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Amber Dawn

b. 1974

Canadian writer

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About Amber Dawn

Born 1974. Amber Dawn is a Canadian novelist, writer, poet, autobiographer and docent.

Amber Dawn is a Canadian writer, who won the 2012 Dayne Ogilvie Prize, presented by the Writers' Trust of Canada to an emerging lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender writer.

A writer, filmmaker, and performance artist based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Dawn published her debut novel Sub Rosa in 2010. The novel later won that year's Lambda Literary Award for LGBT Debut Fiction, Lesbian. In 2013, she released a new book of essays and poems entitled How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler's Memoir. The book was a shortlisted nominee in the Lesbian Memoir/Biography category at the 26th Lambda Literary Awards, and won the 2013 City of Vancouver Book Award.

Dawn was also an editor of the anthology Fist of the Spider Woman: Tales of Fear and Queer Desire, a nominee for the Lambda Literary Award for Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror in 2009, and co-editor with Trish Kelly of With a Rough Tongue: Femmes Write Porn. In 2017, she rejoined the Vancouver Queer Film Festival as co-artistic director with Anoushka Ratnarajah.

She served alongside Vivek Shraya and Anne Fleming on the Dayne Ogilvie Prize jury in 2013, selecting C. E. Gatchalian as that year's winner.

Her novel, Sodom Road Exit, was published in 2018. It was shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction at the 31st Lambda Literary Awards in 2019.

In 2020 Dawn and Justin Ducharme received a Lambda Literary Award nomination for LGBTQ Anthology at the 32nd Lambda Literary Awards, as coeditors of Hustling Verse: An Anthology of Sex Workers' Poetry.

In 2021, her poetry collection My Art Is Killing Me was shortlisted for the Jim Deva Prize for Writing that Provokes.

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Important facts

Born
1974, Fort Erie
Birth century
Nationality
Awards
Lambda Literary Award; Dayne Ogilvie Prize

People in Amber Dawn's life

Named in this biography and alive at the same time

Contemporaries

People whose lives overlapped Amber Dawn's

Frequently asked questions

Who is Amber Dawn?

Canadian writer

When was Amber Dawn born?

Amber Dawn was born in 1974 in Fort Erie.

What is Amber Dawn's occupation?

Amber Dawn is a novelist, writer, poet, autobiographer and docent.

What nationality is Amber Dawn?

Amber Dawn is Canadian.

Sources & further reading

· Wikipedia: Amber Dawn

· Wikidata: Q4741233

· DBpedia: Amber Dawn

Cite this page

APA: Biography.guide. (2026). Amber Dawn. https://biography.guide/amber-dawn/

MLA: "Amber Dawn." Biography.guide, https://biography.guide/amber-dawn/.

Chicago: "Amber Dawn." Biography.guide. https://biography.guide/amber-dawn/.

Data last updated: 2026-09-21 · Spot an error? Report a correction.

Portrait: Wikimedia Commons · author & licence

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