Wordstock
Wordstock is a series of literary shenanigans designed to celebrate and foster writing and storytelling. Wordstock includes:
A Writing Workshop
There are two Writers’ Workshops at the 2024 event. The first is being held Friday morning, July 5, with Jane Doucet presenting "Humour Writing – Seriously!” and in the afternoon on Friday will be a workshop with Jon Tattrie on Presenting Your Writings at Pitch the Publisher and also on Interview Skills. These two workshops are being held at the River John Old School from 10 a.m. until noon and then in the afternoon from 1 to 3 p.m. Free admission.
A Heritage Story Walk
Again this year, the Heritage Story walk will also be held on Friday morning at 10 a.m., meeting at the River John Historical Society Museum and walking from there. It will be a tour of the principal shipyard sites of River John.
Family Campfire Stories & Open Mic
The family storytelling campfire and open mic on Thursday, July 4th at 6:30 p.m. takes place at the campfire pit behind the River John Old School.
Pitch the Publisher
July 6, 9-10:30 a.m., River John Legion. This fan-favourite gives emerging authors 3 minutes to pitch their works to a panel of publishers. See below for how to apply.
Pitch the Publisher 2024
Do you have a manuscript burning a hole in your sock drawer, aching to be published? This might be your chance. At Pitch the Publisher, selected writers each have three minutes to stand at a microphone and pitch their manuscripts to a panel of publishers, in front of an audience. Publishers have five minutes to respond with feedback. Open to writers aged 18 and up.
Here’s how you can be one of the selected writers:
Prepare a proposal. Describe your manuscript in two sentences or less, plus why you are the most qualified person to write it and why people would want to read it. State the genre and intended audience.
Send your proposal (not the manuscript) and your contact information to Read by the Sea Pitch the Publisher by May 15, 2024:
Email your proposal using the Contact Us form on this website, or Facebook Messenger
A jury will select 9 or ten entries that are most likely to succeed. We will contact the selected writers with their time slots for pitching to the publisher panel on July 6, 2024.
Open Mic
Following the Writers' Workshop at St. John's Hall, on July 2, 1-2 pm. As for the Writers' Workshop, please pre-register. Bring your writing - of any kind - and share it with an audience. Covid protocols will apply. This event will also be recorded for the website. (If you plan to attend both the workshop and Open Mic, you may want to pack a picnic lunch. We hope for sunshine!)
Writing Workshop : Pitch a pro before you pitch a publisher
Do you feel ready to pitch your book to a publisher, but something is holding you back? Join Jon Tattrie, editor of Atlantic Books Today, for a front-row seat into the minds of publishers. Jon has published eight books with three regional publishers. As the editor of ABT, he regularly works with the 40 publishers active in Atlantic Canada. He knows what they want, and how to frame your book in a way that gives it the best chance of getting out of the dreaded slush pile and onto an editor’s desk. We’ll talk elevator pitches, book proposals, agents, regional vs national, and answer all of your questions about the publishing world in 2024.
Book Auction
We’re auctioning off copies of books by our Main Stage authors, as a fundraiser and because they are simply fabulous books! Here’s how it works: View the list of auction items below, then use our ‘Contact Us’ form or email [email protected] (include the word “auction” in the subject line) and tell us:
1. Your name, email address and phone number
2. Which auction item you’re bidding on (you can bid on as many items as you like)
3. The amount of your bid
The auction will close at 5 p.m. July 9, at which time we will award the items to the highest bidders.
This is your chance to snag some great books and support Read by the Sea at the same time (how awesome is that?).
Auction Item #1: Kill the Mall, by Pasha Malla. $25 value. Minimum bid: $15
Auction Item #2: Kill the Mall, by Pasha Malla. $25 value. Minimum bid: $15
Auction Item #3: Crow, by Amy Spurway. $22.95 value. Minimum bid: $15
Auction Item #4: Crow, by Amy Spurway. $22.95 value. Minimum bid: $15
Auction Item #5: Fishing the High Country, by Wayne Curtis. $19.95 value. Minimum bid: $15
Auction Item #5: Fishing the High Country, by Wayne Curtis. $19.95 value. Minimum bid: $15
Auction Item #6: I’m Finding My Talk, by Rebecca Thomas plus companion book I Lost My Talk, by Rita Joe (both illustrated by Pauline Young). Value: $45.90. Minimum bid: $30
Auction Item #7: I’m Finding My Talk, by Rebecca Thomas plus companion book I Lost My Talk, by Rita Joe (both illustrated by Pauline Young). Value: $45.90. Minimum bid: $30
Auction Item #8: I’m Finding My Talk, by Rebecca Thomas plus companion book I Lost My Talk, by Rita Joe (both illustrated by Pauline Young). Value: $45.90. Minimum bid: $30
“I like the fact that Read by the Sea gives me a chance to get better as a writer. It’s great to see so many people get together in a shared love of books, reading, and writing.”
Ray Burns, writer, journalist, reader
Meet The Pitch Panel
Boularderie Island Press is located in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. On average, they publish between 3-5 traditional trade book publications and co-publications each year. They have published more than 50 books, including The Appendage Formerly Known as Your Left Arm by Julie Curwin, which won the Alistair MacLeod Prize for Short Fiction at this year’s Atlantic Book Awards.
Paul MacAllister, Monster House owner/author published his first book, There and Back Again: A Herman Tale in the Fall of 2015. He then began Monster House Publishing, a New Brunswick based publishing house for children’s books. Since then, Monster House Publishing has launched several works, including the recent Mi’kmaq Alphabet Book by Shyla Augustine, which was nominated for a New Brunswick Book award this year, and has a second edition on the way!
Chocolate River Publishing was established to raise the profile of New Brunswick in Anglophone children’s literature. Their main focus is on the types of books that kids from kindergarten to grade twelve want to read. They should tell a great story, have strong characters, the action should move fast, and humour doesn’t hurt! What-cha Doing by Kim Renton was nominated for a New Brunswick Book Award this year.
Moose House Publications:
Best-selling author Brenda Thompson founded Moose House in 2019 to publish fiction, non-fiction, and other materials written in or about rural Nova Scotia. The press serves folks who are writing material that excites and compels them, even though it might not have a large-enough potential market to attract larger publishers. They have published 25+ authors in their first two years. Two Crows Sorrow was shortlisted for The Miramichi Reader’s 2020 Very Best of Historical Fiction award and was on Atlantic Books’ Chapters Indigo bestsellers list in January 2020. Their goal is to build up their catalogue with entertaining, challenging, eye-opening stories, plays, essays, and book-length explorations into subjects of local interest. Moose House is proud to be a member of the Atlantic Publishers’ Marketing Association, which supports publishers across Atlantic Canada. Their publisher and staff, and many of their authors, are members of the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia.
Penguin Random House
Penguin Random House Canada, the country’s largest book publisher and part of an international publishing company, was established in 2013 by merger and has a Canadian publishing history going back to 1906. Headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, with office locations in Mississauga, Ontario, and Vancouver, British Columbia, and more than 230 employees across the country, it is the literary home of world-renowned Canadian authors such as Margaret Atwood, Leonard Cohen, Kim Thúy, Alice Munro, Michael Ondaatje, David Chariandy, Dionne Brand, Richard Wagamese, and Chris Hadfield. It is made up of 19 diverse imprints, publishing adult and children’s fiction and non-fiction print and digital trade book publishing.
“Read by the Sea is so great. River John is lovely, and the festival is run by volunteers with deep roots in the community. It’s a fantastic literary getaway in a beautiful place by the sea.”
Stephen J. Maher, author, Read by the Sea 2021 writing workshop instructor and interviewer
Page Turners
* Note** Due to unforeseen circumstances, there are no current book club sets available this year. PageTurners will return next year.