When Lesley Choyce is crafting a story, he often finds inspiration for his characters from people whom he鈥檚 met in real life.
鈥淩eal life people do inspire the characters I build for writing novels鈥�, says the University Teaching Fellow in 蘑菇AV鈥檚 Department of English 补苍诲听 Creative Writing Program in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. 鈥淏ut they are those rare folks who don鈥檛 follow the crowd, who create their own unique path, who exhibit extraordinary compassion and have a high degree of individuality.鈥�
Some of those students have been the Mi鈥檏maw and Black students, some young and some older, that he鈥檚 encountered in his 43 years of teaching in Dal鈥檚 Transition Year Program.
One of them was Angela Parker-Brown, an African Nova Scotian woman from Truro who Choyce taught in the early 1990s. Angie was diagnosed in 2018 with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), a neurodegenerative disease that progressively robs people of motor skills, making everyday activities increasingly difficult.
Angie had been working on a book about her life as a mother of twin daughters and her experience living with ALS but was struggling as the disease progressed. She reached out to Choyce, who she thought could help her finish and publish the project.
Angie won me over completely with a great spirited story, a strong personal philosophy and her own indomitable spirit.
Choyce, who runs , a small literary publishing company, says 鈥渟he was fairly physically incapacitated鈥� but told him she could write it using an eye-gaze technology.
鈥淭o be honest, I was skeptical. But she won me over completely with a great spirited story, a strong personal philosophy and her own indomitable spirit,鈥� he says.
Embodying Angie's spirit
Angie鈥檚 book, , was published in 2022 and went on to be a provincial best seller. The next year, she died of complications from ALS.
Choyce felt inspired by Angie鈥檚 story, which became the focus of his latest novel. Choyce had written and published many young adult novels but wanted to tackle writing about a character a bit older, but not too much.
鈥淭hat provided the spark for what I hope is a very meaningful story,鈥� he says.
The result is his latest book, , a story about a protagonist whose mother dies of ALS complications during his final year of high school and the difficult summer that follows.
The book 鈥渆mbodies a fair bit of Angie鈥檚 story and even more of her spirit,鈥� says Choyce, noting that the mother character communicates with her family through eye-gaze technology and synthesized voice.
The right mindset
When Angie first contacted Choyce about wanting to tell her story, 鈥渟he recognized that there was a thread that connected her desire to write it with the things I鈥檇 been teaching in the classroom those many years ago at TYP," he says.
He had little knowledge of eye-gaze technology and had no idea of the strength of character that Angie had going for her.
鈥淪he taught me that someone with severe physical limitations, with the right mindset and dedication, can not only create a great story and valuable autobiography, but produce a masterwork of writing that can inspire all of us. The new tools available now make this more possible than ever. They can and should be incorporated into both university and community learning.鈥�
I want to offer whatever I鈥檝e learned from writing and publishing to provide real honest advice about how to stay creative and forge ahead without worry about frustrations and setbacks.
Choyce encourages all creative writers to seek out their own path, use adversity to nourish their compassion for others, and to apply creativity to all aspects of their life, not just academics or fiction. He鈥檚 planning on using No More Fridays, his 105th published book, as a basis for a book tour this spring and summer at a number of Nova Scotian libraries centred around workshops on how individuals from real life inspire great characters in novels.
听will offer an opportunity for him to connect with and offer advice to hopeful authors who might have never stepped foot on a university campus.
Choyce, who will retire this summer after 50 years of university teaching, adds: 鈥淚 want to offer whatever I鈥檝e learned from writing and publishing to provide real honest advice about how to stay creative and forge ahead without worry about frustrations and setbacks.鈥�