The (Back) Road Less Travelled
As Margaret Laurence once told filmmaker Anne Wheeler, most working creatives take a circuitous career route. If you want to have an impact, she said, you must be able to understand the reality of others, to see a situation from a place other than your own. (From Taken by the Muse, by Anne Wheeler).
Whether you're writing magazine features or novels, that advice applies. In this talk, Lisa Guenther will map out her own circuitous route into journalism, how it intersects with her work as a novelist and what it's like to build a writing career in rural Saskatchewan. Alexis Kienlen, also a journalist and author, will moderate.
To register for this online event, please visit
https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_IFTy9LpuRDuW8QMmMJwPUg
About this event:
First Draft: Conversations on Writing is an online talk series that dives into themes that affect our writing lives. Writing helps us to understand things and to communicate these findings to our audience, even if our audience is ourselves. Sometimes we are driven by these themes, other times they’re the things that hold us back – what we learn through the process can be revolutionary. The quest to be understood unifies all writers.
This event features a 15-minute talk presented by Lisa Guenther. Following the talk is an interview conversation with Alexis Kienlen to dig deeper into the event theme.
Participants are welcome to submit questions in advance of the event to
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Please be mindful of your time zone as all times listed are Saskatchewan time. Find your time zone here:
https://dateful.com/time-zone-converter
Accessibility measures in this event:
Live auto -captions through Zoom during the live event
(TBD) A read-along copy of the presenters talk available during the live event only
Presenter self-descriptions
This event will be recorded, captioned, and made available for 30 days (until January 4, 2026) on the SWG YouTube channel following the event: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRAIIcrpQW0NcY6ZM0GGSzw
Transcript of the event available upon request
Presenter
Lisa Guenther grew up on a ranch in western Saskatchewan. That experience has informed her fiction, as well as her career as a farm journalist. She is the editor of Canadian Cattlemen magazine and works as a senior editor with the teams at Country Guide and GrowPro magazines. Lisa’s columns and features have won awards with the Canadian Farm Writers’ Federation and with the North American Agricultural Journalists. Her first novel, Friendly Fire, placed second in the John V. Hicks Long Manuscript competition and was shortlisted for a Saskatchewan Book Award. Her second novel, All That’s Left, is a finalist for a 2025 High Plains International Book Award.
Host
Alexis Kienlen is originally from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, but she currently lives in Edmonton. She is a poet, journalist, essayist and fiction writer. She is the author of two books of poetry, a biography, and a novel called "Mad Cow." When she's not reading or writing, Alexis enjoys watching movies, doing Aquafit and going on long walks with her partner Nathan and their Boston terrier, Edie.
You may also like the following events from Saskatchewan Writers Guild:
- This Tuesday, 30th September, 12:00 pm, Scooped: How I lost my mother, found my family and recovered my identity in Martensville
- This November, 4th November, 06:00 pm, First Draft: Conversations on Writing with Patricia Dawn Robertson and Deana Driver in Regina, Saskatchewan
- This November, 19th November, 06:30 pm, Talking to the Past: Finding Stories in the Archives with Dr. Merle Massie in Regina
