most apparent in attempting to rate the excellent crop of short stories eligible for the Crime Writers’ of Canada Awards. The quality of the stories is very high, the imaginations of the writers remarkable. They are also a lot of fun! Being a judge was an honour and a pleasure.

A modest bibliography of Liz Westbrook-Trenholm’s short fiction can be found at the occasionally maintained https://www.facebook.com/lizwestbrooktrenholmwriter.

www.marjoriedeluca.com

M.M. (Marjorie) DeLuca was born in Durham City, England. After graduating from the University of London, she moved to Canada where she worked as a teacher, then studied Advanced Creative Writing with Pulitzer prizewinner, Dr. Carol Shields.

She’s the author of five gripping suspense novels: Amazon bestseller, THE PERFECT FAMILY MAN, Bookscan Top 100 bestseller; Apple Books and Amazon bestseller, THE SECRET SISTER, THE NIGHT SIDE and critically acclaimed historical suspense, THE SAVAGE INSTINCT. Her forthcoming novel, THE DIVORCE PARTY will be published on July 1st 2025 (Bloodhound Books UK).

She’s been a panelist at Thrillerfest and Bouchercon and has been featured on top podcasts, The Thriller Zone, The Poisoned Pen Bookstore, Bookwild, and Crime Writers of Canada. When she’s not writing, she loves watercolour painting and golf.

manuscriptalchemy.com

Nicole Bross is the author of Past Presence, a supernatural mystery which was a finalist for the Crime Writers of Canada's Best First Crime Novel award in 2020. She's also an Author Accelerator-certified book coach and editor, working with fiction writers. Nicole understands the challenges authors face and can help you tell a different story about who you are as a writer. Specializing in adult and YA genre fiction, Nicole works 1:1 with authors of all experience levels to develop a writing practise that works for them, using a collaborative approach that's tailored to each writer's individual needs. She loves working with first-time writers, people who want to write a book but don't know how, and people who can always start writing a book but never seem to finish them. Whether you're creating an outline, writing your first draft, revising, or getting ready to pitch to agents and publishers, she's here to make the journey easier. Learn more and book a free call to talk about your project at www.manuscriptalchemy.com

www.petesblogandgrille.com

Peter Carter is Toronto writer/editor/one-time magazine owner and journalism teacher with more than 40 years’ publishing experience. The former Chatelaine columnist still writes for publications big (Reader’s Digest) and tiny (Manitoulin Expositor) and these days he is immersed in non-fiction crime writing as a staff editor at the legal publication Law360 Canada. For more than a decade Peter has produced the award-winning blog www.petesblogandgrille.com, he has been a trusted jurist of national magazine and online publication awards and most recently, Peter published his memoir, Storyworthy: Why writing is righting. Peter also loves riding his motorcycle and playing the accordion but never at the same time.

Scott writes stories set in Southern Alberta. Before turning to fiction, he was a landscaper, speechwriter, foreign correspondent, lawyer, and brand ambassador.

His debut novel, The Sunbeam Room, was published in 2024 to critical and commercial success.

“A thought-provoking story about the ties that bind within a divided world.”

Scott’s second novel, Birds of a Feather, is set for release in the fall of 2025.

A serial killer is stalking aspiring writers in Lethbridge. Can the unlikely duo of Samuel Rigondeaux, a reference librarian, and Flagstaff, a former RCMP officer now homeless, stop the Crow Killer before Samuel is add to the body count?

When not writing, you will find Scott hiking in the Rockies, walking a pilgrimage trail in Europe, or travelling across Canada with his wife, Coleen, in their vintage Westfalia van named Finn.

​​Scott is a founding member of the Alexandra Writers Centre chapter in Lethbridge and was a juror in the Crime Writers of Canada Awards of Excellence in 2023.

suejaskula.wordpress.com

Sue Jaskula’s career spanned many years in a mix of law firm and hospital administrative work before she jumped at the opportunity to take early retirement and pursue a career in writing, a pursuit she entered with energy and enthusiasm.

Ecstatic to become a published author at age sixty, she pinches herself every day that someone buys one of her books or drops an awesome review. She loves connecting with readers and fellow writers and one of her favourite things is seeing posts of her books being read in faraway places.

After a lifetime in southern Ontario, Sue and her husband were thrilled to retire to Kincardine, Ontario near their adult children and grandchildren. On these shores of Lake Huron, with some of the best walking trails in the country, her imagination soars and her best stories come to life.