'Reading the Air' Poetrey Collection Launch Party

DATE : May 28, 2026

DEADLINE: June 23, 2026 - 7:00 pm

Join us for the launch of Brenda Gunn's second poetry collection Reading the Air on Tuesday June 23, 2026 from 7 to 8:30 pm at Audreys Books (10702 Jasper Ave) in Edmonton.

Hear a reading from the author, purchase a book, and get it signed!

All are invited to take this walk through history, which will leave attendees with a greater appreciation for family, the land, and the power of words.

In the spring of 1906, under cover of darkness, lovestruck sixteen-year-old Will Ingram crept from his Missouri farm after a violent confrontation with his father. So began an epic, eight-year journey of mishap and misadventure as young Will “rode the rails,” working his way across the American Midwest. Bronc busting, trick riding, and roping with Buffalo Bill at Oklahoma’s 101 Ranch and Wild West show, running a locomotive engine off the track in Kansas, and drinking, gambling, and gold-panning up at Cripple Creek, Colorado, before eventually settling on an Alberta homestead. His children knew little about their father’s past, and almost nothing of those eight lost years. What was it that drove him away, never to see his family again?

Luckily, in 1914, he wrote it all down. Reading the Air is a granddaughter’s tribute to a grandfather rediscovered through poetry. Brenda Gunn reads between the lines to reimagine the extraordinary tale of a seemingly ordinary man, inspired by a poem he wrote and found the courage to share.

Event info: www.audreys.ca/events/5439620260623