• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Welcome
  • Manuscript Consultation and Workshops
  • Book Club Freebies
  • News & Events
  • Reviews
  • Contact
  • Buy Always Brave, Sometimes Kind
Katie Bickell

Katie Bickell

Author, Instructor, Manuscript Consultant

Always Brave, Sometimes Kind

Warm and Gritty, Well-Defined and Utterly Complicated.

Winner of the 2021 Indie Project Award for Alberta.

Winner of the 2021 Georges Bugnet Award for Fiction.

Shortlisted for the 2021 ReLit Award for Novel.

Learn more

Author, Instructor, Manuscript Consultant

Katie Bickell


Katie Bickell is the author of Always Brave, Sometimes Kind.

Always Brave, Sometimes Kind earned the 2021 Georges Bugnet Award for Fiction, and was shortlisted for the 2021 ReLit Award for Novel. Earlier versions of the novel’s chapters received the Alberta Literary Award’s Howard O’Hagan for Short Story, The Writer’s Guild of Alberta’s Emerging Writer Award, and The Alberta Views Fiction Prize.

Katie lives in Sherwood Park, Alberta, with her husband and daughters, where she is currently penning her second novel, Alskling. Katie frequently teaches creative writing courses and offers manuscript consultation to emerging writers.

Learn more
Reviews
Awards
Events

Let’s write.

Subscribe to stay in touch

Don’t worry, I won’t blow up your inbox (I’m far too disorganized to send mail that consistently). But if you’d like to receive the odd love letter when I’m feeling sentimental or be in the know when I’m offering new courses, consider signing up. Of course, those on the email list will be the first to know when Askling is launched (well, after the messy but loveable folks I live with, anyway).

Sign up for the email list

Services


Manuscript Consultation

Bring your story to its strongest draft.

Learn more

Workshops and Courses

Develop your craft with group instruction.

Learn more

Author Readings and Speaking

Join me to explore inspiring literature.

Learn more

Send Me a Letter

    Latest from the Blog

    Upcoming Course “From Crafting to Completion: A Short Story Intensive”

    While there is no one way to write a short story, there are ways to make its creation a thing of beauty and creative fulfilment. And whether you are just diving into short story writing,…

    Continue Reading Upcoming Course “From Crafting to Completion: A Short Story Intensive”

    Work with Katie in the Alexandra Writers’ Centre Society 2021/22 Author Development Program

    Meet the 2021 Alberta Literary Awards Finalists

    Celebrating ABSK’s ReLit Awards Shortlist

    More on the blog

    With Many Thanks

    I acknowledge the support of both the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and The Canada Council for the Arts.

    Membership

    I am proud to be a member in good standing with the  Writers’ Guild of Alberta and The Writer’s Union of Canada

    katiebickell

    Visit me on instagram!

    katiebickell
    In March I shook off my pandemic funk. A trip to C In March I shook off my pandemic funk. A trip to Cuba brought me back to life and I made an intention to harness the energy. This morning I met my goal, five months in the making.

I wanted to feel strong again. I have a very vivid memory of the best I’ve ever felt: in this memory, I am 26. At this time I was still nursing my youngest daughter, and training for a half marathon. It was an unremarkable day, but, in this memory, I am running and the sun is at my back. I can see my shadow in front of me, and I can feel the way my ponytail swings behind me. I’m on Cloverbar road, just in front of the firehall. What I can’t feel are my legs: I’ve just crossed 7K and my mind has turned off from that part of my body. They’re doing their work but from my perspective, I just feel like I’m flying.

In March, I realized how badly I wanted to go back there to that moment of freedom - or at least try to. Although I’ve been a daily long distance walker for years, I didn’t know if I could still run and hadn’t tried but for a kilometre or so about once a year (usually around my New Years resolutions lol). Worst, this time last year I partially tore my Achilles’ tendon, an injury that had me on crutches and sunk any confidence I had in my physical strength.

But this time I took myself seriously. I started a “Dream Big, Start Small” program on the @runkeeper app, and then signed onto the #trainwithrunkeeper #myfirst10k program once it had completed. Today I finished the program and ran for a full hour - something I haven’t achieved in the last decade! 

It’s been a hard won win: tendon pain, plantar fasciitis, then knee pain, and now piriformis pain I’m treating with massage and yoga. A spring and summer of ice packs, Tylenol, wraps, and liquid glucosamine and turmeric gummies. But today I made it to that moment: full freedom, flying.

Not a full 10K (yet), but the end of the Runkeeper program, and 60 minutes running: no stop, finishing strong ❤️
    Maybe some luck is coming this way 🍀 Maybe some luck is coming this way 🍀
    Chloe’s first soccer game ⚽️ For those of yo Chloe’s first soccer game ⚽️ For those of you without preteens at home, this look means “stop embarrassing me, Mom.” 

Just kidding, all the looks mean that.
    For all the truth about how hard mean girl dynamic For all the truth about how hard mean girl dynamics can be (and are) at their age, the best part of being a girl is having that one girl beside you. #girlhood #thisisten #besties
    20yrs old: “I sleep in my contact lenses all the 20yrs old: “I sleep in my contact lenses all the time! Just doesn’t affect me! Weird right?”
36yrs old: “I looked at my computer screen for 15 minutes before remembering to switch into glasses and now I can’t blink.” 
#sandpapereyes #amwriting #blindasabat
    #spring2020 #stillsnowing #april2020 #alberta #sto #spring2020 #stillsnowing #april2020 #alberta #stopsnowing #amwriting
    🎶I want a home with a crowded table, and place 🎶I want a home with a crowded table, and place by the fire for everyone 🎶 

Forgot to take photos of our “home with a crowded table” during a beautiful Easter dinner, but so loved stretching the holiday out over three days dyeing #pysanky with @lisasana, @liv.nich, Brynn, Caily, and Chloe. We used various teas along with beet powder and turmeric to make dye on Friday night and drew with the wax from tea light candles on Saturday and every night girls ran to and from our homes under the warm weekend’s full moon. The kids had such fun blowing the eggs that (thank goodness) we moms didn’t have to 😂 

#easterphotodump #eastereggs #pinkmoon #springsnow #homemadedye #easter2022 #crowdedtable #plantyourgarden #romantisizeyourlife
    Instagram post 17957270350683206 Instagram post 17957270350683206
    A surprise gift from my 10 year old niece 🐣🌸 A surprise gift from my 10 year old niece 🐣🌸💞 @lisasana you make pretty sweet kids 🥰
    Woke at 3am and couldn’t get back to sleep. Reor Woke at 3am and couldn’t get back to sleep. Reorganized the living room as quietly as possible instead. Willow managed to sleep through it 🐾
    I like my hair’s natural texture, but I don’t I like my hair’s natural texture, but I don’t give it enough love. Usually I straighten or blow dry or curl it away before I have to do anything “professional” or “in public” or “normal” but the kids and I call it my witchy hair and when it’s like this I feel most me. Tonight I’m teaching a writing class and students will develop plots as wild as my waves. Death to styling tools (at least today anyway).
    It is -12 degrees Celsius, and flurries in the nig It is -12 degrees Celsius, and flurries in the night left snow on the ground. But F’s tomato seedlings have sprouted so, you know, hang in there… 🌱 ❄️ 🍅 🌸
    Load More Follow on Instagram

    Copyright © 2023 · Katie Bickell