Heather o'neill husband

Jonathan goldstein
Heather O'Neill (born 1973) is a Canadian novelist, poet, short story writer, screenwriter and journalist, who published her debut novel, Lullabies for.
Heather O'Neill and her daughter @arizonaoneill read and recommend books!!

•

How Heather O’Neill became one of Canada’s best writers

It isn’t really accurate to say that Heather O’Neill, BA’94, emerged out of nowhere when her debut novel Lullabies for Little Criminals unexpectedly won CBC’s Canada Reads competition in 2007.

One of her short stories had already been adapted into a movie by Canadian filmmaker John L’Ecuyer, after all, and she was a contributor to the popular public radio show This American Life.

Still, it is fair to say that her life hasn’t been the same since that fateful Canada Reads win. The victory instantly transformed her into a best-selling author and, to her amazement, the subject of profiles in People and other magazines.

“It really threw me,” she says of the book’s success (it would go on to be a finalist for both a Governor General’s Literary Award and the international Orange Prize for Fiction). “It changed my life in so many radical ways that it was very shocking to me. And I was so worried that somehow it would all be taken away. I had confidence in that book, but I didn’t have confidence in myself yet.”

Fast forwa

•

An interview with Heather O’Neill

The celebrated novelist sat down with our Editor-in-Chief to discuss her published works and an upcoming novel.

Montreal is ripe with celebrated authors, like Leonard Cohen, Mordecai Richler, and Heather O’Neill. On a sunny Tuesday morning in March, following a win on the Canada Reads game show, O’Neill met up with The Concordian to discuss her literary journey.

The Concordian: Thank you again for sitting down with me. Let’s start by learning a little more about you.

Heather O’Neill: I was born here in Montreal and then my parents got a divorce. My mother took me to the American South, which is where she is originally from and I lived there with her for a while. After some years, she decided she didn’t want to be a mother anymore and sent me back to Montreal to live with my father.

TC: I’m so sorry to hear that. Through all that, when did you discover your passion for writing?

H.O.: I remember it started when I was in elementary school. I remember back when I was eight or nine, I got a journal for my birthday. I starte