jaynebarnard.ca

Author/Editor JE (Jayne) Barnard is best known for the The Falls Mysteries (Dundurn Press) of women's wilderness suspense and the Maddie Hatter Adventures (Tyche Books), Steampunk fashionista spy tales. Her works have won the CWC Award of Excellence, Alberta Book of the Year, and a Saskatchewan Writers Guild Award. She's also been a finalist for the UK's CWA Debut Dagger, Canada's Prix Aurora Award for Science Fiction and Fantasy, and the Book Publishing Alberta Award (BPAA). A longtime book reviewer, a mentor to rising crime and fantasy writers, she has juried for national, provincial, and international fiction and non-fiction awards. As a developmental editor she works extensively with writers both traditionally and independently published, helping them effectively use fiction structure, character development, suspense, and dramatic tension to ensure their stories engage readers from the first sentence to the final word.

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.

www.kimcheel.com

Kim is an award-winning playwright and actor, and a dedicated editor. Her purpose is to help aspiring authors embrace and share their unique stories, ultimately bringing positive change to the world. She achieves this by guiding them to remove internal and external barriers, enabling them to shape their narrative so readers can truly embrace it. Story is incredibly important to her, whether it’s used to entertain, inform, assist, encourage, educate, or more. She knows firsthand how freeing telling stories is, and she loves creating that feeling for others.

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.

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.

Martine L. Jacquot a publié une quarantaine de livres – romans, poésie, nouvelles, essais –, dont le roman Les oiseaux de nuit finissent aussi par s’endormir (Éditions David, Ottawa) et le recueil de poésie Les temps fauves (Liber Mirabilis, France). Son œuvre a été couronnée de plusieurs prix. Diplômée de quatre universités dont la Sorbonne et Dalhousie University, elle s’est fait remarquer comme journaliste, chercheure et auteure. Elle a présenté ses oeuvres sur 4 continents - de Moscou à Yaoundé, de Brasov à Pondichéry, de Tanger à Lafayette, de Bogota à Lima en passant par Paris et Washington.

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.

www.billkochwrites.com

Kim is an award-winning playwright and actor, and a dedicated editor. Her purpose is to help aspiring authors embrace and share their unique stories, ultimately bringing positive change to the world. She achieves this by guiding them to remove internal and external barriers, enabling them to shape their narrative so readers can truly embrace it. Story is incredibly important to her, whether it’s used to entertain, inform, assist, encourage, educate, or more. She knows firsthand how freeing telling stories is, and she loves creating that feeling for others.

www.parlaymanuscript.com/

Sandra McIntyre is a writer, writing instructor and book editor with more than twenty-five years' experience helping writers tell their best stories. Through Parlay Manuscript Services, Sandra offers developmental editing, manuscript critiques, book coaching and more. She holds a graduate degree in English Literature from Dalhousie University, and one of her favourite genres to read is crime fiction. She's lived in eight different Canadian cities but now calls Nova's Scotia's Annapolis Valley home.

donaleemoulton.com/

donalee Moulton’s first mystery book Hung out to Die was published in 2023. A historical mystery, Conflagration!, won the 2024 Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense (Historical Fiction). donalee had two books out in 2025, Bind and Melt, the first in a new series, the Lotus Detective Agency. Her first paranormal mystery, Cardinal, was published earlier this year.

donalee’s first mystery short story “Swan Song” was one of 21 selected for publication in Cold Canadian Crime. It was shortlisted for an Award of Excellence. Other short stories have been published in numerous anthologies and magazines. Two stories have been recently shortlisted for a Derringer Award.

donalee is an award-winning freelance journalist. She has written articles for print and online publications across North America including The Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, Lawyer’s Daily, National Post, and Canadian Business.

As well, donalee is the author of The Thong Principle: Saying What You Mean and Meaning What You Say and co-author of the book Newsworthy: Media Relations Without the Spin.

As a professional editor, donalee offers writers a variety of services including developmental editing, copyediting, first-page critiques, synopsis and query letter review and development, coaching, and proofreading.

www.puddester.com

Dr. Derek Puddester has practised medicine in Canada for more than three decades. He is an award-winning child and adolescent psychiatrist and Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa, where he spent twenty years developing programs to support medical students, residents, and practising physicians. He currently practises in British Columbia, where he is also a member of the Department of Psychiatry.

His fiction is shaped by a career spent listening closely to people in moments of fear, grief, shame, and change. A proud Newfoundlander and queer writer, Derek is drawn to stories where secrets have consequences and where survival is rarely simple. He writes crime, suspense, gothic romance, and speculative fiction grounded in place, medicine, folklore, family loyalty, and the complicated moral lives of physicians. His work often moves between public institutions and private reckonings, asking what people owe one another when truth, duty, and desire collide.

Sisters in Crime recognized his first novel, OUT OF THE FOG, as a runner-up for the 2025 Pride Award. His first novella, SUMMER STORMS AND STRANGERS, was published in May 2026, and his second, GLITTER ON GEORGE STREET, was released in June 2026. His short story UNDER THE STAGE is forthcoming in August 2026, followed by a paranormal romance novel SALTWATER IN HIS VEINS (October 2026).

Derek is a member of Crime Writers of Canada, Queer Crime Writers, the Writers Alliance of Newfoundland and Labrador, and the Writers Federation of British Columbia. He lives in British Columbia with his husband, Luc.

Sylvia was born in Germany to Holocaust survivors. She is the author of the Dr. Rebecca Temple novels, one of which, Find Me Again, won an Edgar award. The other two were nominated for a Crime Writers of Canada award and a ReLit Award. Her historical novel, The Queen of Unforgetting, was chosen by Project Bookmark Canada for a plaque installation in Midland Ontario, where the book is set. Her fifth book is a young adult mystery novella, Best Girl. Her latest novel, The Orphan, (2024) is an historical mystery with speculative elements set in Washington DC in 1844. It was chosen as a Judges Best Pick for a Silver Falchion award.

Her short stories have appeared in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Down & Out Magazine, Vautrin, Murder Most Geographical, as well as many anthologies. One of her stories, “Polly Wants a Freaking Cracker,” originally published in Mystery Most Humorous, won this year’s CWC Best Short Story award. Six of her stories have been shortlisted for Derringers and CWC awards. She lives in Toronto where she teaches writing to seniors