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Angie Abdou (born 11 May 1969) is a Canadian fiction writer.

Contents 1 Early life and education 2 Career and Awards 3 Bibliography 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Early life and education

Abdou was born in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. She received a B.A. (Hons.) from the University of Regina (Saskatchewan) in 1991, an M.A. (English) from the University of Western Ontario in 1992, and an Ph.D. (English in the Field of Creative Writing and Canadian Literature) from The University of Calgary in 2009. She currently lives in Fernie, British Columbia, Canada and is a college professor at The College of the Rockies (Cranbrook, British Columbia). She lives with her husband, Martin Hafke, and her two children, Oliver and Katherine.

[edit] Career and Awards

Abdou's first collection of fiction, Anything Boys Can Do, was published in 2006 by Thistledown Press. BC Bookworld praised the collection as "an extraordinary literary debut."^[1] The book deals with contemporary heterosexual relationships and addresses topics such as infidelity and miscommunication between the sexes. In The Victoria Times Colonist, Brownen Welch claims that "Abdou confirms for us that the female frame is capable of holding within itself a multiplicity of complications and contradictions."^[2] Welch praises Abdou for finding a nonjudgemental language with which to discuss female sexuality.

Abdou's first novel, The Bone Cage, was published in 2007 by NeWest Press. The novel follows the lives of two Olympic athletes near the end of their careers and explores the connection between body and identity. It immerses the reader into the world of elite athletics in all its vivid and visceral detail. A review in VUE Magazine (Edmonton, Alberta) states: "Angie Abdou's debut novel, The Bone Cage, finds its heart.. daring to question what happens to athletes who put everything else on hold for a chance at the Olympics. [....] What lurks in the shadows of elite athletics is what makes Abdou's follow up to Anything Boys Can Do, a book of short stories, so compelling"^[3] The Bone Cage's themes, though, are also relevant outside the world of athletics. In Canadian Literature a reviewer writes: "The Bone Cage extends past sport, exploring the tentative relationship between people and their bodies. Are we simply prisoners of our own "bone cage," predestined by our body, or can we overcome the limits of our body? Do we even want to overcome our body, or is it simply inseparable from ourselves? The Bone Cage's questioning of an inherent self-body dichotomy reaches out universally, involving not only sport, but also illness and death. Ultimately, because Abdou does not offer concrete answers for these questions, she shows that though the specific relationship between body and self is individualized, our struggle to reconcile them is universal."^[4]

Abdou's newest novel, The Canterbury Trail, originated as a dissertation project at The University of Calgary. It will be published by Brindle and Glass Press in Spring 2011.

The Bone Cage was selected by Kootenay Library Foundation as the feature book for its first annual "One Book, One Kootenay" celebration (launching September 8, 2009) ^[5].

Abdou is an enthusiastic instructor of creative writing who teaches courses and workshops at College of the Rockies, Sage Hill Teen Writing Experience, Write in the Kootenays and The Fernie Writers Conference.

[edit] Bibliography

• Anything Boys Can Do (short stories), 2006, Thistledown Press
• The Bone Cage, a novel, 2007, NeWest Press
• The Canterbury Trail, a novel, forthcoming 2011, Brindle and Glass Press

[edit] References

This article includes a list of references or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations where appropriate. (August 2009)

[edit] External links

• Angie Abdou's Website
• Abdou in the Writers' Union of Canada
• Abdou in BC BookWorld
• Sask Publishers' Review of Anything Boys Can Do
• The Quest for the Gold, article on Abdou in Prairie Books Now
• Search for Embodiment in The Bone Cage, review in Canadian Literature
• The Bone Cage -- the Perfect Companion to the Olympics, Review in Journal of Sport Literature