StoryFest 2026
The StoryFest 2025 Pass grants your access to the following events:
- André Alexis: October 2 - 19:30
- Eric Andrew-Gee: October 7 - 19:30
- Caroline Adderson: October 12 - 13:30
- Brian Stewart: October 21 - 19:30
- Brendan Kelly: October 28 - 19:30
- David Bergen: November 4 - 19:30
All these events will be at the Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
394 rue Main, Hudson, QC J0P 1H0
Celebrating 25 years of StoryFest
Over the years, we’ve welcomed over 200 incredible Canadian authors. For the first time, we’re inviting the audience’s favourite authors back to StoryFest to celebrate this milestone with us!
Greenwood StoryFest 2026
All-Events Pass 
Michael Crummey
Michael Crummey is an award-winning poet and writer of historical fiction, who often draws on the heritage and landscape of Newfoundland and Labrador. His most recent bestselling novel, The Adversary, earned the prestigious 2025 Dublin Literary Award and was named Best Book of the Year by The Globe and Mail, CBC, Toronto Star, and The New Yorker. His earlier novels include Galore, winner of the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Novel (Canada and Caribbean). He is making a return visit to Hudson from his home in St. John’s.
Oct 6 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
The Adversary, a national bestseller and winner of the 2025 Dublin Literary Award, is set in the remote outport of Mockbeggar on Newfoundland’s north coast, where Abe Strapp is getting ready to marry the daughter of a rival merchant to secure his dominance over shore business… that is until the Widow Caines shows up and throws the wedding and Abe’s plans into chaos.
Oct 6 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Anita Rau Badami
Anita Rau Badami returns to Hudson with her first new book in 15 years! Her earlier novels include the bestseller Tamarind Men, and The Hero’s Walk, which earned the Regional Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and Italy’s Premio Berto. Her other novels receiving wide acclaim are Can You Hear the Nightbird Call? and Tell It to the Trees. She has also received the Marian Engel Award for a woman writer at mid-career. She joins us again from Montreal at this year’s co-sponsored Quebec Writers’ Federation event.
Oct 8 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
An instant national bestseller, Asha in Her Garden relates the story of Asha Mohan as she turns 70 in Montreal and must face having her long beloved maple tree being cut down in her backyard garden. The tree’s necessary demise brings back memories of when Asha was knocked unconscious by a drug dealer known by her wayward son. It also stirs memories of an earlier tragedy in India that caused her to flee her country of birth. The reflections give Asha new clarity about who she is and what will be required of her now.
Oct 8 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Gail Anderson-Dargatz
Gail Anderson-Dargatz won the UK’s Betty Trask Award, the BC Book Prize for Fiction, and the Vancity Book Price for her first novel, The Cure for Death by Lightning. Her second novel, A Recipe for Bees, was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize. The Spawning Grounds was shortlisted for the Canadian Authors Association Literary Award for fiction. Her thriller, The Almost Wife, was a Canadian bestseller, and her other thriller, The Almost Widow, was shortlisted for the Crime Writers of Canada Howard Engel Award for Best Crime Novel Set in Canada. She is visiting Hudson again from her home in BC’s Shuswap region.
Oct 23 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
In The Atlas Keeper, Elsie Campbell’s life has stalled. Since her mother’s death several years earlier, she has lived in her sister’s basement but has now been asked to leave. She has no real friends, no romance, and spends her days crunching data for her father’s mapping company. All this changes the day after a solar eclipse when Elsie finds an atlas that gives her the power to go back to 12 turning points in her life, as well as to visit the future with unexpected consequences.
Oct 23 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Michelle Good
Michelle Good is a member of the Red Pheasant Cree Nation in Saskatchewan. After working with Indigenous organizations for 25 years, she obtained her law degree as a 43-year-old single mom and then spent 14 years advocating for residential school survivors. She earned her MFA in creative writing while still practicing law. Her debut and best-selling novel, Five Little Indians, earned the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction, the Amazon First Novel Award, and the Rakuten Kobo Emerging Writer Prize. Her bestselling book, Truth Telling: Seven Conversations about Indigenous Life in Canada, was shortlisted for the Balsillie Prize for Public Policy. Last year she was made a Member of the Order of Canada.
Oct 25 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
An instant national bestseller, Eliza Sunshine begins with Eliza returning home thin and listless from her first year at residential school. Her grandmother, Swan, begins to heal Eliza with long prairie walks, confident that the land will restore Eliza’s energy. Along the way, Swan tells her own stories of adversity in dealing with encroaching settlers. Decades later, when Eliza’s daughter, Ella, returns home from university with braids and a beaded headband, Eliza is aghast because she had worked so hard to free herself from the oppression that came with being seen as Cree. Ella has her own ideas and, when tragedy strikes, she must decide how to deal in the aftermath and find her way to preserve the family’s history.
Oct 25 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Mary Walsh
Mary Walsh created and stared in This Hour Has 22 Minutes, CBC’s satiric take on current affairs. The series earned her numerous Gemini / Canadian Screen Awards. Many fondly recall her outspoken Marg Delahunty character. She also wrote, produced and starred in the award-winning series Hatching, Matching and Dispatching, which returned to CBC as a feature length presentation called A Christmas Fury. Her debut novel, Crying for the Moon, was a Canadian bestseller. A Member of the Order of Canada, she has also received the Governor General’s Lifetime Achievement Award in the Performing Arts, and the CSA’s Earle Grey Award for lifetime achievement in television acting. She is making a return visit from her home in St. John’s.
Nov 1 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Brassy Bit of Aging Crumpet is a disarmingly vulnerable and wickedly funny collection of essays in which Mary Walsh chronicles her sometimes difficult but never boring life with the hopeful conclusion that growing old means finally discovering – and loving – oneself. Her subjects range from the heartbreak of growing up next door to her family, to behind the scenes of her popular CBC shows, to dealing with a challenging parent, as well as struggles with alcohol and self-doubt. The result is a collection of essays that are deftly comical, heartachingly vulnerable and, above all, hopeful.
Nov 1 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Peter Mansbridge
Most Canadians are well familiar with Peter Mansbridge as the former anchor of The National, CBC’s flagship nightly newscast, as well as his many years as the chief correspondent for CBC News. He has received well over a dozen national awards for broadcast excellence, including lifetime achievement recognition from the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada, a recipient of the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, distinguished fellow of the U of T’s Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, as former two-term chancellor of Mount Allison University. His three previous books, Off the Record, Extraordinary Canadians, and Peter Mansbridge One on One: Favourite Conversations and the Stories Behind Them were all national bestsellers. He is taking part in StoryFest for the first time, visiting Hudson from his home in Stratford.
Nov 8 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
A Noble Profession: Inspiring Stories of Teachers Who Shape Our World is an invitation by bestselling co-authors Peter Mansbridge and Mark Bulgutch to celebrate the impact and influence of teachers and the students whose lives they have changed forever. Their book focuses on the homeroom heroes who dedicate themselves not only to following the curriculum but to protecting their students, recognizing their struggles, and intervening when necessary, helping to shape them into productive members of society and the leaders of our future.
Nov 8 - 7:30 p.m
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Terry Mosher (Aislin)
August 9, - 7:30 pm
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Lesley Chesterman
Winner of Taste Canada’s gold medal award, Lesley Chesterman shares over 90 delicious recipes, Montreal-style! She will talk about her new book, A Montreal Cook, reveal her own favourite local venues, and illuminate the secrets of great entertaining!
May 19th - 7:30 pm
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
Eliza Reid
Eliza Reid is a bestselling writer, public speaker, gender equality advocate, and cofounder of the acclaimed Iceland Writers Retreat. She was born and raised in Canada but has lived in Iceland for over 20 years. From 2016 to 2024, Eliza served in the unofficial role of First Lady while her husband was President of Iceland. Her first two books, Secrets of the Sprakkar and Death on the Island, were international bestsellers. She lives in the outskirts of Reykjavik with her husband and four children.
April 27th - 7:30 pm
Stephen F. Shaar Community Centre
With early praise in from Jeanette Walls (The Glass Castle) and Susan Orlean (The Library Book), from bestselling author and former First Lady of Iceland Eliza Reid comes The First Lady Next Door – a candid, funny, and deeply inspiring memoir about rising to an unexpected role, finding your voice, and showing up as your real self when the world expects something very different.
Previous Guests
Past StoryFest guests are remembered fondly for their generous spirit of sharing, engaging presentations and enthusiastic discussions with our audiences over the last 20 years.
2025
Andrew Coyne
Andre Alexis
Eric Andrew-Gee
Caroline Adderson
Brian Stewart
Brendan Kelly
David Bergen
2024
Carol Off
David O’Meara
Rick Mofina
Whit Fraser
Elizabeth Renzetti
Marc Garneau
Daniaile Jarry
Nahlah Ayed
2023
Anita Anand
Kathy Reichs
Lesley Chesterman
Maureen Meyhew
R.H Thomson
Waubgeshig Rice
Eliza Reid
2022
Martha Wainwright
Patterson Webster
Gillian Sze
Nita Prose
Kaie Kellough
Debra Thompson
Tarah Schwartz
Linda Leith
David Heti
Iain Reid
2021
Souvankham Thammavongsa
Russell Banks
Perdita Felicien
Mary Lawson
Marie-Louise Gay
Kent Nagano
Katherena Vermette
Amanda Leduc
David Homel
Tessa McWatt
2020
Annabel Lyon
Emily Urquhart
Joan Thomas
Margaret MacMillan
Michaela DiCesare
Michelle Good
Tommy Schnurmacher
Anakana Schofield
Steven Price
Alix Ohlin
Frances Itani
Rawi Hage
Ann Hui
D’Arcy Jenish
Dave Williams
Jennifer Robson
Michael Redhill
Sylvain Rivard
Liona Boyd
Marjorie Simmins
Zoe Whittall
Ian Hamilton
Ken Dryden
Catherine McKenzie
David Adams Richards
Geoff Green
Silver Donald Cameron
Alissa York
Mary Walsh
Lawrence Hill
Daniel Levitin
Beth Powning
Monia Mazigh
Laurie Gough
Douglas Gibson
Lee Maracle
Ian Howarth
Alexandre Trudeau
Cathryn MacNamee
John Sheridan
Ross King
Nisha Coleman
Saleema Nawaz
John Farrow
Eric Siblin
Heather O’Neill
James Orbinski
Terry Fallis
Marina Endicott
Takriluk Partridge
Don McKay
Monique Polak
Ian McGillis
Gail Anderson-Dargatz
Gwynne Dyer
Guy Vanderhaeghe
Lydia Lukidis
Kim Thúy
Ann-Marie MacDonald
Kathleen Winter
Lisa Moore
Tomson Highway
Lauren B. Davis
David Halton
Sean Michaels
Terry Mosher
Louise Carson
Marco Fraticelli
David Groulx
Margaret Atwood
Kate Pullinger
Michael Winter
Paul Thompson
Peter Behrens
Merilyn Simonds
Graeme Gibson
Stephanie Bolster
Monty Reid
Arleen Paré
Roméo Dallaire
Valerie Redmond
Ann Charney
Paris Elizabeth Sea
Michael Crummey
Emma Donoghue
Charles Foran
Helen Humphreys
Bonnie Laing
Michael Ondaatji
Linda Spalding
Catherine Austen
Lorne Elliot
Nancy Richler
Anita Rau Badami
Oana Avasilichiaeoi
Paris Elizsee
Norm Foster
Ian Keteku
Sally Armstrong
Wayson Choy
Lauren B. Davis
Elizabeth Hay
Ami McKay
Jeffrey Simpson
Linden MacIntyre
Joel Yanofsky
Catherine Chandler
Gary Townsend
John Asfour
Merilyn Simonds Wayne Grady
Anthony De Sa
Wayne Johnston
Bill Haugland
Colleen Curran
Margaret Trudeau
Trevor Ferguson (aka John Farrow)
Johanna Skibsrud
Louise Penny
M.G. Vassanji
Nino Ricci
Claire Holden Rothman
Jason Heroux
Robyn Sarah
Claudia Coutu Radmore
Jane Urquhart
Jan Wong
Donna Morrissey
Maria Loggia
Jeff Heinrich
Stevie Cameron
Joseph Boyden
William Toye
Shane Kelly
Mark Smith
Jon Paul Fiorentino
Susan McMaster
Susan Gillis
Mark Abley
Tony Hushion
Claire Mowat
Noah Richler
Roy MacGregor
Mark Smith
Lorne Elliott
Gil Courtemanche
Karen Molson
Karen Molson
Ken McGoogan
Barry Callaghan
Louisa Blair
Dinu Bumbaru
Charlotte Gray
Jane Brierley
Mark Abley
Victor Owen
Victoria Freeman
J.L. Granatstein
Marian Fowler
Ed Lawrence
Christopher Moore
Sylvia Fraser
Philippe Gigantès