Veteran author Harry Thurston capped a climactic literary evening at the Grad House in Halifax by reading from a memoir about losing a big, two-hearted river. The Nova Scotia native, who is slated, as vice-chair, to become chair of the Writers’ Union of Canada, gave a bravura

performance, and so managed to overcome the damaging revelation that he winters in Portugal. As one of those authors — 25 books and counting — who will join the roster of mentors in the MFA program in CNF at King’s College, Thurston marvelled at the talent

of those five readers who preceded him. They included Beth Hitchcock and Terra Duncan Bruhm, pictured here, and Jen Powley, Gina Woolsley, and Fiona Campbell, several of whom moved the audience to laughter and near tears. Obviously, you should have been there.