Joanne Latimer
Writer | Journalist
Joanne Latimer is an award-winning writer based in Montreal
About ◦ Book ◦ Awards ◦ Journalism ◦ Copywriting
About
This left-handed fusspot has a master’s degree in art history, but I haven’t let it go to my head. I love authors like Gary Shteyngart and comics like Gary Gulman. My favourite writers include Sally Rooney, Miriam Toews, Heather O’Neill, Roddy Doyle, A. L. Kennedy, Fintan O’Toole, Frank McCourt, Colin Bateman, Charlie Kaufman, Michelle Gallen, Alexandra Fuller, Mark Abley, Kevin Barry, Louise Kennedy and many more.
Book Project
Me: “How big is Northern Ireland?”
Mom: “Ach–you could tuck it under your arm and keep walkin’.”
Follow me here, as I expand a feature I wrote for The Montreal Gazette into a travel memoir.
Making a Show of Yourself is part travel memoir, part political notepad. It’s about a summer abroad, when the most important thing in my backpack was a U2 t-shirt. This coming-of-age story sends up my naïveté about the Troubles. What starts as a wild crush on Bono ends up in Belfast, before the ceasefire. But this is not a rebel song. My people are the other kind of Irish, the Irish Protestants who insist on being part of the British empire. Their Republican neighbours in the North, often Catholic, want to join the Irish Free state in the South. The only thing they agree on is teatime. The book is a comedic romp through Belfast as I try to dodge the social and political landmines while struggling to reclaim my Protestant heritage. But it’s equally a story of hope—about how a war-weary nation made tentative peace with neighbours so seemingly alike to the outside world.
Previous coverage of Northern Ireland includes:
A mecca for whodunits that’s really dunit
Maclean’s
Something A Can of Paint Can Fix?
Maclean’s
Beatlebone by Kevin Barry
Maclean’s
5 Best Martini Bars in Belfast
Ottawa Citizen
Montreal Fest Spotlights Emerald Isle
The Globe and Mail
Berlin, and its last Jews, during wartime
Maclean’s
Warrior Matron
The Montreal Gazette
The Other Kind of Irish
Montreal Gazette
Awards
2019 Quebec Writers’ Federation Mentorship Program Winner | 2014 Canada Council for the Arts Writer’s Grant Winner, Category Nonfiction | 2010/2009 Canadian National Magazine Award Nominee/Winner | 1992 Helena Rubinstein Foundation Scholarship Winner, Paid Internship | Winner of the Helena Rubinstein Foundation Internship at MoMA
Journalism and Communications
Agonizing over the thread count of bed linens, a lifestyle writer’s work is never done. There are always more hotels and books to review, more art, film and fashion to follow.
Bravely, I step forward.
Working as a book reviewer, film critic, lifestyle writer and arts reporter, I have been widely published. Topics range from cocktail trends to poetry collections. Personal highlights include meeting Picasso’s maid, discovering a typewriter museum in San Francisco, writing an ode to iceberg lettuce, and giving the side-eye to my first GPS.
The National Magazine Awards have been kind to me, bestowing two nominations and one win.
Copywriting
Thriving in deadline-driven environments, I write fundraising proposals, press releases, web text, video scripts, social media, annual reports and campaign copy. My specialization is lifestyle branding—travel, luxury goods—leveraging my eight years with FASHION magazine to writing about products and trends.
Clients include universities, tech startups, shipping companies, real estate developers, fashion designers, restaurants, beauty brands, sports brands, furniture icons and department stores.
Contact
Send me a message through this form or—even better—find me on social media. I look forward to hearing from you.
P.S. If you’re feeling friendly, tell me about the last book you read!
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