Pictou-Antigonish Regional Library

1. Home
2. Events
3. Writer in Residence
4. Maureen Hull

Writer-in-Residence "Maureen Hull"

Maureen Hull was born and raised on Cape Breton Island. She studied at NSCAD, Dalhousie University and the Pictou Fisheries School. Before and during her formal education she worked in the costume department of Neptune Theatre. Since 1976 she has lived on Pictou Island in the Northumberland Strait. Between 1976 and 1998 she worked as a lobster fisher; for seven of those years she home-schooled her two daughters. She began writing in 1992, fiction, poetry, children's literature and creative non-fiction.

She has been a member of the NS Writer's Federation (Writers Council) since 1999, as a writer, a mentor and a workshop instructor (Rural Writes). Maureen has been a member of the jury for several awards and grant adjudication committees including - the Writers' Union of Canada, NS Writer's Federation, the Nova Scotia Arts Council and St. Francis Xavier University. Maureen is also a member of the Writers' Union of Canada, and the Canadian Children's Book Centre.

In 2001, Maureen was also the Berton House Writer-in-Residence, and the Visiting Author for the Labrador Creative Arts Festival in November 2006.

Her fiction and poetry has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies. Her short story collection, Righteous Living, Turnstone Press, 1999, was short-listed for the Danuta Gleed Award, and several of her stories have been read on CBC radio. Her second picture book, Rainy Days With Bear, 2004, was short-listed for the Ann Connor Brimer and Blue Spruce awards. Her first novel, The View From a Kite was published by Nimbus/Vagrant in September 2006 and won the inaugural Moonbeam Award (for YA mature issues).

In 2009, her co-authored illustration children's e-storybook, "Lobster Fishing on the Susan B" a digital partnership with the Pictou-Antigonish Regional Library won the Canadian Library Association's national Innovation award. Nimbus Publishing of Halifax, released the printed version of the storybook, "Lobster Fishing on the Sea" in Spring of 2010.

Selected List of Publicaitons

• Lobster Fishing on the Sea. Nimbus, September 2010
• Lobster Fishing on the Susan B January 2009 (illustrated children's e-storybook – Pictou-Antigonish Regional Library)
• The View From a Kite. Nimbus/Vagrant, September 2006.
"The View From a Kite is a thoroughly engrossing novel. Maureen Hull creates an authentic, full-spirited protagonist who captivates the reader immediately. Here is a difficult tale told unflinchingly by a master storyteller." - Lesley Choyce
• Rainy Days with Bear. Illustrated by Leanne Franson. Lobster Press, 2004. ISBN 1-894222-85-7 .
"Franson's soft watercolour illustrations bring Hull's tale of imagination and patience to life." - Carol-Ann Hoyte, Montreal Review of Books.
• The Montreal Aunts. Christmas Family Treasures. Kacey Barron, Editor. Hugh Lauter Levin AssociiatesInc., 2003. ISBN 0-88363-044-3.
• Homarus Americanus. Atlantica: Stories from the Maritimes and Newfoundland. Lesley Choyce, Editor . Goose Lane Editions, 2001. ISBN 0-8692-309-0.
• Wild Cameron Women. Illustrated by Judith Christine Mills. Stoddart Kids, 2000. ISBN 0-77373-219-5.
"[A] book about storytelling - about how family storytelling connects us to the wisdom of our ancestors, and about how storytellers [...] shape their tales to convey that wisdom to us." - "Wild Cameron Women." Perry Nodelman. Quill & Quire, February 2000.
"Maureen Hull's imaginative solution to handling a child's fears is written with humour and spirit." - "Wild Cameron Women." Indigo Review, www.indigo.ca
"[A] fresh imaginative tale that will appeal to readers for many years to come." - "We Recommend..." Children's Book News, Spring 2000.
• Righteous Living.Turnstone Press, 1999. ISBN 0-8801-232-2.
"[A] gleaming, carefully-polished gem [...] Hull's writing is redemptive and, ultimately, purifying." - "Righteous Living." Margo Wheaton. Pottersfield Portfolio, Vol. 20, No. 2 (Spring 2000).
"[H]er writing touches on the nerve that runs through the core of everybody's supposedly ordinary existence. These stories are like our lives - sometimes momentous, sometimes mundane, sometimes startlingly real." - "Throwing off trappings: A good catch of stories from an island scribe." Atlantic Books Today, No 26 (Fall 1999).
• Heading North, "Brain". Words Out There: Women Poets in Atlantic Canada. Jeanette Lynes, Editor. Roseway Publications, 1999. ISBN -89646-09-1.
• Homarus Americanus. Water Studies. Ian Colford. Editor. Pottersfield Press, 1998. ISBN 1-895900-12-3.

"J. Maureen Hull's [...] writing is filled with joyful lyricism." - Review of Water Studies. Janet McNaughton. Quill & Quire, March 1998.