A reading by two award-winning Canadian writers will take place at 5 p.m. Saturday, May 26, at Vashon Bookshop.

The reading, organized by Vashon Poet Laureate Merna Ann Hecht, will feature British Columbia’s Poet Laureate, Rachel Rose, and novelist Gurjinder Basran.

Rose’s works have been appeared in publications, including “The American Poetry Review” and “The Best American Poetry.” Her 2012 book, “Song & Spectacle,” won the Audre Lorde Poetry Award in the United States and the Pat Lowther Award in Canada.

She was the librettist for “When the Sun Comes Out,” Canada’s first lesbian opera, which grappled with fundamentalism, homophobia and forbidden love.

She is also the winner of a 2014 and 2016 Pushcart Prize and received a fellowship to the prestigious International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.

Along with Rose’s activism and poetry, she has authored a non-fiction book, “The Dog Lover’s Unit,” describing her journey through four countries following the work and stories of canine law enforcement units.

Basran’s debut novel, “Everything Was Good-bye,” was the winner of the BC Book Prize and the Ethel Wilson Fiction Award. It was also named as a Chatelaine Magazine Book Club pick in 2012.

Her second novel, “Someone You Love Is Gone” (2017), is the story of immigration, taking place over more than three generations, of a family that has migrated from Pakistan to India to Canada.

As in her first book, the story addresses the grief of South Asian families leaving their homelands and has been described as “a deeply moving story of the generational memory and loss that are part of the complexity of forced migrations and immigration.”