Ben Antao has released a new book of poems titled Love Triangle.

A weekend passion of lust between a lesbian and a heterosexual married man leads to untold grief in this modern story of love triangle narrated in verse by Ben Antao, the prolific author of novels, short stories, travelogues and memoirs.
Love Triangle is composed in terza rima, the three-line, ten-syllable poetic form of interlocking rhymes that Dante employed in his Divine Comedy.
The 160 Sonnets surpassing the 154 of Shakespeare’s dwell on the themes of art and artists, persons, places and things that Antao encountered during his travels in Canada, France, Goa, Italy and the United States.
The book is priced at $25, bu tBen  will offer it for $20 for WEN members.

WEN Member, Mostafa Dini, has authored a paper which was accepted for the 5th IASD European Regional Conference; Rome, 6-8 November 2014; titled Application of the Viscoelasticity Property of Brain Tissues to describe Waking-Sleep Continuity Theory. Mostafa writes “This is another opportunity to introduce my theory of Dreams and Dreaming internationally and wish some of the folks would attend the conference. The conference program is already available in the conference webpage.

For more info click here.

The Summer Sizzle Poetry Contest Winners were announced at the July 19th Breakfast Meeting. Professor Stephens Hans was on-hand to present the certificates and awards.

They are:

1. Sumaira Chaudhury for “Hot Summer’s Day”
2. Barry Clegg for “Summer Sports”
3. Ann Birch for “On Blue Heron Trail”

Let us all congratulate Bill Galvin who will be inducted into the Canadian Horse Racers Hall of Fame this August. This is a great lifetime achievement.

He produced a History of Grand Circuit Racing in Canada and the Golden Horseshoe Circuit Press Book, conducted equine poetry and art competitions for grade school children and organized both trotting under saddle races at Greenwood and intercollegiate harness driving championships.

He published Ballads of the Turf in 2006, was the first publicity chairman of the Sovereign Awards and published a 100-year history of racing at Greenwood and Woodbine. Galvin, the former president of the North American Harness Publicists Association, was a regular weekly contributor to Canadian and U.S. harness trade magazines, and wrote a regular nightly review of the races for the dailies and other media.

For more info click here.

Orillia’s Big Read is the library’s community reading program. Sponsored by the Friends of the Library. The Big Read encourages everyone in our community to read the same book, and to rediscover reading for the fun of it!
Our 2014 selection is:
“Settlement ” by Ann Birch!
The untold story of scandal and political intrigue in early Toronto. Anna Jameson arrives in the tiny settlement of Toronto in November, 1836. She has come at the request of her estranged husband, but she intends to gather material for a new book, which will eventually be published in England years later. At first, Anna finds herself in an alien world. She has little in common with Toronto women whose interests centre on gossip and their families, but as she begins to move into adventures like sleigh-riding and helping to fight a major fire, she enters a new life. And she also meets man-about-town Sam Jarvis. But Jarvis has a loving wife, a pile of debts and a violent past. The story is told from both their points of view. She travels alone into the wilderness, becomes the first white woman to descend the Sault rapids in a canoe and discovers the joy of freedom. On Manitoulin Island, she and Sam Jarvis meet again. During a long canoe trip down Lake Huron, they wrestle with the conflicts in their relationship and arrive at a settlement.

September 19, 2014 is Settlement Day at the OPL!

Afternoon Tea Q&A with Big Read author Ann Birch
2-4pm
Free!

Big Read Soiree on the Island Princess with Ann Birch Includes wine and nibblies, and a tour of the lake!
$20 per ticket.
7:30-9pm

Registration and purchase of tickets for these events begin August 19th, 2014!

Please contact us for more information.

For more info click here .

Annual General Meeting
The Annual General meeting will take place immediately following our guest speaker at the June 21st Breakfast Meeting. This is an important meeting and all are urged to attend and participate in the process to elect and support our new board for 2014-2015. There are several positions still open and new board members are welcome. Please review the AGM package that will be emailed to WEN members.

At our May 17, 2014 Breakfast Meeting, Rich Helms will give a one hour workshop on Creating a Book Trailer. The workshop is free and will take place right after our regular meeting from noon to 1PM.  All are invited.

More details on the workshop and course can be found by clicking  here

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
ENTRIES TO BE POSTMARKED ON OR BEFORE MIDNIGHT, MAY 17, 2014
 Poems must have “summer” as a theme.
 Poems must be unpublished. Self-published poems and poems that have been published online are con-sidered published and thus cannot be submitted.
 Poems cannot exceed 72 lines; the stanza breaks count as lines. The poem title does not count, nor does the space between the title and the first line of the poem
 Author’s name must not appear anywhere on the same page as the poem, back or front.
 Include a cover page with author’s name, poem title and author’s complete contact information.
 If your poem is longer than one page, please include the title of the poem and page number on any addi-tional pages.
 Submissions may be emailed as a Word document attachment to communications@wenetwork.ca or mailed to WEN Poetry Contest, 251 McKee Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M2N 4E2.
 Please do not paste the entry in the body of your email, as your formatting may be lost when the poem is transferred to a Word document.
CONTEST JUDGE: Stevens Han, Professor of Literature, Han Yang University, Seoul, Korea

WEN Member, Darlene Madott launches her latest book at the Columbus Centre on May 14, 2014 at 7:00 PM. All are welcome.

Several members of WEN took part in poetry readings at Canada Blooms exhibition on March 18, 2014.