Read Local BC

ReJoyce - A Bloomsday Celebration
2024-06-16 16:00 - 18:00 (America/Vancouver) | Cross and Crows Bookstore, 2836 Commercial Drive, Vancouver, BC, Canada
A circle reading of Joyce’s Ulysses, bring your copies to take your turn, or choose your favourite Joyceab/Irish/modernist texts to share. Edwardian dress encouraged.
Cross and Crows Books, Commercial Dr
4 – 6 pm

Write on Bowen Festival for Readers & Writers
2024-09-13 09:00 - 2024-09-15 16:00 | Cove Commons on Bowen Island, 430 Bowen Island Trunk Rd, Bowen Island, British Columbia, V0N 1G0, Canada
The Write on Bowen Festival of Readers & Writers is a three-day event on beautiful Bowen Island that showcases writers and authors and their work. It provides opportunities for participants to attend workshops and other events that will aid them in the development of word-based creative endeavours. It allows everyone, including the general public, to be exposed to a rich diversity of voices, styles and presentation of works. It engenders connections and inspiration between and amongst all in attendance as they are drawn together around the love of the written and spoken word.
In addition to offering stimulating interactive workshops to writers of all genres and levels, the Festival presents author readings, a Saturday night Gala featuring a keynote speaker, luncheon panels and other special events. We look forward to welcoming you to our idyllic island.

Poetry Bus! Celebrating the 28th Year of Poetry in Transit
2024-09-28 12:30 - 14:00 | UBC Robson Square, 800 Robson St, Vancouver, BC, V6E 1A7, Canada
In partnership with TransLink and BC Transit, Read Local BC presents the launch of this year’s Poetry In Transit campaign at Word Vancouver. Now celebrating its 28th year, this beloved community-engagement project displays the work of ten BC poets on public transit vehicles throughout the province. Join us to hear a selection of the featured 2024-25 poets read from their work, followed by a short discussion and Q&A in which you can engage with the poets over your love of the written verse! Hosted by Evelyn Lau.

TriCities Writers Fest
2025-04-07 08:00 - 17:00 | BC
Get ready for the Tri-Cities Writers Festival 2025!
We’re welcoming more than a dozen celebrated authors to our community for four days of talks, panels, and workshops this May. Sessions will be in-person and online, and include a kick-off cocktail reception, where you can enjoy great food and drink alongside your fellow book lovers, and our panel of guest authors.
The Writers Festival is a collaboration between local libraries and the Tri-City Wordsmiths, with support from OverDrive, Evergreen Cultural Centre, and the Writers’ Union of Canada. With funding from Canada Council for the Arts/Conseil des arts du Canada.
For the schedule and author lineup, visit: https://www.coqlibrary.ca/seasonal-pages/tri-cities-writers-festival

International Zine Month and Comics Fair
2025-07-08 17:30 - 20:00 | Vancouver Public Library, Central Branch, 350 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6B 6B1, Canada
Come out and meet local Vancouver-based zine and comic makers from the local community as they celebrate International Zine Month in July. Participate in lightning talks and workshops around the inspiration and production of creative works in both text and image.
Workshops will be announced soon.
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Participants include:
Kelsi James and Erica Mulder, representing Aces & Aros Vancouver
Melody Jane
Jotika Healing Arts
Tubbytats and Go够Studio
Shannon PS Art
Rachel Lau
UBC Comics Studies Cluster
GOLDbard
Jules Webster
Megaphone Magazine
and many others!
*Drop in event, no registration required

Horizons
2025-07-10 19:30 - 22:30 | Vancouver Playhouse, 600 Hamilton St Vancouver, BC V6B 5N6 Canada, Vancouver, BC, V6B 5N6, Canada
How do we hold grief in these fractured times? When nation states starve the innocent and empires redraw borders with ruthless intent, when tools meant to connect us end up driving us apart, we turn to artists to offer meaning and remind us of our humanity. Horizons gathers a luminous constellation of award-winning artists who offer us vision, sanctuary, and solidarity.
Curated by Ruby Singh, this event features Vivek Shraya, whose award-winning body of work spans music, literature, visual art, theatre, TV, film, and fashion. Also featuring Kimmortal renowned for their highly conceptual, genre-bending musical explorations and intricate lyricism. Mohanad El Eek, a virtuoso Syrian oud player, adds his exceptional talent to the lineup.
The night will also showcase exclusive one-night-only collaborations: the heart-stirring poetry of Brandon Wint paired with the dynamic composer, trumpeter, bassist, and electronic musician Feven Kidane; and Governor General’s Literary Award winner
Cecily Nicholson in collaboration with the soulful sounds of violinist, singer, and songwriter Sejal Lal.
Together, these artists create a powerful soundscape—part concert, part gathering, part invocation of a future built on connection, care, resistance and difference. This is more than a performance—it’s an invitation to critically imagine new ways of being together in the troubling present.
Just as horizons stretch beyond lines on a map, this night of performance transcends the confines of genre. Through music, poetry, and stories, these artists light a torch in the dark, guiding us toward collective reckoning and shared humanity.
This is more than a performance. It is a gathering — a reminder that even in grief, we can meet at the horizon and imagine something new, together.

The Canine Library
2025-09-13 13:00 - 15:00 | John Hendry Park / Trout Lake, 3300 Victoria Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5N 4M4, Canada
We’re back for the 2025 Canine Library at John Hendry Trout Lake Park. Borrow a St. John Ambulance certified therapy pup, read them poetry, or join a poetry workshop. Sign-ups start at 12:30 pm—spots go fast, so don’t be late!
Enjoy books, barks, and fun with VPL’s Children’s tent and VPL’s Writer in Residence, Selina Boan, at this rain or shine party in the park. Stop by and visit the BiblioBike, our electric cargo trike that brings the Vancouver Public Library to you! Get a library card, check out a book, explore VPL’s digital library, and ask about library related services.
*Please note, you can only register for The Canine Library in person at the park. Kids 14 and under must be accompanied by an adult. Once you’ve registered to receive your bark-code, you can check out a pup for a 10 minute session. The pup lineup will be announced as soon as they calm down from all of the excitement.
Presented in partnership by Vancouver Public Library, Paws 4 Stories, St. John Ambulance BC/Yukon and Trout Lake Community Centre.

Poetry Bus! Celebrating the 29th Year of Poetry in Transit
2025-09-20 14:00 - 15:30 | UBC Robson Square, 800 Robson St, Vancouver, BC, V6E 1A7, Canada
In partnership with TransLink and BC Transit, Read Local BC presents the launch of this year’s Poetry In Transit campaign at Word Vancouver. Now celebrating its 29th year, this beloved community-engagement project displays the work of ten BC poets on public transit vehicles throughout the province. Join us to hear a selection of the featured 2025-26 poets read from their work, followed by a short discussion and Q&A in which you can engage with the poets over your love of the written verse!
READERS
HOST Elee Kraljii Gardiner is an author, editor, and creative mentor whose award-winning books of poetry include Trauma Head and serpentine loop, and the anthologies Against Death: 35 Essays on Living and V6A: Writing from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, and three chapbooks: Residence, WATCHER with Gary Barwin, and Trauma Head: the medical file. A frequent collaborator with choreographers, musicians, and visual artists, Elee is currently collaborating with nature via a series of durational installations that investigate the law of thermodynamics and cultural ideas regarding the passing of time. Originally from Boston, she lives in Canada where she directs Vancouver Manuscript Intensive, a program pairing authors with mentors. eleekg.com

Susan Alexander’s poems have appeared in Canadian and international anthologies and literary magazines, such as The Southern Review, Pangyrus, Arc and Grain. Her most recent publication is Berberitzen with Raven Chapbooks (2024). She is the author of two full collections, Nothing You Can Carry (2020) and The Dance Floor Tilts (2017) with Thistledown Press. Her poetry has won multiple awards, including the 2022 Vancouver’s City Poem Prize. She has hosted poetry readings and panels for the Federation of BC Writers and Victoria’s Festival of Writers. Susan lives on Nexwlélexm/Bowen Island, the traditional and unceded territory of the Squamish people.

Jen Currin is the author of seven books, including Hider/Seeker: Stories, which was a finalist for a ReLit Award and was named a 2018 Globe and Mail Best Book, and The Inquisition Yours, which won the 2011 Audre Lorde Award and was a Lambda finalist. Born and raised in Portland, Oregon, on the traditional territories of the Multnomah, Chinook, Clackamas, and other tribes, Currin lives in New Westminster, BC, on unceded Qayqayt, Kwantlen, Kwikwetlem, and Musqueam territories and teaches creative writing and English at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.

Junie Désil, born to Haitian immigrant parents in Montréal and raised in Winnipeg, has devoted over two decades to empowering communities made marginalized. An accomplished poet, her debut collection, eat salt | gaze at the ocean (2020), was a finalist for the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize and explores themes of Black sovereignty and the Haitian diaspora. Currently residing on the Traditional Territories of the Homalco, Tla’amin, and Klahoose, Junie mentors emerging writers at Simon Fraser University’s The Writer’s Studio. Beyond her professional life, Junie enjoys writing, coaching, consulting, and raising goats.

Joseph Kidney’s poems have been published in Best Canadian Poetry 2024, Vallum, The Malahat Review, The Fiddlehead, The Ex-Puritan, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed (in Arabic translation), and more. He has won the Short Grain Contest, the Young Buck Poetry Prize, and Arc’s Poem of the Year. Devotional Forensics is his first full-length collection.

Natalie Lim is a Chinese-Canadian poet living on the unceded, traditional territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh Peoples (Vancouver, BC). She is the winner of the 2018 CBC Poetry Prize and Room magazine’s 2020 Emerging Writer Award, with work published in Arc Poetry Magazine, Best Canadian Poetry 2020 and elsewhere. She is the author of a chapbook, arrhythmia (Rahila’s Ghost Press, 2022).

Lauren Peat is a poet, translator, and teacher based in Vancouver, BC. Her poems, essays, and translations from French have appeared in a wide variety of journals and magazines, and her many collaborations with composers are featured in the repertoire of acclaimed vocal ensembles across North America. Her debut poetry chapbook, Future Tense, was published by Baseline Press in 2024.

Tom Wayman’s prolific literary career includes writing more than twenty poetry collections, three collections of critical and cultural essays, three books of short fiction and a novel, as well as editing six poetry anthologies. He received British Columbia’s 2022 George Woodcock Award for Lifetime Achievement in the literary arts. In 2015, he was named a Vancouver Literary Landmark, with a plaque on the city’s Commercial Drive commemorating his championing of people writing for themselves about their daily employment. He won the Western Canada Jewish Book Awards prize for fiction in 2016 (for the short story collection, The Shadows We Mistake for Love) and for poetry in 2023 (for Watching a Man Break a Dog’s Back: Poems for a Dark Time). His memoir, The Road to Appledore (or How I Went Back to The Land Without Ever Having Lived There in the First Place), was published in 2024. Wayman lives in Winlaw, BC, and his website is www.tomwayman.com.

Calvin Wharton has been published in numerous magazines and anthologies in Canada, the U.S., Wales, Sweden, and Denmark. He is a former chair of Creative Writing at Douglas College and writer in residence at the University of Wales. His books include a collection of short fiction, Three Songs by Hank Williams, and poetry collections The Song Collides, The Invention of Birds, and This Here Paradise.

Victoria Festival of Authors
2025-10-15 - 2025-10-20 | Victoria, BC
The Victoria Festival of Authors celebrates its 10th anniversary with 40 luminary guests including 2025 Booker Prize nominee Maria Reva, Booker Prize nominee Madeleine Thien, Emma Donoghue, Brian Thomas Issac, Conor Kerr (all Scotiabank Giller Prize nominees), and a wide range of talented and award-winning Canadian and local authors including Joseph Dandurand, Katherena Vermette, Sheri-D Wilson and more. This year’s festival continues its hybrid format with in-person programming, livestream viewing for some events, and virtual readings and panels with authors from around Canada. Join us and celebrate 10 years of literary arts from Oct. 15 to 19, 2025.

Vancouver Writers Fest
2025-10-20 - 2025-10-27 | various around Vancouver, Vancouver, BC, Canada
They can delight, inspire, provoke, comfort and unite—as do the authors, journalists and poets who wield them. At the Vancouver Writers Fest we encourage readers of all ages to explore the power of storytelling, and books, through our dozens of events with local and international writers.
Our activities include both year-round programming and our flagship, annual literary Festival: one of the largest and most prestigious in North America. Tens of thousands of readers visit the cultural hub of Granville Island and venues around Vancouver to connect with local and international authors during this week-long event.
Throughout the year we offer free and paid events with established and emerging authors, in addition to youth education opportunities.

Alcuin Wayzgoose: Letterpress Print & Book Arts Fair
2025-10-25 10:00 - 16:00 | Vancouver Public Library, Central Branch, 350 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6B 6B1, Canada
The Alcuin Society and Vancouver Public Library are pleased to present the biennial Alcuin Wayzgoose, the largest letterpress print and book arts fair in Vancouver!
Come and meet more than 27 many skilled book artists, printmakers, letterpress printers, papermakers and paper marblers and watch various book arts demonstrations throughout the day.
The exhibitors this year are:
Barbarian Press
Brigitte Potter-Mael
Canadian Typography Archives
Charles Van Sandwyk Fine Art Studio
Emily Carr University of Art + Design
Greenboathouse Press
Hannah McKendry
Ibis Trading Inc
Introvert Press
Jean Kares
Jocelyn Barrable-Segal
Keith Valentine
Mariko Ando
Markus Fahrner
Mother Tongue Press
Murray Schellenberg
New Leaf Editions
Penny Parry
Phyllis Greenwood
Renée Alexander
Seawrack Press
Sim Publishing
Stefani Peter
Taaye Wong
The Haunted Bookshop
UBC Fine Arts Department of Art History
Westcoast Calligraphy Society
No registration is required

Whistler Writers Festival
2025-10-30 - 2025-11-03 | various in Whistler, BC
In 2025, the Whistler Writers Festival is pleased to gather in-person to welcome readers and writers to our mountain town. We continue to offer a select number of online events. Please review the program and website carefully to determine which options are available for each event.
We look forward to sharing stories again this year.

Fraser Valley Writers Festival
2025-11-07 - 2025-11-09 | BC
The Fraser Valley Writers Festival is an annual two-day literary festival featuring keynote addresses, readings, panel discussions, writing workshops, live podcast recordings, and more, hosted at the Abbotsford campus of the University of the Fraser Valley.
​November 7-8, 2025
UFV Abbotsford, Room B101

Giant Silent Reading Party
2025-12-16 18:00 - 20:00 | Vancouver Public Library, Central Branch, 350 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6B 6B1, Canada
Are you stressed about the holidays or feeling a little lonely? The Vancouver Public Library is hosting a giant silent reading party to combat the holiday blues. Our “silent reading party” at the library is a social space where patrons can sit together and read in silence. Do you have book that you just haven’t had the time or space to finish? Well now you can finally bring that book out of your giant TBR pile to the table!
Enjoy the company of other book lovers with a 30 minute conversational social afterwards to discuss what you are reading.

Follow Request: Speed Friending at the Library
2026-02-03 18:00 - 20:00 | Vancouver Public Library, Central Branch, 350 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6B 6B1, Canada
We know it is tough to make friends in Vancouver so we’re here to help. Bring your favourite book, e-book, graphic novel, DVD, podcast, blog or zine to discuss at this fun, casual, in-person event at Central Library.
You’ll have six minutes with each person to chat about the item you brought and see if there is a friendship connection. At the very least you’ll have a bunch of interesting conversations with people who share similar interests.
This event is open to all with limited space available and takes place in the Alice MacKay room in the Lower Level of the Central Library.
Registration is required and this event will be capped at 100 people, so sign up early!

Nowruz Celebration: The Seven Trials of Esfandiyar
2026-03-14 14:00 - 16:00 | VANCOUVER PUBLIC LIBRARY – CENTRAL LIBRARY
Hear the story of the Seven Trials of the hero Esfandiyar from the famous The Persian Book of Kings! In true heroic fashion, Esfandiyar fights beasts, a dragon, and a mythical bird to get to the fortress where his sisters are held captive. But not all tasks require raw strength and battle skills – heroism is about more than that.
Led by Dr. Alexandra Hoffmann, this event guides you through the story, featuring an engaging lecture, recitations in Persian and English, and an opportunity for discussion. Join us for an afternoon immersed in Persian culture and learn how one might go about killing a dragon.
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This event is organized by Ashkan Doremami, BA (UBC), Dr. Alexandra Hoffmann, Assistant Professor of Classical Persian Literature and Culture (UBC), and Dr. Hessam Dehghani, Assistant Professor of Teaching in Persian Language and Culture (UBC).
In partnership with the Persian Language and Culture Program at UBC and PanBeh Bookstore (Vancouver’s Iranian/Persian Bookstore).

Giant Silent Reading Party
2026-03-17 18:00 - 20:30 | Vancouver Public Library, Central Branch, 350 West Georgia St., Vancouver, BC, V6B 6B1, Canada
Are you feeling a little lonely and finding it hard to connect with community in Vancouver? The Vancouver Public Library is hosting a giant silent reading party to get ready for Spring. Our “silent reading party” at the library is a social space where patrons can sit together and read in silence. Do you have book that you just haven’t had the time or space to finish? Well now you can finally bring that book out of your giant TBR pile to the table!
Enjoy the company of other book lovers with a 30 minute conversational social afterwards to discuss what you are reading.
*Light refreshments will be provided.
