Take a look at this petition and do sign. But also, click through the signatures. There are many people who have taken the time to write about their family and personal experiences under Communism.

Hope to see you there!!

Call Me Aram will be published in the fall of 2008. Here’s the cover:
Aram Davidian, like his fellow orphaned Armenian refugees, is delighted with his new home on a farm in Georgetown, Ontario. But despite the excitement his new surroundings, Aram worries about his young friend Mgerdich, who was injured on the long trip to Canada and is recovering in France. And what is more worrying is that he and the other boys have been assigned new English names. How will their extended families find them one day if all the boys have new identities? Even when their translator assures them that their hosts want only the best for the boys, Aram cannot accept the name David Adams. When Mgerdich finally arrives at the farm, a relieved Aram finds the courage to lead the boys in a gentle revolt. Together, they must find a way to convince the Canadians adults that the boys, as grateful as they are for their new lives, they cannot forget their old ones. They must keep their names.

Here.

President of Ukraine honours local author

Elizabeth Yates
Brantford Expositor – 24 May 2008 

City author Marsha Skrypuch hopes to snatch a few words with Ukrainian president Victor Yushchenko when he gives her a state honour at a ceremony in Toronto on Wednesday.Skrypuch will receive the Order of Princess Olha, Class III: the highest honour the country bestows on foreign citizens. The medal recognizes her books about the 1932-1933 Ukrainian famine, which killed up to 10 million people. The award comes on the 75th anniversary of what Ukrainians call Holodomor: meaning death by hunger.

Since her award was announced in February, Skrypuch has been waiting to hear when the honour would be bestowed. The date is now confirmed for a 9:30 a.m. reception at the Old Mill Inn and Spa.

About 600 people, mostly from the Ukrainian community, are expected to attend, says Skrypuch, who will be accompanied by her husband, Dr. Orest Skrypuch, and other family members.

Meeting Yushchenko – on his first visit to Canada – will be a thrill. She wants to tell him how much she admires the reforms he has brought to the country where her paternal grandfather was born. “He’s my hero,” she says, citing Yushchenko’s role in the 2004-2005 Orange Revolution, which introduced free elections to Ukraine.

Yushchenko also helped draw attention to the famine and to the fate of Ukrainians during the Holocaust.

“His father was an Auschwitz survivor,” says Skrypuch. “People don’t realize that Ukrainians and Poles died along with the Jews.

“He’s a symbol of all that being acknowledged.”

A writer of award-winning books for children and young adults, Skrypuch has carved a significant career crafting fiction from the facts of historic atrocities.

In 2000, she wrote Enough, a picture book based on a folktale about a young girl’s attempts to save her village from starvation during the Ukrainian famine. The Holodomor also inspired her story called The Rings, published in Kobzar’s Children, a 2006 anthology of Ukrainian-Canadian writings which she also edited.

I have been awarded the Order of Princess Olha, by Victor Yushchenko, President of Ukraine.

The state awards of Ukraine are the highest form of honor of the citizens for outstanding achievements in development of economy, science, culture, social sphere, defense of Motherland, protection of man’s constitutional rights and freedoms, state building and public activity, for other services before Ukraine. The state awards are set exclusively by the laws of Ukraine.

The citizens of Ukraine, foreigners and stateless persons may be decorated with the state awards.

Decorating is conducted by the decree of the President of Ukraine. The recipient gets the state award and the document which certifies decorating thereof.

– the Order of Princess Olha of I, II, III class – to honor the women for distinguished services in state, production, public, scientific, educational, cultural, charity and other spheres of public activity, bringing up children in family

The “bringing up children in family” is an interesting addendum.

And here is what the medal looks like:

Here is the cover for Daughter of War, which is coming out in May:

This is the sequel to Nobody’s Child and The Hunger. Here’s the dustjacket blurb:

Teenagers Kevork and his betrothed Marta are the lucky ones. They have managed so far to survive the Armenian genocide in Turkey, and both are disguised as Muslims. But Marta is still in Turkey, pregnant with another man’s child. And Kevork is living as an Arab in Syria.

Kevork yearns to get back into Turkey and search for Marta, but with the war raging and the genocide still in progress, the journey will be impossibly dangerous. Meanwhile, Marta worries that even if Kevork has survived and they are reunited, will he be able to accept what she has become? And what has happened to her sister, Mariam, who was sold as a slave to the highest bidder?

Daughter of War is a gripping story of enduring love and loyalty set against the horrors of Turkey during World War I.

Good news for Aram!

Aram’s Choice and its sequel, Call Me Aram, are being made into a theatrical production and it will be staged at the Georgetown Little Theatre in May 2008.

I am thrilled about this because the Armenian orphans featured in both of my books were raised at an orphanage in Georgetown Ontario. My stories are being adapted by the children who will play the varous roles, with help from producer Sam Hancock.

And the timing is awesome. Call Me Aram comes out in May 2008, as does Daugher of War.

The other neat thing is that Aram’s Choice has been nominated for the Golden Oak Award.

The Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association

cordially invites you to the Toronto launch of

Marsha Skrypuch’s newest novel:

Prisoners in the Promised Land:

The Ukrainian Internment Diary of Anya Soloniuk

Spirit Lake, Quebec, 1914

(Scholastic Canada)

when:

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

7:00 PM

where:

The Library

Royal Canadian Military Academy
426 University Ave.

(South of Dundas on the WEST side of University Ave.
St. Patrick Subway Station)

Books will be available for sale and autograph. Proceeds donated to UCCLA

for further information, contact pr@uccla.ca

The plaque unveiling and book launch was awesome! The day before the launch/unveiling, there was a huge article in the Montreal Gazette about the Ukrainians of Point St. Charles who were interned during WWI as enemy aliens. Lots of good quotes and some poignant photographs. The article was written by Monique Polak, a fellow CANSCAIPer and all-round awesome person. I’d like to get her to join kidcrit but she’s way too busy!

Here’s a bit about Monique.

Since getting back from Montreal, I’ve been working on Roxolana, albeit still very slowly. I’m expecting the edits for Daughter of War any day now and am looking forward to plunging in. Maybe that will jumpstart Roxolana.

I also saw the cover for Daughter of War. It is STUNNING! I can hardly wait to show it off!

You are cordially invited to attend the unveiling of the commemorative plaque recognizing the many kindness shown by the YMCA to our people recalling the imprisonment of Ukrainians and other Europeans as “enemy aliens” during Canada’s first national internment operations of 1914-1920.

The plaque will be installed at the YMCA: Centre-Ville / Downtown Centre YMCA 1440 rue Stanley, Montreal, Quebec, on Saturday, 29 September 2007, at 11:00 a.m.

Immediately following the plaque unveiling, there will be a:

Book Launch of

Prisoners in the Promised Land
The Ukrainian Internment Diary of Anya Soloniuk
by
Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
Reception to follow