Rice will serve as a mentor for program featuring budding Indigenous writers

By Sam Laskaris

SUDBURY – When Anishinabek writer Waubgeshig Rice found out he had a chance to serve as a mentor for young Indigenous writers he jumped at the opportunity.

That’s because Rice himself relished the times others had mentored him in his own writing.

Rice, a member of Wasauksing First Nation, is one of seven professional writers who have been selected as mentors for this year’s Audible Indigenous Writers’ Circle.

“I’ve known about the program for a while,” he said. “And I’ve met some aspiring writers that have gone through it.”

This marks the fourth year of the Audible Indigenous Writers’ Circle, which is a six-month mentorship and workshop program for budding First Nations, Inuit, and Métis writers from across Canada.

A total of 21 writers will be chosen to be part of the program this year. Applications opened on Feb. 1 and will be accepted for eight weeks.

Those seeking to be part of the program can find an application here.

There is no cost for the aspiring writer to apply for the program. And those that are selected to be part of the program are eligible for a bursary to support program expenses.

Though this is Rice’s first year as a mentor for the program, he did some guest seminars last year.

Richard Van Camp, a Dogrib Tłı̨chǫ writer from Fort Smith, Northwest Territories, is heading into his fourth year as a program mentor.

“Richard was very keen on getting me involved,” said Rice, whose own writing career has seen him have four fiction books published. “He’s a champion of the program.”

And so too is January Rogers, a member of Six Nations of the Grand River, who is in her third year as a mentor. Rogers is a successful poet, media producer, and performance and sound artist.

Rice has been mentored by both Van Camp and Rogers during his career.

“If they’re vouching for the program, that’s enough for me,” Rice said.

Rice had spent most of his journalism career as a radio host and video journalist with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). He left the CBC in 2020 to focus on his own writing career.

His most famous book thus far has been Moon of the Crusted Snow, published in 2018. This novel is a thriller about life in an Anishinaabe community when it loses all of its electrical power.

The sequel to this book, Moon of the Turning Leaves, was published this past October.

During the past three years, more than 55 emerging Indigenous writers have been mentored through the Audible Indigenous Writers’ Circle.

After this year’s mentees have been selected, they will take part in the half-year mentorship and workshop program. They will be paired up with one of the seven mentors, who will guide them through their creative writing processes.

Besides Rice, Van Camp, and Rogers, the other mentors in the program this year are Reneltta Arluk, Joshua Whitehead, Warren Cariou, and Tanya Talaga.

Arluk is a writer and actor from the Northwest Territories who has Inuvialuit, Dene, and Cree ancestry.

Whitehouse, from Peguis First Nation in Manitoba, is an award-winning author.

Carriou, who has Métis ancestry, is a Winnipeg-based writer, filmmaker, photographer and professor.

And Talaga, whose family is from Fort William First Nation in Northern Ontario, is an award-winning Anishinaabe journalist and the author of a pair of national bestsellers.