Alexandra Moorshead joins the Eden Mills Writers’ Festival in a newly-created role as festival director.
Her whole career has been in events and festivals. Most notably she was the festival director for Toronto’s The Word On The Street, a book and magazine festival.
The Eden Mills Writers Festival is moving from a board of directors to a governance board. The board of directors, like a working board, and the Eden Mills community organized the festival.
“And it's time now to pass the torch over,” said Moorshead.
The governance board will oversee the work being done for the festival.
Staff, like Moorshead, will put the festival together. In her new role as festival director she is looking forward to people coming to Eden Mills in September.
Originally from London, England, her family moved to Canada to grow her dad’s publishing business. She currently lives in Georgetown.
“I come from a family of heavy readers,” she said.
Her mom, sister and brother-in-law each read over 50 books a year. When her dad was alive he also read a lot.
“You know, it certainly does run in the family," she said.
Her sister has a little library at her home in Toronto. She always asks Moorshead what she’s reading.
Currently, she’s reading Stiff by Mary Roach. It’s a non-fiction book about the history of cadavers. Moorshead reads a variety of genres and switches between fiction and non-fiction books.
One of her fondest memories reading was during the beginning of her career, she took a day off work and went to Niagara. She spent the day moving around to different benches reading a book.
“And it was just the most wonderful day and the fact that I still remember all these years later makes me smile when I think of it,” she said.
When she started at Brock University one of her favourite courses was about children’s book authors pre and post 19th century. The professor would read short stories to the class.
“I think that’s why audiobooks are as popular as they are, because when somebody with skill reads to you it's thoroughly enjoyable,” said Moorshead.
At the festival there will be five sites where author’s will read excerpts of their books and interact with readers.
“This is like book Woodstock or something,” she said.
The festival is celebrated in the village of Eden Mills. People bring chairs and blankets to sit near the waterfront. There are 45 Canadian authors at this year’s event. Festival goers can have their books signed by the authors themselves.
“I think having a signed book is something that's very special. And it's a nice memory of the time that you were at the festival,” said Moorshead.
For the future of the festival, it hopes to bring in students and professors in creative writing programs from local universities.
