Skip to content
Catherine A. O’Toole is a writer and businesswoman living in Canada. She is working on two projects: a novel called DIRTY WORK and a book-length collection of poetry called JUNK STUFF. A number of Catherine’s stories and poems have been published in literary magazines.

Writer CV

2023
  • ACTINIC LIGHT – this story has been selected to appear in Issue 99 of Mslexia as part of the Poison-themed Showcase section (SEPTEMBER 2023).
    This is the fifth “Maddalena” story to be published and my very first one to be placed internationally. I’m very proud. These stories have morphed into a novel (in progress), DIRTY WORK. Writing is adventure.
  • Jericho Writersthe UNWC. Feeling very fortunate, my tutor is Sam Jordison (Galley Beggar Press). This course started in September 2022 and runs until September 2023.
2022
  • CARMEN – this short story appears in The Fiddlehead, Winter Issue, No. 294. (JAN/FEB) 2023.
  • My music recommendation (Bakar!) appears online in The Fiddlehead’s Stop! Look! Listen! section on their website
2019
  • Started writing/developing JUNK STUFF, my collection of linked grief-poems that began in Hoa’s workshop.
2018
  • An autumn 2018 poetry workshop with Hoa Nguyen busted my brain open and poems have been tumbling out ever since. Let’s see what happens next…
2016
  • Galley Beggar Press inaugural Short Story Prize (2015) – I was awarded a special mention (and I cannot overstate how much this means to me). Again, no hyperlink evidence exists but I did save this,

    Galley Beggar Press @GalleyBeggars
    SHORT STORY PRIZE SPECIAL MENTION:
    Catherine O’Toole, ‘Maddalena’
    Jan 8, 2016
    1 retweet 2 likes

2014
  • Quit writing. Started a company, IB TYPE Inc. Women got to work.
2009-2014
  • Novel-writing and pitching (The Light Standard), novel/short-story-writing (Maddalena), pitching some more
    You know the drill…
2009
  • Writers in Paradise – I attended this writers conference at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, FL. Instructor, Dennis Lehane. Lesson learned? End each writing day knowing exactly what needs to happen next.
  • Maddalena – this short story appears in Front&Centre, Issue #21. Black Bile Press, 2009.
  • The Rules – this short story appears in Dandelion Magazine, Issue (34.2). Dandelion Magazine Society, 2009.
2008
  • Maddalenas Beads – this short story appeared in IN MY BED Magazine, Vol. 1, Issue 1, April 2008. But that online-only lit mag has shuttered, and there is no hyperlink evidence to support this writing credit, so – if a tree falls in the forest…
  • A number of my poems were published in Scarborough Fair while I was attending the University of Toronto. SF is the oldest campus literary magazine in Canada.

About

Catherine A. O’Toole is a writer living in Canada. She is working on two projects: a novel called DIRTY WORK and a book-length collection of poetry called JUNK STUFF. A number of Catherine’s stories and poems have been published in literary magazines. A graduate of the Humber School for Writers, she received her BA from the University of Toronto. In 2009, Catherine attended Writers in Paradise. She began her writing life as a poet. Catherine is co-Founder/Director @ibtype Formerly, Catherine worked in the textbook publishing industry, first as a sales representative and, finally, as an Acquisitions Editor with McGraw-Hill Ryerson. In 1992, she left publishing to live in France. She and her husband Ian worked as labourers on a goat farm near the Loire and, later, on an organic vegetable farm in Burgundy. This information is pertinent to the novel she has hiding in her valise…