Mouthful of Bees comes from Quinn's own experience as someone who both provides and uses mental health and addiction services. The collection moves between personal, communal and mythical experiences of madness to obliterate the idea that recovery is a tidy or linear event. These pieces ask us to be unflinchingly honest with how we care for each other and our environment. They ask us to be patient with each other and our inevitable mistakes while prodding at society's uncomfortable relationship with forgiveness. Finally, they challenge us to welcome resilience in all of its' messy and awkward iterations.

Shannon Quinn is the author of Questions for Wolf (Thistledown Press) and Nightlight for Children of Insomniacs (Mansfield Press). Her poetry, short fiction, and creative nonfiction have appeared in literary journals in Canada, the US, and the UK including Room, subTerrain, THIS, Maisonneuve, ARC, Grain, The Malahat Review, CV2 and Prairie Fire. She has worked as a writer and producer for CBC Radio One. Quinn currently works for The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto.

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