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Wanted: Romance lovers seeking like-minded individuals for fun, learning, and a heck of a good time.
Welcome to the Toronto Romance Writers (TRW), the home for romantic fiction lovers in Toronto. Whether you’re a seasoned professional, are working on your first chapter, or simply love discussing and analyzing romantic fiction, TRW is for you. We embrace all romance writers and readers, and are committed to providing a safe, inclusive, and definitely fun place for all.
We have members from Toronto and the surrounding area, including northern and southern Ontario and even across Canada. Our roster of published members includes New York Times and USA Today bestselling authors.
Interested in joining TRW? Regardless of where you are in your career—just starting your first book, or already published—TRW has something for everyone. Please join us for workshops, discussion, support, advice, feedback, or simply a chance to get away from your computer. We’d love to meet you!
We welcome guests at most of our monthly meetings. Please see our Events listing and review our Guest Policy .
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Board elections will happen in June, and new coordinator and VP officer positions are currently being recruited for. Check our our Volunteer Page here .
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Alberta Romance Writers' Association
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2612 14A Street SW
Calgary, AB T2T 3X7
Alberta Romance Writers
Learn The Craft of Writing
The Alberta Romance Writers’ Association (ARWA) is a non-profit society dedicated to helping our members learn the craft of writing in an open and non-ju
Joining arwa registration for the 2022-2023 arwa membership is currently open. new members are accepted anytime during the year. the program year begins in sept, our authors books, new releases from arwa writers other novels from arwa writers treasures along the fenceline, programming workshops and meetings, all sessions are for members and registered guests (please email us to register) and are held at st mark’s lodge 2612 14a street sw, calgary, ab t2t 3x7. st, welcome to alberta romance writer’s association, mission statement.
The purpose of the Alberta Romance Writers’ Association is to promote excellence in romance fiction writing and to provide support for its members through professional development. The Association evolved in 1987 from a six‑week workshop co-sponsored by Alberta Culture, Film and Literary Arts and the Calgary Public Library. In September of 1989, the Association was incorporated under the Societies Act of Alberta as a nonprofit organization . The objectives of the Association have been proven by the number of professional writing careers that have been launched since its inception.
We are an Independent body of writers not affiliated with any other organisation.
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Romance Writers of Atlantic Canada
Enhancing the craft and art of writing, and advancing the careers of our authors.
Our AGM is Sunday, April 2, at 2:00 pm . It will be online, and possibly in person as well. The business meeting will be followed by a publishing panel discussion. More information and connection details will be posted closer to the meeting.
We will be electing a new Vice-President and Secretary for a two-year term—for the first year you’ll be working alongside the existing President and Treasurer. You don’t need to be a published author or long-standing member to hold these positions. New members and new ideas are always welcome. If interested, please contact us .
The Association of Romance Writers of Atlantic Canada is a Nova Scotia registered society, dedicated to enhancing the craft and art of romance writing, and advancing the careers of our members . RWAC offers a supportive environment for writers at all stages of their careers, and supports diversity. Our members and books encompass an array of sexual orientations, identities, and racial and ethnic backgrounds.
Romance Writers of Atlantic Canada began in 2000 as a chapter of Romance Writers of America . Spearheaded by RWAC’s founding president, Victoria LeBlanc, the chapter consisted of two published authors and more than a few writers who had yet to complete their first novel. In 2020, RWAC became an independent organization, and is no longer associated with RWA. Several RWAC members are also members of RWA, the Writer’s Federation of Nova Scotia , and other writing organizations. The RWAC holds meetings several times a year, on Sunday afternoons. At present, meetings are online only. A meeting typically covers association business, news from members, and a short workshop or presentation. Other activities include a summer day-long workshop, weekday evening drop-in help chat sessions, a writing retreat, and a year-end potluck. There is an annual membership fee, and some activities have an additional charge. See the calendar for details.
Officers of RWAC serve for two years, on staggered terms.
President – Deborah Hale 2022-2023
Vice President – Tim Covell 2021-2023
Treasurer – Kayleigh Malcom 2022-2024
Secretary – Jaime Lynn Hart 2021-2023
For information about our members and their work, please see Our Members . If you are interested in becoming a member, please Contact Us . View our privacy policy.
From 2013 through 2015, members wrote over 150 blogs for an earlier version of this site. Topics include author interviews and the business and craft of writing. Explore them in the Blog Archive .
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Featured member.
Are you ready to take your writing to the next level?
Canadian Authors Association is—and always has been—a membership-based organization for writers at all stages of their writing careers: aspiring, emerging, and professional.
Join us for professional development and networking opportunities with people who care about the craft and business of writing as much as you do.
Learn more at About CAA & Programs & Webinars .
Check out member benefits here .
Ready to join us? Visit this page .
Submissions Are Open For The 2023 Fred Kerner Book Award
If you are a current Canadian Authors member, or join before the submission deadline, with a book published in the previous calendar year (2022), you still have time to submit to the annual Fred Kerner Book Award.
The deadline is March 31, 2023. The prize is $400 and a one-year complimentary membership with Canadian Authors Association.
Details, guidelines, and entry form are available here .
Professional Development Opportunity for Canadian Authors
With submissions to the Whistler Independent Book Awards reaching an all-time high, we are seeking additional Canadian Authors Reviewers . All readers will receive their books for review in early June, and have until the end of July to review them.
Please indicate your interest by filling in this online form: https://independentbookawards.ca/wiba-reviewers-questionnaire/
Take this opportunity to learn valuable skills while supporting the association!
Jean Kay: 2021 Winner of the CAA Allan Sangster Award
On Saturday, April 24, CAA held a volunteer appreciation event to recognize and celebrate the many volunteers across Canada who work behind the scenes to run the association, its branches, and its programs.
At the event, one particular member was awarded the Allan Sangster Award, given to long-time volunteers for long and meritorious service.
Find out more about Jean Kay and the award here .
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Be Part of the Change
In the federal government’s Budget Commitment of April 7, 2022, it pledged “to ensur[e] that the Copyright Act protects all creators and copyright holders … and [to] work to ensure a sustainable educational publishing industry, including fair remuneration for creators and copyright holders, as well as a modern and innovative marketplace that can efficiently serve copyright users.”
This promise was welcomed by writers’ groups across the country. Momentum is building. You may already have written a letter to your MP. We urge you to write again, spread the word, and part of the push to get the law changed before anything else diverts the politicians’ attention. Everyone who writes to their MP is eligible for a draw to win a free one-year membership with CAA.
We also encourage you to share some animated 15-second shorts with your friends, family, and associates. They need to understand how unfair the 2012 amendment to the Copyright Act is, and what the impact is on Canadian culture.
For more info, links to the shorts, and the deadline for our membership draw, see Take Action!
Webinar Wednesdays Are Here!
The 2022 Canadian Authors & SF Canada Webinar Series is well underway, with three already behind us and several more to go.
- August 17 : A Quick and Easy Guide to Book and Publishing Contracts, with D.G. Valdron
Find out more ab o ut these webinars and how to register here .
CanWrite!100 Writers’ Conference
On September 18 and 19, we held our conference virtually, with six amazing sessions taught by bestselling authors and industry experts, plus two panels—one with agents and a publisher and another on alternate forms of storytelling. We will have recordings of individual sessions available for purchase very soon, so watch this space.
In the meantime, check out the conference pages here .
Mike Phelan
Frances boyle, jennifer harris, mike mulcahy, kieran egan, karen gansel, anne kathleen mclaughlin, suzanne craig-whytock, jason waddle, carmel m. toussaint, christine bergsma, michael gates, jacquie dankner, nan williamson, doreen vanderstoop, joyce goodwin, anna v. leigh, arwinder kaur, k. r. wilson, bill waiser, lucian childs, patrick connors, tonya liburd, melanie marttila, lorrie potvin, gwen tuinman, jolie phuong hoang, tina kamakaris, carolyn trickey-bapty, monique layton, nancy chislett, lori hahnel, christopher canniff, jane baird warren, renee sarojini saklikar, carol l. mackay, andrew palmer, barbara wade rose, elaine cougler, kamal parmar, cathalynn labonté-smith and frances peck, catherine graham, gordon k. jones, lise mayne (pen name lg pomerleau), christopher gorman, svetlana machurina herrera guzman, mark vulliamy, nduka otiono, susan j. atkinson, d. neil elliott, doug jordan, purabi sinha das, john bennett, sharon frayne, nancy m. bell, joann catania, rosanna battigelli, naomi eliana pommier steinberg, sylvia barnard, pamela dillon, may q. wong, nina shoroplova, richard tattoni, aaron s. bayley, jean van loon, christopher butt, ifeoma chinwuba, rita miceli, deborah cannon, darlene madott, martin neil campbell, susan sommers, d.f. whibley, samreen ahsan, bill arnott, susan wadds, guglielmo d’izzia, james arnett, vanessa farnsworth, kelly allers, keith inman, peter freeman, robert w. mackay, liz rachel walker, dr. ian prattis, susan mockler, catherine little, dorothee komangapik, malak kalmoni chehab, vera constantineau, k.s. covert, willie handler, betty guenette, john van rys, tara k. torme, liisa kovala, karen schauber, p.l. stuart, christine topjian, anne m. smith-nochasak, hasib iftekhar, richard pyves, rick prashaw, gerald richardson brown, yvonne van lankveld, john passfield, frank spezzano, rebecca st. pierre, louise rachlis, maurice suwa, anne lazurko, eleonore schönmaier, scott overton, kathleen s. schmitt.
League of Romance Writers
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League of Romance Writers invites you to attend two meetings before deciding to join. Membership Dues are $30.00 annually.
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Why the implosion of the Romance Writers of America matters
This article was published more than 3 years ago. Some information may no longer be current.
The Romance Writers of America (RWA) – the world’s leading guild of romance writers – has effectively imploded, and the future of the organization and its values are at stake, along with its major role across the North American publishing industry.
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Writer Courtney Milan has been at the centre of controversy among the members of the Romance Writers of America. The Canadian Press
A rapid number of events, starting with the censure of Asian-American bestselling author Courtney Milan, have occurred involving the international industry organization over the past three weeks, culminating in the resignations of both its president, Damon Suede, and its executive director, Carol Ritter, on Thursday. “It’s this ugly, raw, wound that’s surfacing, and on the whole, people are pretty upset,” Calgary RWA chapter president Emily Varga said.
Since it was founded in 1980, RWA has grown to more than 9,000 members, and holds a massive annual conference and its own annual awards, the RITAs. The first Canadian RWA chapter was founded in Ottawa in 1985, and there are now four more across the country. “I met my agent at RWA and I met my then-publisher at RWA,” said Ottawa chapter president Lucy Farago.
The growth of RWA is no surprise, considering that romance made up 13.5 per cent of Canadian fiction sales in 2017 and 23 per cent of the overall U.S. fiction market in 2016.
However, diversity, inclusion and the less-than-equal treatment of non-white authors have all been serious issues at RWA for many years, exemplified by how visible minorities continue to be stereotyped in titles by white authors. Toronto RWA chapter president Farah Heron, who made her novel debut with The Chai Factor last year, said she was tired of seeing Asian women portrayed as submissive in romance novels. “It chips away at you over time,” she said.
In late December of last year, this issue garnered a new level of attention after news broke the organization was disciplining Milan.
Last summer, Milan openly criticized depictions of half-Chinese characters in the book Somewhere Lies the Moon by Kathryn Lynn Davis on Twitter. Milan, who is half-Chinese, called the portrayal a "racist mess.” The RWA Ethics Committee found Milan to have “engaged in conduct injurious” to the organization. The ruling came with a punishment of a one-year suspension of membership and a lifetime ban on holding leadership positions within the organization.
There was massive, immediate backlash. Authors and RWA members flooded Twitter, especially after learning ethics complaints may have been filtered by RWA staff, leading to the possibility some did not reach the organization’s Ethics Committee.
In one example, a RWA member from Calgary who writes queer romance entered the RITAs last year. The author received feedback from the judges that the novel didn’t qualify because the story was between two male characters. Varga said the author reported that experience to the RWA but received no response. “There are systemic issues our members have had entering contests,” Varga said, pointing out that RWA has a significant number of members like her who are lawyers and had expressed concerns about the organization’s bylaws and protocols for ethics complaints.
Even though the RWA soon rescinded its ruling against Milan, there was still a cascade of negative consequences, including the resignation of authors who had previously signed up to judge the RITAs , authors pulling their books from RITA consideration, the resignations of members and directors-at-large, the withdrawal of at least 36 agents’ support from future events, significant global press coverage, as well as public support for Milan from superstar authors Nora Roberts , Neil Gaiman and N.K. Jemisin.
Dozens of RWA chapters across North America, including in Calgary, Toronto and Ottawa, issued public statements condemning the organization’s senior leadership and the actions against Milan. Several publishers also pulled their support from RWA and its national conference, including Avon , Berkley Romance , Entangled, HarperCollins Canada, Harlequin, Kensington, St. Martin’s, Gallery Books and Tule Publishing .
Last Tuesday, the 2020 RITAs were officially cancelled , citing the contest’s inability to “reflect the breadth and diversity of 2019 romance novels/novellas.” Two days later, RWA announced Suede and Ritter would step down from their positions, though Ritter would have a transition period of several months.
But the statement about the resignations did not include an apology to Milan nor go into detail about what happened. “Telling us that they’re going to be transparent and honest is not the same thing as showing us that they will be,” Heron said.
What has happened within RWA isn’t just about the future of a literary genre that has frequently been subject to misogyny and stereotyped as being frivolous or not as prestigious as other kinds of fiction, despite its massive sales. “This is about our livelihoods and our careers,” Heron said.
The situation has also highlighted how badly the romance genre and the publishing industry at large have treated non-white authors, even best-selling ones. Until 2019, there were no black winners at the RITA awards, despite several authors such as Beverly Jenkins and Alyssa Cole earning critical acclaim and appearing on several bestseller lists.
For many RWA members, most of their involvement and loyalty has been through their local chapter’s monthly meetings, training and writing seminars. Some chapters are considering no longer officially affiliating with the national organization. And even with the resignations at the senior level, Varga and Heron said many Canadian chapter members are not planning to attend the national conference in San Francisco this year due to the significant number of author, speaker and publisher withdrawals, and the cancellation of the RITA awards.
“You can get all these brand new or unreleased books signed by the author,” Heron said, calling the free giveaways one of the best and most fun parts of the conference, despite the long lines. “Those [major] publishers not coming means that won’t happen.”
Varga, Farago and Heron said the organization has a lot of work ahead of it to regain the trust of its members, including an actual apology to Milan and greater transparency about what happened. Varga said the choices RWA makes now, and which group it aims its changes toward, will determine its long-term future.
“Are you trying to make the people who say racist things happy?” she said. “Or are you trying to make people who call out racism happy?”
There’s also the possibility of starting an entirely new organization for romance writers with a new set of bylaws, board of directors and values. It’s an outcome many members aren’t thrilled about but understand might be necessary.
“I would be sad to see the organization go,” Farago said. "But if it needs to go to fix it then that’s what has to happen.”
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Welcome to the Toronto Romance Writers (TRW), the home for romantic fiction lovers in ... including northern and southern Ontario and even across Canada.
Romance Writers of America® (RWA) is a nonprofit trade association whose mission is to advance the professional and common business interests of
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The purpose of the Alberta Romance Writers' Association is to promote excellence in romance fiction writing and to provide support for its members through
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Calgary Association of Romance Writers of America, Calgary, Alberta. ... No workshop, just ... find out about her village life in the Canadian Rockies
We are a membership-based organization for writers at all stages of their writing careers—aspiring, emerging, and professional. Dedicated to promoting a
League of Romance Writers invites you to attend two meetings before deciding to join. ... Phone Number INSIDE the United States or Canada.
A rapid number of events, starting with the censure of Asian-American ... The first Canadian RWA chapter was founded in Ottawa in 1985