PEIL: Who inspired you to become a writer?
way to get the story out into the world would be as a novel. I am so grateful that Acorn Press decided to go with the book.
I suppose it was my maternal grandfather and mother who inspired me to write. My grandfather was a storyteller with a great love of history. My mother indulged me as a small child by following my orders to stop her housework and sit and write down the stories I dictated to her. My high school english teacher, Shirley Barlow appreciated my stories, which was encouraging. But for many years my only writing was in the workplace or contract writing. Life as a single parent was busy and didn’t permit the time, or so I thought, for writing that might go nowhere.
PEIL: Who is Daniel MacDougall?
Daniel MacDougall is a young man with big dreams and big responsibilities in the winter of 1956. He is doing his best to achieve his own goals, stay true to himself, while answering to a number of other people. The lesson he is forced to learn is that no one walks alone, and it takes great strength to ask for help, and feel worthy of receiving it.
PEIL: Did you learn anything about MacDougall that surprised you?
PEIL: When did you write your first book?
Daniel surprised me in that he became a much more complex character on the page than I had first planned. He insisted on that and might have done a little of the writing himself.
My first published book was Vintage Christmas: Holiday Stories from Rural Prince Edward Island published by Nimbus in 2016. My second book was Memories of Christmas published in 2022 by Acorn Press. Both are a series of short stories. Name Your Game is my first novel.
PEIL: Share a bit about your background.
PEIL: Do you write full time?
4-H played a big role in my youth giving me numerous opportunities to learn skills, travel, and meet people who celebrated rural living. My first four years of schooling were in a one- room school housing grades one to eight. In grade one I was lucky enough to sit behind a grade eight student who would do my work while I read. I then attended Miscouche Elementary and Miscouche High school, before taking a political science degree at the University of Prince Edward Island. My first job after university was as a news reporter with CJRW radio station. My one big regret in the job was that I didn’t accept the offer to go up with the Snowbirds when they performed in Summerside, however, I did fly on the last flight of the Argus along with other media members. For the past twenty- one years I have been employed as a cultural programmer with Culture Summerside, the arts, heritage, and culture department of the western capital. No two days are ever the same, which is a real privilege.
With my job I write everyday, which can make it hard to come home and create something for myself. I can go long periods without working on a story, but I am trying to become more disciplined in scheduling time. Also working on ridding myself of guilt about taking time to have fun writing when perhaps I should be doing some real work, whatever that might be.
PEIL: What is Name Your Game about?
Name Your Game is a drama about family and community and the ties that bind them.
PEIL: Why did you decide to write this story?
PEIL: Do you have any books launching in 2025?
In 2010, I had the good fortune to be accepted for the PEI Screenwriter Bootcamp, which proved to be one of the best weeks of my life. My first idea for a screenplay was rejected and I had hours to write a new proposal before the camp started. I was rather frantic for an idea and then the universe delivered. The Name Your Game plot came to me, and there was no looking back. I wrote the screenplay and pitched it, but funding was an issue so it sat gathering dust until the winter of 2022 when I decided perhaps the
I have no new work coming out in 2025; however, I currently have a new novel in progress. No deadlines in sight, and then the question will be, will a publisher want to print it?
PEIL: Anything you would like to add?
The only thing I would add is that I believe although Name Your Game is set in 1956, it clearly speaks to today and the challenges people are facing in fulfilling their dreams.
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