From Vancouver’s waterfront paths to mountain trails, this reading brings together two writers attuned to the rhythms of landscape and movement.
Bill Arnott explores the city’s shoreline walks with curiosity and insight in A Perfect Day for a Walk by the Water, while bronwyn preece shares poems shaped by journeys through wild and changing terrain in hiking beyond. Together, they offer an afternoon of storytelling and poetry that traces how place is experienced through attention, motion, and presence.
Location: C420 UBC Robson Square
Type: In Conversation, Reading
Moderator: Anna Eastland
Readers: Bill Arnott, A Perfect Day for a Walk by the Water: Exploring Vancouver's Shores (Arsenal Pulp Press) | bronwyn preece, hiking beyond: poems from the trail (Caitlin Press)
About The Host
Anna Eastland
Anna Eastland is the author of unexpected blossoming: a journey of grief and hope and velvet flame: the poetry in life after loss. Finding solace in nature in the midst of kid chaos is a common theme in her work. She is a contributor to various poetry and prose anthologies, and is the author of a WWII short story in Dutch, the Magazine, based on her step-dad’s youth in Holland. As V.P. of the Delta Literary Arts Society, she leads monthly writing circles and open mic’s for writers. Anna loves helping people find their voices almost as much as she loves going out dancing with her fellow authors. For her latest adventure, she’s working on her first novel, a psychological thriller with Sterling and Stone Studios.
About The Readers
Bill Arnott
Bill Arnott is the BC Book Prize bestselling author of the Perfect Day Walks, the Season memoirs, and the award-winning Gone Viking travelogues. For his expeditions he’s been named Fellow of Britain’s Royal Geographical Society and serves as Ambassador for Canadian Geographic and Adventure Canada. Bill also writes for numerous magazines and presents for universities, TV and radio. When not trekking Bill can be found around B.C. where he lives on Coast Salish land.
bronwyn preece
dubbed the ‘backcountry poet’, bronwyn holds a PhD in performance. she is the author of knee deep in high water : riding the Muskwa-Kechika, expedition poems (Caitlin Press, 2023); and with Simply Read Books Sea to Sky Alphabet (2023); Gulf Islands Alphabet (2012) and the forthcoming Canadian Rockies Alphabet (2026).
