June 9, 2026

LiterASIAN Toronto 2026

 

The Toronto edition took place on May 22, 2026, at the Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library at the University of Toronto Libraries. It was presented jointly by the Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop and the Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library.  The 2026 theme focused on renewal, inheritance, and literary continuity. The organizers described it as a call for writers and readers to honour earlier generations of Asian Canadian literary pioneers while imagining new directions for the future.  

For ACWW, the theme feels particularly meaningful because it arrives more than three decades after the organization's founding and nearly fifty years after the publication of Inalienable Rice, often regarded as a landmark anthology in Asian Canadian writing. 

Featured authors included Farzana Doctor, Jack Wang, and June Hur, with the conversation moderated by Larissa Lai.  Next up: Vancouver's LiterASIAN Festival on June 27-28, 2026!

May 11, 2026

Citizen Chen: One Immigrant. One Mic. One Hell of a Story



Citizen Chen blends stand-up and true storytelling into a comedy of culture whiplash and daily low-key panic: language fails, border anxiety, small-town awkwardness, and rebuilding a life in Canada—one misunderstanding at a time. Fast, sharp, and weirdly tender, it’s big laughs with real moments underneath (no lectures, I promise). Come for the comedy, stay for the truth I didn’t mean to say out loud.

Scarlet Chen – creator/performer


PAST CRITICAL REVIEWS for Citizen Chen

Series Creator & Writer: Dream Raider (Original series produced by HBO Asia)

Winner: First Place, UCLAx Feature Screenplay Competition (Co-writer, Fortune Springs)

Core Artist & Filmmaker: Messages on Doors (The Fox Queen)

Co-Playwright & Performer: Percolate, a sold-out site-immersive production (Pacific Coast Stage Co. / Nanaimo Fringe Festival)

Successful Producer: Produced and hosted a series of consistently sold-out stand-up comedy showcases across Vancouver Island


Friday, May 29, 2026, 7:15 p.m. 8:15 p.m

Jim Green House Studio (Box Office at The Cultch)
1895 Venables Street, Vancouver, BC, V5L 2H6 (map)

May 2, 2026

LiterASIAN Festival 2026 - Re-Generation


Tickets for LiterASIAN 2026 are now available! Click here for event details and tickets.

April 21, 2026

Presented by: Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library & Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop (ACWW)


Celebrate Asian Canadian literature and discover the next wave of voices. This year’s theme, Re-Generation, reflects cycles of renewal and growth, inviting both newly published and established authors to draw inspiration from those who came before while reimagining the possibilities of Asian Canadian literature.

By embracing Re-Generation, LiterASIAN Toronto 2026 calls on writers, artists, readers, and community members to honour past contributions and continue this important work.

Featuring Authors
Farzana Doctor | Jack Wang | June Hur

Moderator
Professor Larissa Lai, Richard Charles Lee Chair in Chinese Canadian Studies, University of Toronto

Special Performance

The event will feature a special erhu performance by Amely Zhou, Music Director of the Canadian Chinese Orchestra and a musician specializing in the erhu and guzheng. Date: Friday, May 22, 2026
Doors open: 2:15 PM

Program & Reception: 2:45 – 5:15 PM (reception with refreshments included)
Location: Cheng Yu Tung East Asian Library, 8th Floor, Robarts Library, 130 St. George Street, Toronto

Celebrating New Asian Canadian Novels at Flying Books





 
DD, House of Anansi, Comorant, and Flying Books are hosting authors Jane Park (Inheritance) and Leslie Shimotakahara (The Breakwater) for a conversation and book signing.

ABOUT INHERTANCE

A Korean Canadian woman returns to the prairies, where she revisits her childhood and confronts her haunting guilt. Inheritance explores the immigrant experience, the sacrifices made by both parents and children, and the way trauma is transferred to the next generation. As Anne completes her journey to the past, she emerges to finally define life on her own terms.

Jane Park is a second-generation Korean Canadian writer. She is a MacDowell Fellow, and was a participant in the Banff Centre’s Writing Studio, and Diaspora Dialogues. She was born in Edmonton, Alberta, lived in New York City for over a decade, and now lives in Calgary, Alberta. Currently, she is pursuing an MFA at the University of British Columbia. Inheritance is her debut novel.

ABOUT THE BREAKWATER
A multigenerational saga about the long shadow of an unspeakable family secret, culminating in an overdue reunion between rivalrous brothers. In this heartbreaking family story, two brothers, both old men not far from death, must at last confront long-buried family secrets — and their lingering effects on subsequent generations.

Leslie Shimotakahara is an award-winning author of three novels and a memoir, as well as numerous short fiction and essays. She won the Canada-Japan Literary Prize (2012) and has been shortlisted for the K.M. Hunter Artist Award. Her writing has appeared in the National Post, World Literature Today, and other anthologies and periodicals. She holds a PhD in English from Brown University, and lives in Toronto with her husband.

RSVP
 

 

April 19, 2026

Oil and Water: Reading and Discussion with Authors Joanne Leow and Phoebe Wang


Join authors Phoebe Wang and Joanne Leow for a joint reading and discussion at Iron Dog Books! Joanne Leow is an SFU professor and author who will discuss her recently published nonfiction title, Exhumations: Inside the Body of a Petrostate. Phoebe Wang is an author and poet whose collection of essays, Relative To Wind: On Sailing, Craft and Community, was published in Fall 2024. Both books examine the colonial relationship of bodies with the natural environment -- the authors will discuss these themes and more through conversation and readings. This event is taking place on Thursday, April 30th, starting at 7:00pm with doors opening at 6:30pm. Reserve your spot through the link below!

From the publisher:

JOANNE LEOW is a Canada Research Chair and Associate Professor at Simon Fraser University. Her research interests lie at the intersections of spatial theory, decolonial theory, postcolonial studies, transnational and diasporic texts, and the environmental humanities. Her essays, fiction, and poetry have been published in Brick, Catapult, Evergreen Review, The Goose, Isle, The Kindling, The Town Crier, QLRS, and Ricepaper Magazine. Her first academic monograph is Counter-Cartographies: Reading Singapore Otherwise (Liverpool University Press, 2024), and her debut collection of poetry is Seas Move Away (Turnstone Press, 2022). Joanne Leow grew up in Singapore and lives on the unceded traditional territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.

PHOEBE WANG is a first-generation Chinese-Canadian currently based in Toronto, Canada. She is the author of the poetry collections Admission Requirements (McClelland and Stewart, 2017), shortlisted for the Gerald Lambert Memorial Award, the Pat Lowther Memorial Award, and nominated for the Trillium Book Award, and Waking Occupations (McClelland and Stewart, 2022). Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The Globe & Mail, The New Quarterly, Brick, and The Unpublished City, which was shortlisted for a Toronto Book Award, and she co-edited The Unpublished City: Volume II, The Lived City. She is currently on the editorial board with Brick Books. She has been a mentor with Diaspora Dialogues and is an adjunct professor and mentor in the University of Toronto Creative Writing MA program. Wang lives and sails in Toronto, Ontario.

Thursday Apr 30th, 2026, 7:00 PM -8:30 PM Iron Dog Books