ARTIST PROFILE
Anita Daher
Anita Daher is grateful for the support of other writers, and for life, which provides her with ample writing material. In fact, a 1999 forest fire sparked her first book, "Flight from Big Tangle", an Orca Young Reader.
When Anita Daher was a young girl, she dreamed of being a writer, but for many years she lacked the confidence to pursue that dream. Writers, for her, were heroes. "Who did I think I was?" she thought. "I certainly wasn't a hero."
In 1995, she left a career in the aviation industry, swept her nerve together into a little pile, and decided to give writing – and her dreams – a chance. She wrote stories set in the unique pockets of Canada for radio, newspapers, and magazines.
In
1999, while living in La Ronge, a small town in northern Saskatchewan,
a forest fire threatened her home, and became the backdrop for her
first book. "It was the most frightening experience of my life,"
she says. "It happened so fast... within an hour, it had incinerated
a subdivision, stranded my husband at the airport, and was pushing
into the community. Perhaps because I moved a few months later,
I never found closure that I hope my neighbours did. The images
stayed vivid in my mind, and I was able to draw on them for this
book."
Anita Daher was born on Prince Edward Island but has lived in many distinct parts of the country, gathering images and experience, and writing about them. Some of her stops include: Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan – home to Al Capone's hidden tunnels; Churchill, Manitoba – known as the polar bear capital of the world; Baker Lake, Nunavut – an Inuit community closest to Canada's geographic centre; Yellowknife, Northwest Territories – self-proclaimed diamond capital of North America; and now Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, on the hip of the Canadian Shield, rich in history and natural beauty.
In her journey toward living her dream, Anita has met some of her
heroes. "All the writers I've been lucky enough to meet assured
me I would get there, just as they did. They made me understand
that we are a community of writers, and by encouraging and supporting
each other, we carry on, and the literary landscape of Canada is
better for it."
Visit Anita on-line at her web site: www.AnitaDaher.com
Back to Profile Archive page