The Jewish Book Festival presents Toronto’s Danila Botha

Join us as Danila Botha shares her debut graphic novel, Vidal, winner of the 2026 Canadian Jewish Literary Award for Graphic Literature.

Through Chagallian vignettes, she follows the life of her great uncle Vidal, from his Sephardic upbringing in Tiberias (Ottoman Empire and then British Mandate Palestine) to his engineering studies in Haifa, to his artistic life in Paris to his work with the underground resistance, to his time in Auschwitz. Vidal captures the culturally rich Sephardic Jewish experience and illuminates the untold stories of family, hope, freedom, and what their pursuit can cost.

Sunday, November 29 | 2:00 pm
Paperny Family JCC

Free admission! Reserve your seats online.

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Danila Botha is the author of four short story collections, including the forthcoming Sleepwalking Too Close to the Fire (Guernica Editions, 2027). Her short stories have been nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize, named a finalist for the Montana Prize, and selected for Best Short Fictions. She has written two novels: Too Much On the Inside (2015), which was optioned for film, and A Place for People Like Us (2025).