Book Launch Event

Sunday, April 14, 2024 2:00-4:00pm

Ben McNally Books

108 Queen Street East, Toronto

From award-winning writer Jann Everard, a debut short story collection about love and loss.

Some of the women in Blue Runaways are grieving. Some are looking for a second chance. All are at a turning point. From Iceland to Bali, from the comfortable houses of Canada’s cities to its wild and expansive backcountry, the characters in this collection face the most human of fears: that dear ones die, love is a risk, and no promise is certain. As diverse in situation as it is controlled in theme, this collection serves as a multifaceted exploration of loss, love, and what it takes to move on. With a keen eye for landscape and an uncanny knack for inhabiting hearts and minds, Everard ventures into her character’s darkest days. By confronting the sorrow of being alive, Blue Runaways reveals the joy of knowing we are not alone.

PRAISE FOR BLUE RUNAWAYS

“The characters in Jann Everard’s sensitive and precisely calibrated stories have profound relationships with the natural world." — Steven Beattie, That Shakespearean Rag Prose

"...prose that’s vivid, precise, and quite beautiful... stories that are at their beating heart mysterious and profoundly satisfying.” — Rachel Cantor (Half-Life of a Stolen Sister; Good on Paper)

“... a thought-provoking and bittersweet collection.” — Kathy Page (Paradise and Elsewhere; Dear Evelyn)

“Everard has a painter’s eye for landscapes — both foreign and familiar — and a storyteller’s skill in communicating how the natural world shapes our humanity. Read [these stories] slowly, and savour them.” — Carleigh Baker (Last Woman; Bad Endings)

Jann Everard was winner of The Malahat Review’s 2018 Open Season Award for Fiction. Her fiction has been published in leading Canadian journals including The Fiddlehead, Prairie Fire, Grain, Room, The New Quarterly, Humber Literary Review, EVENT, The Dalhousie Review, The Antigonish Review, and Coming Attractions 15. A long-time resident of Toronto, she now lives on Vancouver Island.