Alexandra Shimo
Teacher Writing Coach Author Journalist
About me
It’s six in the morning as I write this and I’m trying to find a few words that will sum up the career of a 48-year old slightly creaky Gen Xer. (Jesus, am I really that old?)
Here are a few things about me:-
I think it’s really important to be able to play with whatever material you’re dealing with. If it ain’t making you laugh, something must be broken.
I’m not very funny myself. But I’m really good at finding funny people and cajoling them into working with me. Is that you? Please apply within!
Any list should have three items. Three, and thank you to Del La Soul, is the magic number. (Check out their song on this very subject. It’s amazing. Also one of my favourites). But because I”m not funny myself, this list only has two.
One of my personal heroes LL Cool J asked people whom he had just met to call him Todd. Because once that high highfalutin persona entered the mix, once they were dealing with the musician’s list of endless achievements, once conversation started to feel like a recitation of one’s Wikipedia page, whatever creative work was lost, sucked up by that evil sucking drain also called, “Pretension.”
So, you can call me Todd. Or Alex. I prefer Alex.
Teacher
Nothing brings me greater joy than helping my students find their own voices and cutting through the crackly static of publishing to get noticed. I have lectured and taught at many places including Toronto Metropolitan University, Toronto’s Young Voices Arts Festival Program, Saskatchewan Talking Fresh Writing Festival.
Currently I teach Creative Nonfiction, Freelancing the Feature, the Master Class, and Memoir at the University of Toronto Continuing Studies.
Subject Expertise
Journalism, business journalism, broadcast journalism, writing (print, online, television and radio), business writing, feature writing, the art of pitching, decolonizing the curriculum, marketing, business marketing, PR and communications, book publishing, digital and social media marketing.
Student Achievements
My students are brimming with talent and with a little guidance, find their way towards publication. There isn’t enough space to list their many achievements, so I’ve focused on some of the highlights.
Testimonials
-
![]()
“Through the lessons and assignments Alex has given me over the years, I’ve grown from being someone who likes to write into a writer working on her craft with discipline and focus. But the experience of being Alex’s student goes well beyond and far deeper than acquiring skills; it’s a process of personal transformation. With her guidance, I’ve become more curious about the world, more eager to read different books and listen to different thinkers, more willing to interrogate my own ideas and beliefs. I’m not just a better writer because of Alex, I’m a better human being.”
Doctor and Writer Shelly Dev
-
![]()
"Alexandra Shimo is a skilled, dedicated and passionate writing coach who pushes you in the best possible way. She gave me the tools and confidence I needed to do more with my writing while helping me strengthen my magazine pitches. Her coaching style is sharp, encouraging and detail-oriented. With Alex's encouragement, I successfully placed my first book with a publisher. I'm grateful to have had Alex's guidance and know that I benefited from working with her."
Author and Journalist Erin Pepler
-
![]()
“Alex Shimo was the instructor for a Creative Non-Fiction course I took at U.of T. She gave great feedback on our assignments, helping me learn about narrative arc, and how to pitch articles. She also led great discussions about the craft of writing memoir, personal essays and CNF stories. Her passion for her work, and for social justice was evident in her teaching. Her sense of humour and critical lens kept all of us engaged in lively discussions. I had never thought I'd be able to publish my work, but her class inspired me to start pitching and led to my publication in several newspapers and online journals. I felt that it was her encouragement and ambition that helped me hone my work to another level.”
Teacher and Social Worker Elana Moskovich
-
“Alex is an accomplished writer who shares her expertise by fostering a supportive and collaborative environment. I have taken two creative non-fiction courses with Alex. She challenged us to find the confidence to dig deeper, to the core of a subject. That exploration along with her steady technical guidance helped us create better, more vivid writing.”
Former MP and Author Peggy Nash
-
![]()
"I vividly remember Alex's feedback. She would read it out to us each class, taking our stories one by one, in turn. Gracious, generous, kind: she took time, was careful with our work and hearts. Intelligent, incisive, and disciplined: she pushed us to be better writers. Since taking her classes, I've been published and won awards; my successes have been modest, humble, but greatly to her credit."
Kevin Keystone, Writer and Principal The OAK Agency
Writing & Creativity Coach
-
Andrea Werhun is the author of the sex work memoir Modern Whore, published by Strange Light in April 2022.
Erin Pepler is the author of Send Me Into the Woods Alone: Essays on Motherhood published by Invisible Publishing in April 2022.
Peggy Nash is the author of Women Winning Office: An Activist’s Guide to Getting Elected published by Between the Lines 2022.
-
1st Place: Kevin Keystone. American Jewish Press Association Awards. “Hike Challenges One’s Views.”
2nd place: Caroline Neasmith won second place at the 90th Annual Short Story 2022 competition through Reader’s Digest.
-
Award of Recognition. Accolade Global Film Competition. Amanda May. The Scar Runs through The Pupil. 2020.
Best Editing. Hollywood International Diversity Film Festival, CA, Amanda May. The Scar Runs through The Pupil. 2020
Award of Merit. Spotlight Short Film Awards, Atlanta, GA, Amanda May. The Scar Runs through The Pupil, 2019
I didn’t take the usual route to get here. By here, I mean bestselling author whose work has been translated into eight languages, who has won several awards, etc., etc. More than 40 years ago, I was an anxious child, who became an anxious teenager, who became an anxious adult. I pursued the “safe option” with a degree in economics, and a job as a researcher at the CBC.
And I was unhappy. Desperately unhappy. Something inside of me said I needed to write. But how? I hadn't even studied English at high school as I had concentration problems from childhood trauma. It all seemed like one ridiculous, rusty pipe dream.
So before I even started to explore writing, I needed to try to understand the nature of healing. Which is what I did, and do, as I continue to study Buddhist and other healing methodologies with teachers, monks, and elders across North America. These wisdom traditions, I've found, often point to a truth that is just out of reach of our daily realities.
I mention this is because I work with all sorts of people, who are often not where they belong. They have big creative dreams. They know they have something important and meaningful to say. They are just not sure how to bring it into the world.
My job, as your creativity and writing coach, is to help you find your soul voice. It turns out that leaning into what is unique about you, or learning how to bring that onto the page, is really the only thing that it's about. The rest of it--the grants, the awards, the accolades, the publishing deals etc--they fall into place once you are able to fully own your own brilliance.
Is it really that easy? No, it's not easy, because like driving, that's not one skill, but many. But we all have muscle memory, and our imaginations are always more expansive than we first imagined!
One more thing, I only take clients work who have a creative project involving words, and that project must be in service of humanity and the planet.
I really hope that's you.
Love
Alex
PS The first session is free!
Up Ghost River
-
National Bestseller
Finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Non-Fiction
Winner of the CBC Bookie Award for Canadian Non-Fiction
A CBC Best Book of the Year A Hill Times Best Book of the Year
A Quill & Quire Book of the Year
Film development with Northwood Entertainment.
-
“The word ‘courageous’ is often tossed around without much thought, but in the case of Edmund Metatawabin’s residential school memoir, the label fits. . . . While the book’s early chapters unearth horrific memories, Up Ghost River unfolds into an activist’s triumphant story of survival and resistance.” —Quill & Quire (Book of the Year)
“The horror of Metatawabin’s account seem almost unbelievable, but it is all too factual, backed up with official documents. Nor can Canadians dismiss this as a tragedy from a now bygone era; Metatawabin argues that recent legislation from the Stephen Harper government is a continuation of oppression. This work is a harrowing but enthralling account of an aspect of Canadian history that the country would prefer to forget but which continues to haunt.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“The story of surviving the horrors of the residential school experience has been told by so many others. But Edmund Metatawabin’s Up Ghost River is told with such unsettling bravery, in plain, honest language, that this intimate portrait of his childhood resonates longer after the pages are closed.” —Literary Review of Canada
“Up Ghost River arrives at an important time in the ongoing national debate over Canada’s reconciliations with its native communities, adding personal perspective and emotional texture to a debate far too many of us get to see only through an ideological lens. . . . A book that has the potential to be a valuable cultural document. . . . Up Ghost River succeeds in turning one man’s personal account into a telling testament of an entire people’s trials.” —Toronto Star
“A searing memoir about a young boy and the legacy of trauma inflicted on Canada’s First Peoples by the residential school system. A gripping read.” —The Globe and Mail
“This aptly titled, well-crafted book is an especially poignant reminder of the harm [residential schools] caused. . . . By weaving together memoirs and Indigenous cultural practices, the case that [Metatawabin] makes for a louder voice in the country’s political, economic and environmental decisions is cleverly strengthened.” —Winnipeg Free Press
“Shocking, detailed and revealing. It is a story of profound courage, suffering, and an ongoing healing process. Despite the often dark and serious concepts discussed, a surprising humour is present as well. Read this book!” —The Argus
-
Invisible North
-
• Globe and Mail 100: Best Books of 2016
•The Hill Times: Best Books of 2016
•2017 RBC Taylor Prize — Longlisted
• 2017 BC National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction — Shortlisted
• 2016 Speaker's Book Award — Shortlisted
-
“In the complex, elemental and messy business of sharing space, the work can serve as a different on-ramp to discussions about colonization, economic evisceration and shared responsibility for an anti-colonialism movement.
“The author is a good storyteller and the work is accessible and smart. The research is evident and the detail is engaging. Her authentic voice is both informative and challenging.
As a reporter, and an investigative one at that, Shimo grounds her work in responsible journalism. As one with an obligation to present the truth (and to some degree as someone excising the infection that is colonization), Shimo embraces her obligation.”
-Tracey Lindberg, The Globe and Mail
“What begins as a journalist’s journey to discover the roots of a remote First Nations water crisis becomes a gripping first-person account of an outsider’s short but intense experience of the brutal conditions that are daily life for many First Nations communities in Canada. Shimo’s time in the northern Ontario Kashechewan reserve—a place that drew international attention in 2005 for abominable living conditions—serves as a microcosm of the obstacles First Nations face when the catch-22s of Indian Act provisions stunt economic development and condemn successive generations to despair and suicide rates that are among the highest in the world…Her work can be painful to read, but, like other literature on reconciliation, it’s a necessary contribution to addressing age-old wrongs.”
-Starred review, Publisher’s Weekly
“The appalling community dynamics she encountered soon took its toll: within four months she had unspooled, physically and mentally, and was back in Toronto, where she pulled herself together and made two subsequent trips. Her account of her experiences is part memoir, part gripping expose, wholly unforgettable.”
-Sarah Murdoch, Toronto Star
“Alexandra Shimo’s Invisible North: The Search for Answers on a Troubled Reserve combines memoir and investigative journalism into a must-read for every Canadian. Few non-indigenous Canadians have any understanding of how reserves work and Shimo opens our eyes through first-hand experience and exploration of reserve history and the Indian Act…. The time for Canadian ignorance regarding northern reserves is over. Our re-education can begin with this book.” -Barbara Romanik Winnipeg Free Press
“This book is an intimate and rare portrait of a place where the people are pushed to their
-La Semaine
“Out of her pain came this book one that I would recommend to anyone who is interested in the plight of Canada’s Indigenous peoples.”
-National Post
-
Environment Equation
-
Published by:
Adam’s Media (United States)
New Holland Publishers (UK);
Éditions Caractère (French Canada);
Mo Media; (Netherlands);
Oceano (Spain);
Sinais de Fogo (Portugal);
WSOY (Finland);
Tourbillon (France)
Didakta (Slovenia);
Eesti Paevaleht (Estona);
Libretto (Norway)
-
Journalist
Returning to Canada after studying journalism at Columbia University on academic scholarship, I went to work as a producer at the CBC for shows such as The Current (radio), Sounds Like Canada (radio), Newsworld (television), and The National (television). I then worked as an editor at Maclean's, Canada's largest current affairs magazine.
Currently, I freelance for The Guardian (London), Longreads (US), The Independent (London) , The Walrus, The Globe and Mail, Toronto Life, and many others.
Here are some of my articles:
The Globe and Mail: Discrimination against the Neurodivergent: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-lets-stop-treating-the-neurodivergent-as-second-class-citizens/
Broadview: Can Universal Basic Income solve Canada’s Declining Fertility: https://broadview.org/author/alexandra-shimo/
Walrus and the Science of Late Blooming lesbians: https://thewalrus.ca/author/alexandra-shimo/
The Globe and Mail: After my annus horribilis, I'm questioning the future of the nuclear family, The tomato rules at Iceland’s Fridheimar, a fresh take on farm-to-table restaurants, We need to help students learn how to overcome their anxiety
Broadview: Can Universal Basic Income solve Canada’s declining birth rate? Is Canada ready to play its part in the global climate refugee crisis? This Manitoba city proved that universal basic income changes lives – so why isn’t available for all Canadians? Every Christmas, my chosen family makes a promise
Today’s Parent: My kid didn't feel like two moms were enough—so we created "project queer”
Hazlit: The Scars to Prove It: “In the mid 2000s, new programs made it seem like Canada might finally reckon with the toxic legacy of residential schools. Less than 10 years later, they’re going broke and forgotten. Sounds familiar.”
The Guardian (UK): Are sexual abuse victims being diagnosed with a mental disorder they don't have.
Toronto Star: How many children were killed? Indigenous people need truth before reconciliation.