Experience a moving celebration of truth, imperfection, and emotional bravery as Tanya Boteju and Léa Taranto read their bold, boundary-pushing YA fiction. Boteju chronicles queer self-discovery in a Catholic high school with humour and heart. Taranto offers a gut-wrenching, compassionate portrait of a teen in psychiatric treatment, battling OCD and finding hope in community.

Location: Sunroom, UBC Robson Square

Type: Fiction, Young Adult (YA)

Readers: Tanya Boteju, Messy Perfect (HarperCollins Canada) | Léa Taranto, A Drop in the Ocean (Arsenal Pulp Press)

About The Readers

Tanya Boteju

TANYA BOTEJU lives on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations (Vancouver, BC). Part-time, she teaches English to clever and sassy young people. The rest of her time, she uses writing as an excuse to eat pastries. Her debut novel, Kings, Queens, and In-Betweens, was named a Top Ten Indie Next Pick by the American Booksellers Association. Her second book, Bruised, was selected as a Gold Standard book by the Junior Library Guild. Tanya’s latest YA novel, Messy Perfect, combines issues of faith, sexuality, and friendship, and her first middle grade nonfiction book, Allyship as Action, arrived in August 2025. Look for her first adult romcom in 2026! In both her teaching and writing, Tanya hopes she’s bending the universe even the tiniest bit toward justice. Visit her at tanyaboteju.com.

Léa Taranto

Léa Taranto is a disabled Chinese Jewish Canadian writer who lives with OCD and comorbid disorders. An MFA graduate of the University of British Columbia, alumnus of Simon Fraser University Writer's Studio, and member of PRISM International's poetry board, she resides on traditional, unceded Halkomelem and Squamish territories in BC. Her writing has been published in the anthologies Emerge 20, Upon a Midnight Clear: More Christmas Epiphanies and in various Canadian literary journals. A Drop in the Ocean is her debut novel.