Can't Lit – Details, episodes & analysis

Welcome to the chaos of a book launch! Are all book launches like this? I hope so! The Triple Treat Book Launch took place on Sunday April 28th at beloved R&B Brewing. Jen Sookfong Lee was the host and books by Dina Del Bucchia (You're Gonna Love This), Daniel Zomparelli (Jump Scare) and Andrea Warner (The Time of My Life) were launched and feted and were sold by the amazing Iron Dog Books!  Listen to Cynara Geissler read from Andrea's book while she recovers from surgery. Dina and Daniel read from their new books and also host three rounds of trivia: Generally Vaguely Dirty Dancing, Horror Movie Trivia, and TV Trivia. And Dina reads a poem from her book that tells you which SNL cast member you are! And that's not all, A Giant Woman (Cynara Geissler and Hannah McGregor) performs with The Jewel Tones (Martin Austwick and Helen Zaltzman). And we are treated to a performance by The Established, Shanda Leer! A wonderful night. A fun time. All of this was recorded by our wonderful sound tech, Sean Cranbury.

Spring has sprung! And we have Tania De Rozario on the podcast to talk about her new collection of essays, Dinner on Monster Island as well as talking about horror as a conduit for feelings, loving ghosts, demons and phantoms and eating the rich. We also marvel at Rosie the wonderful podcast dog, and we promise to stop referencing (and trashing) Oppenheimer. Listen now! Transcript here.

Hello! This month we have the incredible writer, artist and library professional Emily Riddle! We talk about her wonderful poetry collection The Big Melt, tattoos, the importance of friendships, her luring people to Edmonton, and a lot of talk of snacks. As usual! There are some big laughs, and Emily saying some very insightful things, of course, Jen being very real in her emotion corner and  Dina hates the horrible Spence Diamond ads on the radio. 

To celebrate this festive season Dina and Daniel rented a snowy chalet and invited past Can’t Lit guests to join them by the fire to chat, eat and drink. A lot. Jen Sookfong Lee, Jordan Abel, Sean Cranbury, Billeh Nickerson and Aaron Chapman discuss important holiday stuff, like how to ruin poems for the holidays, hangovers, holiday traditions, eggnog, holiday movies and TV, the Nutcracker, stealing Christmas trees, curling, cats eating tinsel, veal, poetry as gifts, grilled cheeses and many more weird tangents. We also go over what we can’t with for Christmas. And there are so many F-bombs. Happy holidays and cheers, from all of us at Can’t Lit!

Dina and Daniel head to Toronto, a.k.a. Hotline Bling central, and Jacqueline Valencia is there to talk with them about Toronto Poetry Talks, her upcoming poetry collection, There is No Escape Out of Time, diversity and race in poetry, teens, chocolate and Instagram. D & D give an update from their trip to Montreal's strip clubs, karaoke bars and mozzarella stick establishments and even create a new strip club. And we all shout out The BreakBeat Poets and come up with whole new categories of literary awards. 

Dina and Daniel visit Montreal and invite the delightful duo of Bükem Reitmayer and Mike Spry into their hotel room for a wholesome literary chat. We talk about all the important things: movies, TV, shopping, and even poetry, like how a poem can change over time and how process is weird. We also give a shout out to the wonderful bookstore, Librairie Drawn & Quarterly and celebrate Mean Girls Day.

It's always a special occasion when Jillian Christmas is around. Dina and Daniel invite the talented writer, musician and Artistic Director of Verses Festival of Words to talk about writing, but also how miserable fall is, love songs and protest songs, Charmed Can Lit, children's soy lattes, large print erotica on public transit and of course, Shannen Doherty. We also bring back the ever-popular CanLit Feuds and play a new game for this crummy season: Fall or Fall?

Can't Lit's endless summer of great guests continues. Dina and Daniel invite Jen Sookfong Lee over for bourbon and book talk. We get into Jen's two novels and Dina's rage, plus we tell tales from bad literary events and share terrible things people have said to us at Q&As.