Amber Dawn is a Canadian writer, who won the 2012 Dayne Ogilvie Prize, presented by the Writers' Trust of Canada to an emerging lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender writer."Vancouver's Amber Dawn wins LGBT literary award". CBC News, June 26, 2012.
A writer, filmmaker, and performance artist based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Dawn published her debut novel Sub Rosa in 2010. The novel later won that year's Lambda Literary Award for LGBT Debut Fiction, Lesbian."Canadian authors celebrated at the Lambda Awards". Quill & Quire, May 27, 2011. In 2013, she released a new book of essays and poems entitled How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler's Memoir."The red fingernail of authority" . Xtra!, April 19, 2013. The book was a shortlisted nominee in the Lesbian Memoir/Biography category at the 26th Lambda Literary Awards, and won the 2013 City of Vancouver Book Award."Dawn's sex-trade memoir nabs City of Vancouver award". Vancouver Sun, November 23, 2013.
Dawn was also an editor of the anthology Fist of the Spider Woman: Tales of Fear and Queer Desire, a nominee for the Lambda Literary Award for Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror in 2009, and co-editor with Trish Kelly of With a Rough Tongue: Femmes Write Porn.
Dawn was director of programming for the Vancouver Queer Film Festival for four years, ending in 2012. In 2017, she rejoined the Vancouver Queer Film Festival as co-artistic director with Anoushka Ratnarajah."Vancouver Queer Film Fest nets two arts luminaries as artistic directors" . Vancouver Metro, March 17, 2017.
She served alongside Vivek Shraya and Anne Fleming on the Dayne Ogilvie Prize jury in 2013, selecting C. E. Gatchalian as that year's winner."C. E. Gatchalian wins Dayne Ogilvie Prize" . National Post, June 27, 2013.
Her second novel, Sodom Road Exit, was published in 2018."How an abandoned small-town theme park inspired Amber Dawn's new novel". CBC Books, May 7, 2018. It was shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction at the 31st Lambda Literary Awards in 2019."Vivek Shraya, Joshua Whitehead among Canadian finalists for Lambda Literary Awards". Quill & Quire, March 7, 2019.
In 2020 Dawn and Justin Ducharme received a Lambda Literary Award nomination for LGBTQ Anthology at the 32nd Lambda Literary Awards, as coeditors of Hustling Verse: An Anthology of Sex Workers' Poetry.Jane van Koeverden, "Billy-Ray Belcourt, Samra Habib, Ness Lee, Vivek Shraya, Mariko Tamaki among Lambda Literary Awards finalists". CBC Books, March 10, 2020.
In 2021, her poetry collection My Art Is Killing Me was shortlisted for the Jim Deva Prize for Writing that Provokes."Michelle Good, Billy-Ray Belcourt among 2021 BC and Yukon Book Prize finalists". CBC Books, April 8, 2021. In 2026 she won the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize for Buzzkill Clamshell.Cassandra Drudi, "Maria Reva, Julian Brave NoiseCat among winners of B.C. and Yukon Book Prizes". Quill & Quire, September 21, 2026.
Bibliography Published Title Type ISBN Notes2005 With a Rough Tongue: Femmes Write Porn Anthology editor 2009 Fist of the Spider Woman: Tales of Fear and Queer Desire Anthology editor 2010 Sub Rosa Novel2013 How Poetry Saved My Life Autobiographical2015 Where the Words End and My Body Begins Poetry Collection2018 Sodom Road Exit Novel2019 Hustling Verse: An Anthology of Sex Workers' Poetry Collection editor2020 My Art is Killing Me and Other Poems Poetry Collection2025Buzzkill ClamshellPoetry Collection
References
External links Official Website Amber Dawn at Arsenal Pulp Press