Reading & Book-Signing with Alice Irene Whittaker
Argo Bookshop, Canada, H3H 1M2
Thursday, January 16 2025
Join us in store for a reading and book-signing with author Alice Irene Whittaker, for her debut book, Homing: A Quest to Care for Myself and the Earth. This event is free, but space is limited, so please RSVP on TicketSource. Masks are not required, but will be provided for free at the door.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Homing is a memoir about abandoning an exhausting commuter lifestyle to move to a cabin in the woods, embracing imperfection while cultivating a life of care for self and nature.
Alice Irene Whittaker was addicted to productivity, perfectionism, and discipline. She was used to rushing between multiple jobs, her demanding ballet training, and volunteering for social justice causes, making sure that every single moment of her day was accounted for. But then she finds herself as a new mother, commuting four hours a day into the city and exhausted by the state of the world and paralyzed by climate guilt and anxiety. Something has got to give. Overnight, Alice Irene and her husband decide to retreat to a cabin in the woods, in search of a new kind of life.
Surrounded by creek, meadow, and forest, Alice Irene begins a new lifelong journey of repairing her fractured relationship with both herself and the natural world. Dismantling a history of anorexia, obsessiveness, and workaholism, she decides to stop taking and start caretaking. But how can she take care of nature if she cannot treat herself with care?
Braiding together her personal journey with the stories of others who are tending to the Earth, Alice Irene Whittaker has crafted a lyrical, relatable memoir about regeneration and moving from a life of despair to a life of care.
Searching for the spaces between the sorrow of wildfires and the beauty of wildflowers, Homing is about returning home to our bodies, geographies, communities, and place, all as a part of nature.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alice Irene Whittaker is an author and environmental communications leader. Her debut book Homing was published in Fall 2024 from Freehand Book.
Alice Irene is the creator and host of the Reseed podcast. She has been published in national and international publications. She was longlisted for the CBC Nonfiction Prize in 2021 and the CBC Poetry Prize in 2022.
Alice Irene has spent over a decade in communications leadership and executive roles, with a focus on gender and environment. She co-founded, and was Executive Director of, Mother Nature Partnership. Alice Irene is a member of Nature Canada’s Women for Nature and sits on the Board of Directors of Régénération Canada. Awards include the Nelson Mandela and Graca Machel Award, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Innovation Award.
Alice Irene is the mother of three young children. With her family of five and brood of chickens, three cats, and a dog, she lives in a cabin in the woods on unceded Algonquin Anishinaabe land in Québec.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Homing is a memoir about abandoning an exhausting commuter lifestyle to move to a cabin in the woods, embracing imperfection while cultivating a life of care for self and nature.
Alice Irene Whittaker was addicted to productivity, perfectionism, and discipline. She was used to rushing between multiple jobs, her demanding ballet training, and volunteering for social justice causes, making sure that every single moment of her day was accounted for. But then she finds herself as a new mother, commuting four hours a day into the city and exhausted by the state of the world and paralyzed by climate guilt and anxiety. Something has got to give. Overnight, Alice Irene and her husband decide to retreat to a cabin in the woods, in search of a new kind of life.
Surrounded by creek, meadow, and forest, Alice Irene begins a new lifelong journey of repairing her fractured relationship with both herself and the natural world. Dismantling a history of anorexia, obsessiveness, and workaholism, she decides to stop taking and start caretaking. But how can she take care of nature if she cannot treat herself with care?
Braiding together her personal journey with the stories of others who are tending to the Earth, Alice Irene Whittaker has crafted a lyrical, relatable memoir about regeneration and moving from a life of despair to a life of care.
Searching for the spaces between the sorrow of wildfires and the beauty of wildflowers, Homing is about returning home to our bodies, geographies, communities, and place, all as a part of nature.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Alice Irene Whittaker is an author and environmental communications leader. Her debut book Homing was published in Fall 2024 from Freehand Book.
Alice Irene is the creator and host of the Reseed podcast. She has been published in national and international publications. She was longlisted for the CBC Nonfiction Prize in 2021 and the CBC Poetry Prize in 2022.
Alice Irene has spent over a decade in communications leadership and executive roles, with a focus on gender and environment. She co-founded, and was Executive Director of, Mother Nature Partnership. Alice Irene is a member of Nature Canada’s Women for Nature and sits on the Board of Directors of Régénération Canada. Awards include the Nelson Mandela and Graca Machel Award, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Innovation Award.
Alice Irene is the mother of three young children. With her family of five and brood of chickens, three cats, and a dog, she lives in a cabin in the woods on unceded Algonquin Anishinaabe land in Québec.
