University of Guelph announces 3rd Annual Gryphons Read program

The University of Guelph announces the 3^rd Annual Gryphons Read program

Featuring: Eden Robinson

1, 2 October 2019

The University of Guelph announces the 3^rd annual Gryphons Read common reading project, which will encourage first-year students and other members of the university community to connect with each other and to enter into meaningful conversations all across campus by reading and discussing the same book. Gryphons Read is a collaboration between the College of Arts, the Office of the Provost, and the Library, with intensive material and logistical support from Student Experience. 

This year, that book is Eden Robinson’s Son of a Trickster published by Penguin Random House Canada.  On October 1^st and 2^nd, 2019, Robinson will visit the University of Guelph to meet with groups of students and give a public talk and reading as the third featured writer for Gryphons Read. She will also visit the University of Guelph Humber Creative Writing MFA students on October 3^rd in Toronto.

Lawrence Hill, Professor, School of English and Theatre Studies and chair of the Gryphons Read organizing committee says he is "so thrilled that in October 2019, Haisla/Heiltsuk novelist Eden Robinson has agreed to come to campus for two days of visits and conversations about her fabulous, utterly memorable novel Son of a Trickster!" Student Experience staff have been recruiting trainers, facilitators and participants, planning the training, developing resource materials, and overseeing program implementation and evaluation.  Student Experience is “thrilled to once again be engaging new and returning students from across disciplines in the book club component of Gryphons Read. The book clubs provide the opportunity for students to strengthen their communication and leadership skills, meet other students, and engage with the topics in the book in a unique setting.”

This is what Gryphons Read is all about.

Robinson’s novel was shortlisted for the 2017 Scotiabank Giller Prize and was a finalist for the 2018 BC Book Prize and the Leacock Medal for Humour. Robinson, a recipient of the $50,000 Writers' Trust Fellowship, is also the author of the award-winning Monkey Beach, Blood Sports, and the recently released Trickster Drift.  Born in Kitimat, B.C., Robinson is a member of the Haisla and Heiltsuk First Nations.

Son of a Trickster is “a striking and precise coming-of-age novel, in which everyday teen existence meets Indigenous beliefs, crazy family dynamics and cannibalistic river otters. It is the exciting first novel in Robinson's trickster trilogy” (penguinrandomhouse.ca).  

Eden Robinson’s main public event on October 2^nd event is free and open to the public and features Ms. Robinson in conversation with Professor Brittany Luby and Ms. Nadia Timperio, Manager of Graduate Curriculum. It will be held in the Robert Whitelaw Room of McLaughlin Library (2^nd floor, room 246), University of Guelph.

Contact:
Sandra Sabatini
University of Guelph Gryphons Read committee co-ordinator
sabatini@uoguelph.ca
519-824-4120 x53869

Sharon Klein
Deputy Director, Publicity
Penguin Random House Canada 
sklein@penguinrandomhouse.com 
416-957-1562