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Gail Dianne Bowen was born in Toronto. After receiving her Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Toronto in 1964 and her Masters of Arts from the University of Waterloo in 1975, she undertook graduate research at the University of Saskatchewan. Bowen was a lecturer in English at the University of Saskatchewan and the Saskatchewan Indian Cultural College in Saskatoon. In 1979 she and her family moved to Regina where she once more served as a lecturer, this time at the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College (SIFC) and the University of Regina. In 1986 she was appointed assistant professor of English at SIFC (now the First Nations University of Canada), and was Chair of the English Department for six years. The first six books in the Joanne Kilbourn series Deadly Appearances (1990); Murder at the Mendel (1991); The Wandering Soul Murders (1992); A Colder Kind of Death (1994), winner of the Crime Writers of Canada Arthur Ellis Award; A Killing Spring (1996) and Verdict in Blood (1998) have appeared as made-for-television movies with world-wide distribution. Burying Ariel (2000); The Glass Coffin (2002); The Last Good Day (2004); The Endless Knot (2006) and The Brutal Heart (2008) have met with critical and commercial success. In June 2008, Reader’s Digest named Bowen ‘Canada’s Best Mystery Novelist’. Between 2010 and 2017 several more book in the series were published and in 2018, Sleuth: Gail Bowen on Writing Mysteries was published by the University of Regina Press. Bowen’s short story “The King of Charles Street West”, which appeared in Toronto Noir (2008) published by Akashic Books, New York, was singled out for special praise by Publishers’ Weekly. Bowen has had four plays produced at Regina’s Globe Theatre – Dancing in Poppies (1993) which was presented in a special performance for Prince Edward, Beauty and the Beast (1993); The Tree (1994) and an adaptation of Peter Pan (1997). Manitoba Theatre for Young People chose Peter Pan as its 2000 Christmas production. The Grand Theatre in London, Ontario presented Dancing in Poppies in 2002 and Peter Pan in 2003. Gail Bowen passed away on June 25, 2026.

Bowen’s adaptation of Doctor Doolittle was broadcast on CBC’s Showcase in April 2006, and the University of Regina produced a theatrical version of the play simultaneously. Saving Lonesome George, Bowen’s original play about the last of the Galapagos tortoises, was produced by Persephone Theatre in 2008 and will be produced by Carousel Players in 2009.

Bowen’s radio play The Word According to Charlie D was broadcast on CBC’s Showcase in October 2006. Her Long Time Listener/First Time Caller is CBC’s World Play for 2008 and was rebroadcast on CBC on May 18, 2009. She is now adapting the play for Orca’s new series, Raven Books. Bowen was Writer in Residence for the Toronto Reference Library in May and June of 2009. Bowen has written the introduction to “Essays on Canadian Detective Fiction” that will be published by Wilfred Laurier Press in 2009.

Claude Breeze, sometimes also known as cHerbert, was born in Nelson, British Columbia in 1938. He received early education and art training in Saskatoon studying under Ernest Lindner. He attended the School of Art at Regina College and graduated in 1958, receiving instruction from Roy Kiyooka, Ronald Bloore, Art McKay and Ken Lochhead. In 1959 he attended the Vancouver School of Art.

In 1967 Claude Breeze was employed as a Sessional Instructor at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby and then at the Banff Centre School of Fine Arts in Banff, Alberta. Moving to Ontario he worked as the Artist-in-Residence from 1972 to 1975 at the University of Western Ontario and then moved back to Alberta to be a Sessional Visiting Instructor at the University of Calgary in 1975. Moving back to Toronto in the following year he became an Associate Professor at York University. In 1988 he was a Sessional Visiting Professor at the Emily Carr School of Art in Vancouver.

Breeze held his first one-man show in 1965, “Lovers in a Landscape” at the New Design Gallery in Vancouver, British Columbia. Since then he has had many one-man exhibitions and has participated in group shows in Canada, the United States, England, France, Scotland and China. Breeze was an early pioneer in the use of digital technology in studio art making. His work is held in many private, corporate and public collections. His art deals mainly with social and political issues and is manipulated as a combination of expressionist figure to non-representational motifs.

Claude Breeze was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts in 1974 and awarded the Queen’s Silver Jubilee Medal in 1978, he is a painter with a national reputation as well as Professor Emeritus at York University

Sharon Butala was born in 1940 and has lived all but six years of her life in Saskatchewan (33 years in the southwest of Saskatchewan) she resides now in Calgary. Sharon has one son and two grandchildren.

She received her B.A. and B.Ed. from the University of Saskatchewan. Besides having been published in numerous periodicals and anthologies she has published sixteen books.

Amongst other honours Butala has won the Marian Engel Award for Women Writers in Mid-Career, 1986 Writers' Choice Award, Saskatchewan Book Awards and Western Magazine Awards. She has also won a Saskatchewan Writers Guild Member's Achievement Award, a Canadian Authors’ Award, Canada 125 Commemorative Medal, Queen's Jubilee Medal and the Centennial Medal. She initiated and chaired a committee to make the Wallace Stegner house available as a Writer/Artist’s residence. Butala has received two honorary doctorates and is an Officer in the Order of Canada.

Anne Campbell was born in Paddockwood, Saskatchewan and attended school in Saskatoon and Hanley. She studied at the Saskatchewan School of the Arts, the University of Regina and, Drama, at the Regina Conservatory. She has worked in the area of public relations and administration for cultural and arts organizations, including the Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery in Regina, the Glenbow Museum in Calgary, and the Regina Public Library where she was also administrator of community services: Literacy, adult public programming; Writer in Residence; Homebound and Visual Impairment, and a First Nations community library. Anne was named a Research Fellow of the University of Regina, Canadian Plains Research Centre for research on the Regina Five visual artist, Arthur McKay, and where she co-edited two award-winning non-fiction books. Campbell has published six collections of poetry. Her poetry and prose have been featured in numerous journals, magazines, and anthologies, and broadcast on CBC Radio. She has garnered awards for her writing including Canada Council and Saskatchewan Arts Board Awards, Saskatchewan Writers Guild Major Awards, the City of Regina Writing Award and City of Regina Heritage and Mayor’s Arts Awards. She has presented readings, talks and workshops across Canada and her musical compositions with Tom Schudel have been performed internationally.