Contributor: Jean Van Loon Jean Van Loon is an Ottawa-based writer of fiction and poetry, whose first poetry collection, Building on River, was a finalist for the Ottawa Book Award.

“Jean Van Loon shapes a poem with scientific precision. This cohesive collection explores the half-life of familial love set against the unimagined consequences of our species’ nuclear achievements. Heart-rending and thought-provoking, Nuclear Family asks us all what we can learn from the wrong end of time.” Ottawa Book Award jury --- “Relying on careful research and individual memory, Van Loon expertly weaves together the threads of household life with cultural moment… The seeming ease with which these poignant associations are made is jarring and disturbing but effective, forcing the reader to contemplate the everyday reproduction of atomic bombs and the subsequent lingering effects.” H-Net --- “The memoir is heartbreaking, the history sobering and the poetry that encases both—making the music and emotion of Nuclear Family come to life—is crafted with exquisite care.” Arc Poetry Magazine --- “Brave and carefully wrought, Nuclear Family is a rich, measured, language-spurred depiction of a Cold War childhood, thoughtfully summoning memorable detail within the precarity of historical tensions and family tragedy.” David O’Meara