Brian Brennan: 2012 Writer in Residence

September 1 to November 30, 2012

Brian Brennan has worked full-time as a professional writer for more than 40 years. He spent six years as a reporter with weekly and daily newspapers in British Columbia after training as a journalist at Vancouver's Langara College. He then spent 25 years as a staff writer and columnist with the Calgary Herald. After promotion to senior journalist at the Herald in 1984, his duties included coaching and mentoring young writers.

During the early 1990s, Brennan worked as a senior staff writer for the Herald's award-winning Sunday magazine. He won two Western Magazine Awards while there, and also received the national Hollobon Award for medical journalism.

He left the Herald in the winter of 1999 to make his living as a freelance writer. Since then he has written hundreds of articles for newspapers and magazines across North America including The New York Times, The Globe and Mail, the National Post and the Toronto Star. He has also published 10 books of narrative nonfiction. Eight books deal with the social history and colourful characters of Western Canada's past. One book tells the story of his immigrant's journey from Ireland to Canada. His latest title, Inspiring Life Stories since 1912, covers the first 100 years of the history of the Calgary Public Library.

Brennan's mountain history book, Romancing the Rockies, won the inaugural Dave Greber Freelance Writers Award. His book of biographical profiles, Scoundrels and Scallywags, sold more than 10,000 copies and was shortlisted for the Grant MacEwan Author's Award. His best-selling autobiography, Leaving Dublin, was a semi-finalist for the 2012 Alberta Reader's Choice Award.

Visit Brian's website.