Jessica Kluthe - Rosina, the Midwife

Edited by Linda Goyette

Thousands of newcomers are pouring into Alberta from around the globe, bringing unexpected gifts. Many are writers and storytellers.

What pulls them to Canada? What happens to them on the journey? What experiences have they deliberately left behind? What treasures do they bring? How do they describe their emerging sense of place and their creative aspirations in a new home?

In this moving collection of stories and poems, writers from around the world share their thoughts on creating a life in Alberta. Expressed with beauty and clarity, and sometimes translated from the writer's native tongue, these very personal accounts of joy and sadness, regret and humour, homesickness and exuberance, describe the defining moments of a departure and an arrival.

Contributors to The Story That Brought Me Here include Jalal Barzanji, Edmonton's first Writers in Exile; Rita Espeschit, Thuc Cong, Mohammed Al-Nassar, Monika Igali, Sabah Tahir, Therezinha Franca Kennedy, Sangmok Lee, Sudhir Jain, Yi Li, Athiann Makuach Garang, Marsh Hoke, Tortor Maruku, Reinekke Lengelle, Brian Brennan, A.K. Rashid, June Smith-Jeffries, Magdalena Witkowsky, Anna Mioduchowska, Ikponwosa I.K. Ero and Comfort Adesuwa Ero, Wilma Rubens, Patricia Lopez de Vloothduis, Neung-jae Park Mary Cavill, Mansoor Ladha, Chantal Hitayezu and many others. With photographs by Shabnam Sukhdev.

JESSICA KLUTHEs work has appeared in numerous literary publications including The Malahat Review, The Writers Block, Little Fiction, and Notebook Magazine. Recently, Kluthe won the Other Voices creative non-fiction contest for an excerpt from Rosina, the Midwife. In 2011, she was shortlisted for the Alberta Writers Guild James H. Gray award for the first chapter of this book. She received her MFA in writing from the University of Victoria. Kluthe is a writing instructor at Grant MacEwan University in Edmonton, Alberta, and is at work on a novel. Visit Jessica online at jessicakluthe.com and follow her on Twitter @jessicakluthe.

migrations arrows over oceans that chart the direction of movements

Young Rose spotted airplanes, flying low, over their farm. The massive grey planes, the first aircraft shed ever seen, were like heavy, metal birds. Aside from the hum in her ears, the only proof Rose had seen of them was the trail of smoke lining the blue sky. She ran to the shed, where Rosina stood in the doorway, hand to forehead, looking up. Nanni Rosina explained that they were warplanes. At age six, all Rose knew about the war was that cousin Francesco had left Calabria to fight in it, but she didnt dare ask after himlast time shed mentioned his name, shed sent his mother, her aunt, into a crying fit. Rose imagined the airplanes zooming over the ocean, whooshing around the Earth and back, and wondered why so many neighbours had taken ships across the ocean when people could fly so much faster. She didnt dare ask about that eitherleaving the village was a topic left to the adults. Shed heard stories about enormous navy ships. Four years earlier, in 1940, a naval battle had occurred off the Calabrian coast in the waters where shed since dipped her toes. A British squadron and Italian squadron fired at one another, until, after much damage, Italy claimed victory.