Winterkill – Page 2 – Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch

Roberts Elementary author visit

I had a wonderful visit with Roberts Elementary in Gwinnett County, Georgia last week. I’ve been virtually visiting students at this school for a number of years and have such respect for their media specialist, Tiffanie, who has an infectiously positive and generous perspective on life. I also love how her students come up with the BEST questions. There were about 9 classes participating in the session and each one had 3 questions. My favorite question from yesterday was, if you could tell your younger self something, what would it be? My answer: that the people who told me I was a slow learner were wrong. I was a different learner, and that would ultimately be a gift.

Have to say, meeting with students is one of the most wonderful aspects of being a writer.

Tiffanie made my day when she emailed this after the session: WOW! WOW! WOW!

You have a magical way of engaging our students sparking curiosity that lasts way beyond your visit! You answered their questions with such grace, care, and honesty. We loved it!

Kobzar interview re Winterkill

Thank you, Ryan Boyko and the Shevchenko Foundation, for creating this interview about the inspiration for Winterkill. This was filmed at Firefly & Fox, a great independent bookstore in Simcoe Ontario.

Interview with TQ Townsend of Children’s Literature Podcast

Thank you, Tiffney, for your well-considered questions. I enjoyed our discussion!

122 – Winterkill by Marsha Skrypuch

My one and only Canadian school during WRAD

Eleven of my twelve World-Read-Aloud-Day donated virtual visits were claimed by American schools, but one I gave to Melita School in Manitoba, and it came about when two grade 8 students, Chaz and Zander, were doing a project on one of my books and asked to meet with me virtually. Normally, I would have had to say no, but World Read Aloud Day was coming up, so I suggested we meet on that day, with their whole class. It was a wonderful visit with Ms Anderson and her students! Here are some pics.

Hamilton Spectator, Winterkill, Kobzar and Firefly & Fox

Thank you, J.P. Antonacci for this wonderful story in the Hamilton Spectator, titled, “A writer’s promise to her young readers — to tell the truth.”

More pics from WRAD

Discussing Winterkill with Colchester Middle School, VT

Firefly & Fox, Ryan and the Kobzar Award

Winterkill is shortlisted for the Kobzar Book Award, and in preparation for the event night, Ryan Boyko has been tasked with doing short videos about all of the nominees. I love supporting independent bookstores so it was a natural choice to ask Catherine if we could do the interview at her wonderful Simcoe bookstore, Firefly & Fox. That’s Catherine standing beside me with her son Gilbert.

Ryan and I have known each other for quite along time. We’re both passionate about shedding light on Ukrainian and Canadian Ukrainian history and we’ve both been banned by Russia. Ryan is best known for That Never Happened his searing documentary on WWI internment, but he’s done so much more than that! So good to compare notes with my creative friend.

Such a great experience all around, getting to know Catherine and catching up with Ryan. If you’re in Simcoe Ontario, be sure to drop by this fabulous store.

Philipovna

It was a six degrees of separation kind of day yesterday. I had lunch with Robin Baird Lewis, Brantford born and raised like me, and a book person. She’s the illustrator of the iconic picture book Red is Best, written by Kathy Stinson.

Robin Baird Lewis with three connected books

The middle book in this photo is beautifully illustrated by Robin. She works with people who have specialty book projects.

Robin was in town for a few days and emailed to see if we could get together. She had something for me: a book by another fellow book person, Valentina Gal, author of Philipovna a novel/memoir of the Holodomor, which is the same topic as my latest novel, Winterkill. Robin and Valentina are in the same knitting group!

I read Philipovna and LOVED it. I was thrilled to get a hard copy of the book from the author herself as I only had the e-edition, and it is such a powerful book. But also, I wanted to share with her, through Robin, another connection that we had, that both of our books had been discussed in Mateusz Świetlicki‘s groundbreaking work on Ukrainian Canadian historical literature for young people. I brought the book to our lunch to show Robin, and will be sending snaps of the pertinent pages so that Robin can read them to Valentina. How nifty is that?

A visit with Riverside ES

My very first virtual visit was with Riverside ES in Gwinnett County, Georgia last Thursday and it was great to be back there, as I’ve visited a few times in the past. Ms Bartholomew always has her students prepped and it’s such a pleasure to answer their considered questions. Internet gremlins foiled us though. We got through the first session with just minor hiccups, and the second session was pretty much a wash. So this morning I did the second session again. It was nice to see the same students, sitting with smiling anticipation. I started where I left off last week and there was plenty of time for questions. And Zoom liked us this time! Here are some pics from last week’s session.

Canadian Ukrainian Art Foundation Talk

It was an honour to be invited to speak at KUMPF gallery, and it was so nice to catch up with old friends and to chat with many young readers. I loved presenting amidst Bohdan Holowacki’s vast talent — see those paintings on the wall? His artwork will be exhibited until Dec 23! Thanks to Uliana Hlynchak for organizing, and thanks to Sonia Bodnar for reading the same selection from «Викрадене дитя» as I read in the original English edition of Stolen Girl. Yulia Lyubka is a brilliant translator, as everyone in the audience witnessed. It was a particularly emotional reading, as my husband was in the audience and the scene was based on his late mother’s escape from the Nazis. Lidia would have loved to hear this, especially in Ukrainian. Here is a FB video from the event.