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On Writing Poetry

I’m not a poet. Yes, I wrote some shitty poetry in my teenage years, but didn’t everybody? And then, in my early twenties, I had a short-lived poetic spell after I broke up with my first love, in which I penned some terribly unoriginal poems about love and loss. But I’ve always been a fiction lover first and foremost, and anyway, after I moved to Canada at twenty-five, faced with a new language, I wasn’t writing much of anything. When I started writing in English in my thirties, I wrote exclusively prose, first nonfiction and then fiction. Sometimes, people kindly…

Cover girl and other news

So, today I went to pick up the mail and was startled by the magazine I was holding, Jewish Book World, which had my face staring right back at me. And it’s big. Unphotoshoped, fucked-up tooth and frizzy hair big. Inside, there’s a lovely review of my book, a write-up about the award and my essay, “Keeping Promises.” *** More news. I wrote something in HEBREW!!! I know. It’s been so long that I was saddened to discover that I’ve now reversed my sense of insecurity to my mother tongue! It wasn’t easy to write this piece. My words felt…

The Best Place on Earth is One Year Old!

How could it have been a year already? The Best Place on Earth is one year old today! I remember that this day last year was just as gloomy and miserable as today is. I remember feeling anxious and a little bit crazy and not as joyous as I had wanted to feel (that elated feeling came the following day, at my launch, which was hands down the best party I ever had) I remember that that morning I struggled to zip up my parka, which was starting to feel pretty tight on my hugely pregnant belly. I also remember…

‘Yemeni Soup’ Wins a Western Magazine Award

Late last night, as I woke up to breastfeed, I found out that ‘Yemeni Soup and Other Recipes‘ won gold at the Western Magazine Awards! (The gala was too late for me to follow on Twitter, because of the time difference with Vancouver.) The piece (originally published at Grain Magazine) just won silver at the National Magazine Awards last week. I am shocked and delighted! Now I have to call my mother (whom the piece is about) and inform her of this new development… In other news, I had a great time at the Literary Picnic, a part of the Luminato…

On Writing about My Mother and Winning a National Magazine Award

On Friday night, the night of the National Magazine Awards gala in Toronto, I was sitting at home in my PJ’s following the Twitter feed, waiting to hear if the piece I wrote about my mother, ‘Yemeni Soup and Other Recipes,’ won in the One of a Kind category. It was past my bedtime, because now that I’m a mother I can’t waste precious sleeping hours when my baby is sleeping. I kept refreshing the feed, looked at photos that other people tweeted showing beautiful people in glamorous outfits, read their tweets about a chocolate fountain, and imagined how much…

‘Yemeni Soup’ Nominated for a National Magazine Award and a Western Magazine Award!

I was thrilled to find out last week that Yemeni Soup and Other Recipes, a nonfiction piece about my mom, me, and food, was nominated for a National Magazine Award in the One of A kind Category. A few of my mentors and peers are nominated in different categories as well so I’m in great company.  The piece was published in Grain Magazine last summer. Winners will be announced in their gala on June 7th, 2013. Then, the following day – another pleasant surprise! The piece was also nominated for a Western Magazine Award. The winners will be announced in Vancouver on…

The Best Place on Earth First Month Recap

It’s hard to believe but it’s been over a month since The Best Place on Earth was released! Probably because so much has happened. It finally feels like spring in Toronto, the sun is shining, the tree in the backyard has begun to bloom, I packed up my parka in favour of a lighter coat (not leather jacket weather yet, I’m afraid), and the grass in the front yard turned vibrant green. Exciting times! I wanted to catch up on some of the coverage that The Best Place on Earth has received this past month. The biggest news is that…

The Best Place on Earth Longlisted for The Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award!

The other day I woke up to people congratulating me on Twitter. Turns out The Best Place on Earth was long listed for the The Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award! It is a long longlist (as Emma Donoghue, who is also listed, tweeted, “Such a long list that it’s more like a party!”) but it is exciting nevertheless. I’m one of ten Canadians on the list, and this year, the only Israeli. Other writers on the longlist include my literary crush Junot Diaz, Joyce Carol Oates, and my dear friend Nancy Jo Cullen, whose book of short stories, Canary, is launching next week.…

Nominated for the CNFC Readers’ Choice Award

So earlier this fall I found out that I had been nominated for the CNFC (Creative Non-Fiction Collective) Readers’ choice Award for my story Warplanes (which appeared in Grain last summer). I was thrilled, of course; it’s a great honour. My dear friend Eufemia Fantetti was nominated last year and the past winners—Susan Olding for Pathologies (2010) and Theresa Kishkan for Phantom Limb (2009)—are both wonderful writers. The award was announced  at the CNFC conference in Banff, where an excerpt from my story was read in front of the collective members by the lovely and generous Betsy Warland. I didn’t…

Missing In Action Published in PRISM International

I received my copy of PRISM in the mail today and I was thrilled to see my story, “Missing In Action” (1st runner up in their literary nonfiction contest!) in print. This is what the judge Brian Brett had to say about my story: “’Missing in Action,’ is a dazy druggy classic tale of getting lost in Goa, reverberating, replaying, echoing, chronicling a cleansing of old memories in the exoticism of India. It’s brave not only in subject matter but also in its loose style.” It’s a great issue, and featuring the winning entries as well as poetry by two…