http://filidhbooks.com Phone: 250-589-2385 E-mail: info@filidhbooks.com Volume 3, Issue 08
August, 2026
Welcome to the August Newsletter
Your gateway to stories, events, and creative community!
New & Noteworthy
We have updated the Subscribers’ and FANS distribution lists. If this is your first newsletter, previous issues are available on our website.
Monthly Friendly Authors Networking Socials (F.A.N.S.) Return
We start meeting again in September!
September 12, 2026, 10:30 AM – 12:30 PM
Quality Foods, the upper-level café, regular seating area
in Eagle Creek Mall on Helmcken Road in View Royal.
(https://www.facebook.com/groups/295883593397579)
Coming this fall…
· Ron Kearse, Jason Taylor, Jessie Blair appearing at WORD Vancouver Festival, Sept. 19
· Writing at the Turning of the Year Retreat, Campbell River, BC, Oct 6-8
· Fall Book Fair – October 24, Tillicum Centre, Victoria, 8 vendor spots left!
· Monstrously Misguided Anthology Book Launch, October 31.
· Creative Craft Fair – shared author booth – Nov 6, 7, 8 – Pearkes Rec, Victoria – 5 spots left!
· Holiday Book Fair – November 28, Tillicum Centre, Victoria – 8 vendor spots left!
into@filidhbooks.com to reserve a vendor’s space. $60 now, $75 after Sept 15.
Writing at the Turning of the Year Retreat
October 6 to 8, 2026
Painter’s Lodge, Campbell River, BC
A coastal setting where forest meets ocean.
Driveable from most of Vancouver Island, with Nanaimo ferry routes providing the most direct access for those travelling from the Lower Mainland
Join us! For more information or to register, please see our website:
Https://filidhbooks.com/pages/writers-retreat
In the Spotlight –
Author of the Month: Kim Kelln
Kim Kelln is the creator of the Hank Retzer hardboiled PI mystery series. The debut novel in the series is forthcoming, with The Gambling Cowboy and A Simple Case of Infidelity in the works. The Hank Retzer series includes two short stories awaiting publication. Kim also writes short stories and screenplays in a variety of genres.
Kim has written, produced, and directed Bicicles, a feature-length documentary about winter commuting by bicycle in the city, as well as two short narrative films. He co-wrote and co-produced a six-part television documentary about the Langdon Volunteer Fire Department.
In a past life, Kim was — and perhaps still is — a prolific photographer. He has mounted fifteen public exhibitions of his photographs.
Kim currently coordinates and participates in The Fictionists, a novel-writing critique group, but has stepped down from his long-time role as host of the ScriptDreamsYYC screenwriters' discussion group.
Kim lives in Calgary, Alberta, with his patient wife of numerous decades. They are close to two of their children and their two grandchildren. He is a cyclist and, in most cases, prefers two wheels to four. Kim and his wife have recently, and reluctantly, retired from active SCUBA diving in both cold and warm water, but they’re still avid snorkelers.
In real life, Kim is now retired from a career as a data architect and data analyst.
Kim’s short story, The Old Man and the Sea, is published in A Whale of a Tale: Anthology of the Sea, available at filidhbooks.com.
Excerpt of the Month:
(from Missing Singer: A Hank Retzer Mystery by Kim Kelln)
Logline
When PI Hank Retzer is hired to look for the Paradise Club’s missing star singer, he’s drawn into a web of political corruption and a sinister underworld where death is a business. On the run, with a price on his head, can he find her before he’s cashed out?
Dust Jacket Blurb
1956, summer in the City of Angels. Los Angeles is hot, muggy and the smog is putting everyone on edge. Mickey, owner of the Paradise Club, known hangout for mobsters and politicians, has hired PI Hank Retzer to find his star singer. She’s been missing for four days and Hank knows it’s probably a lost cause, made harder by Mickey telling him what not to ask and where not to look. He should have suspected things weren’t kosher when he asked for his premium rate and bills changed hands, no questions asked. After several dead ends, a solid lead steers Hank onto a web of corruption and a sinister underworld where death is a business. Uncovering the criminal enterprise makes him a target with a price on his head. Can he find the missing singer before they cash him out?
Kim’s work is available through his website: http://kimkelln.com
Explore These Literary Events
I. Vancouver Writers Fest - https://writersfest.bc.ca
II. Gibsons Art and Words Festival 2025 - https://gibsonspublicmarket.com/event/art-words-festival-2024-august-22-25/
III. Surrey International Writers Conference - https://www.siwc.ca
IV. Victoria Festival of Authors - https://victoriafestivalofauthors.ca
V. Federation of BC Writers - https://www.bcwriters.ca
VI. Canadian Authors Association - https://canadianauthors.org
VII. Victoria Writers’ Society – http://victoriawriters.ca
VIII. Pride In The Word - https://victoriapridesociety.org/pride-2024/literary/
IX. Denman Island Readers and Writers Festival - https://denmanislandwritersfestival.com/festival-2025/
X. Elephant Mountain Lit Fest – Nelson, BC - https://www.emlfestival.com
XI. Word Vancouver - https://www.wordvancouver.ca
XII. Fraser Valley Book Festival - https://www.fvwritersfestival.com
XIII. Weaving Words Indigenous Writers Festival, Prince George - https://www.weavingwords.ca
XIV. Comox Valley Writers Society - https://cvwriterssociety.ca/conference/2025-north-island-writers-conference/
XV. Whistler Writers Festival - https://whistlerwritersfest.com/
XVI. Wine Country Writers’ Festival - https://wcwfestival.com/
XVII. Word on the Lake - https://wordonthelakewritersfestival.com/
XVIII. Word on the Water - https://www.wordsonthewater.ca/
XIX. Vancouver Island Children’s Book Festival Nanaimo - https://www.vibookfest.ca/
XX. When Words Collide, Calgary, AB - https://www.whenwordscollide.org
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