Lenore Rowntree
Works by Lenore Rowntree:
From ABC BookWorld, "Lenore Rowntree has followed her brilliant but almost entirely unnoticed linked collection, Dovetail Joint and other stories (Quadra Books 2015) with a first novel, Cluck (Thistledown $19.95), in which we follow the life of a socially awkward man, Henry, as he attempts to navigate through Kitsilano burdened by his mother's bipolar illness and his own sexual repression. He's a radio junkie, an obsessive romantic and a chronic outsider. It was a finalist in The Great BC Novel Contest. Her play The Woods at Tender Creek was produced at the Vancouver East Cultural Centre in 2010. Her short stories and poetry have been published in several Canadian literary journals; her poetry was included in the anthology Best Canadian Poetry 2010.
In Rowntree’s third book of fiction, See You Later Maybe Never (Now or Never Publishing $19.95) a childless woman, Vanessa, nearing sixty confronts her past, unsuccessful love life and being forced out of her high fashion career. Vanessa leaves Toronto for a retreat to a holistic campus. She recalls playing as a young girl while her parents’ marriage disintegrated, crushes she had at school and secretly falling for one of her students as a young teacher in training. Eventually, Vanessa connects with her 103-year-old Aunt Marion who continues to find ways to make life more interesting. There’s disappointment, fun, humour and intelligence in this look at what it means to be seen as “old.”
Rowntree grew up in Toronto, then moved to Vancouver where she practiced law, and taught at the university and high school level. She began painting and exhibiting in the 1990s."
Lenore Rowntree is the author of the linked collection of stories See You Later Maybe Never and Cluck, a novel. She is also co-editor and contributor to the collection of life stories Hidden Lives: true stories from people who live with mental illness.
Her writing has been published in many literary journals, magazines and newspapers, including Geist and the Globe and Mail, as well as in several anthologies including The Best of the Best of Canadian Poetry. Her self-illustrated poetry collection for children Love Letters won a gold medal from the Moonbeam’s Children’s Book Awards, her novel Cluck was a finalist for the Great BC Novel Prize, and her nonfiction writing has been nominated for a CBC Literary Award. She has had two plays produced and is thrilled every time one of her characters gets up and walks around a stage.
She has presented writing workshops for various organizations including the BC Federation of Writers, the Creative Nonfiction Collective, the public library system, high school creative writing clubs, and several mental health organizations. She is one of the founders of Fig:ment Magazine a new literary and arts magazine about mental health. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia, and is based in Vancouver and on the Sunshine Coast.