On October 10th, Octopus Books hosted a sold-out conversation between CBC News Ottawa anchor Adrian Harewood and bestselling author Lawrence Hill. Mr. Hill discussed his latest book “Blood: The Stuff of Life”, which has been included in the 2013 CBC Massey Lectures. This volume offers a provocative examination of the scientific and social history of blood, and on the ways that it unites and divides us today. Lawrence Hill is the son of American immigrants — a black father (Daniel G. Hill, first full-time director of the Ontario Human Rights Commission and founder of the Ontario Black History Society) and a white mother — who came to Canada the day after they married in 1953 in Washington, D.C. Growing up in the predominantly white suburb of Don Mills, Ontario in the sixties, Hill was greatly influenced by his parents’ work in the human rights movement. Much of Hill’s writing touches on issues of identity and belonging. Hill is the author of nine books. His 2007 novel The Book of Negroes (also published as Someone Knows My Name and Aminata) won the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best Book and both CBC’s “Canada Reads” and Radio-Canada’s “Combat des livres”. A television mini series based on the novel is currently in production. For more info on Lawrence Hill and his work visit: http://lawrencehill.com/
Submitted by Sarah Onyango
