Tag Archive: Warren Kinsella

Warren Kinsella Biography

— 11.14.2020 09:57 AM

[By popular request.]

Warren Kinsella is the president of Daisy Group. Previously, he was a partner at the law firm of McMillan Binch, in its Public Policy Group, and has also worked as a consultant, journalist and political Chief of Staff. He is a musician and a painter, unmarried, and father to three amazing children.

Warren received a Bachelor of Journalism (Honours) from Carleton University and his law degree from the University of Calgary; he has also completed executive education courses at Harvard’s law school and its school of business.

From 1990 to 1993, Warren held the position of Special Assistant to the Rt. Hon. Jean Chrétien, leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. In addition, from 1993 to 1996, Warren served as Chief of Staff in a number of federal ministries.

In 2003, 2007, and 2011 he was Chairman of the War Room in the successful Ontario Liberal Party election campaigns; federally, he managed the Liberal Party of Canada’s War Rooms in 1993 and 2000. Most recently, he helped oversee the 2018 winning campaign of Toronto Mayor John Tory. In 2020, he worked in several states on the victorious Biden-Harris campaign.

Warren is an award-winning author and journalist and has assisted clients on a wide variety of communications, strategic and regulatory matters. His legal practice focuses on administrative, Indigenous and governmental affairs. He has been the lead of Daisy Group’s Indigenous practice since the firm’s founding.

Warren is a former member of the executive of the Ontario Bar Association and has sat on the communications committee of the Canadian Bar Association. For several years, he has been an adjunct professor at the University of Calgary’s Faculty of Law.

Warren has been a columnist with the Ottawa Citizen, National Post, Hill Times and Postmedia media chain, and is a columnist for the Sun. He published his best-seller, The War Room: Political Strategies for Business, NGOs, and Anyone Who Wants To Win, in 2007. His book Fight the Right is being republished by Random House in 2021. His third book in the X series, Age of Unreason, was released in December 2019.

This is his tenth book and a follow up to 2017’s bestselling and critically-acclaimed Recipe for Hate and 2018’s New Dark Ages.


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Publishers Weekly: Recipe for Hate “riveting…an unflinching page-turner”!

— 07.08.2018 07:09 AM

Publisher’s Weekly is the book trade publication in the United States.  As Wikipedia notes, it is the “American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, “The International News Magazine of Book Publishing and Bookselling”.

And I have never had one of my books mentioned in it.  Like, ever.

But here’s what they have said about my new one, Recipe for Hate:

“Riveting…Tension starts high and stays there in this unflinching page-turner, which offers a fascinating glimpse into the early punk scene and a moving testament to the power of friendship.”

Link is here.

Quill and Quire, now Publisher’s Weekly.  If you are so inclined, feel free to order your copy (or copies!) here and here!


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Review: Recipe For Hate “a complex, multilayered mystery”!

— 05.23.2018 01:13 AM

“The Canadian Review of Materials is published weekly from September through June and is an all-volunteer online publication which features reviews of books and other materials that are authored, illustrated and/or published by Canadians and that are produced for/of interest to children and adolescents. CM’s reviewers are teachers, teacher-librarians, public librarians and university professors…”

And here’s what they say about Recipe For Hate in their review!

“[Recipe For Hate is] a complex, multilayered mystery that highlights the energy and passion of youth while pointing a finger at issues like police misconduct, irresponsible journalism and the rise of the alt Right.”

Not bad! Other reviews, to date, are below:

  • Quill and Quire: “Kinsella skillfully blends convincing depictions of both the punk scene and the racist underground with the hoary trope of a band of kids setting out to solve a mystery. The novel is a suspenseful page-turner that also gives considerable food for thought, anchored in realistically drawn characters and an eye for significant detail.” 

  • Publisher’s Weekly: “Adult author Kinsella (Fight the Right) sets this riveting murder mystery in Portland, Maine, in the late 1970s…Tension starts high and stays there in this unflinching page-turner, which offers a fascinating glimpse into the early punk scene and a moving testament to the power of friendship.”

  • Globe and Mail: “Portrayals of rebellious and non-conforming teens can feel reductive or contrived but Kinsella nails it without any stereotyping or embellishment. Though this authenticity will have big teen appeal, the novel is also part police procedural, part detailed history on the emergence of punk and part gritty murder mystery, all elements that skew more adult. Classification aside, it’s absorbing, jarring and raw.”

  • Toronto Star: “Warren Kinsella is known mostly as a political operative and pundit, but he also has estimable punk-rock credentials (as punk historian and as bass player in SFH, which bills itself as Canada’s best-loved geriatric punk band). This YA novel is loosely based on real-life events, and concerns the murder of two teenagers in 1979 in Portland, Ore., then the epicentre of the punk scene. It will be of interest to anyone interested in punk culture — not just the music, but the fanzines, art and writing of the period.”

  • Booklist: “Kinsella’s book explodes off the page from the start…a dark and engrossing tale of punk-rock heroes fighting for justice.” 


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Recipe for Hate in Quill and Quire: “suspenseful page-turner”!

— 02.03.2018 10:39 PM

Quill and Quire has published, online and elsewhere, their review of Recipe For Hate.  Here’s what they have to say:

  • “Kinsella skilfully blends convincing depictions of both the punk scene and the racist underground…”
  • “The novel is a suspenseful page-turner that also gives considerable food for thought, anchored in realistically drawn characters and an eye for significant detail.”
  • “…its significance to contemporary life and social schisms is powerful and impossible to ignore.”
  • “…Kinsella captures the political underpinnings of the [punk] movement – a surprising reminder of hope in these dark days.”

You can get your copy of Recipe For Hate  here and here. Meanwhile, the book tour hits Montréal next month!


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New Dark Ages, now

— 02.01.2018 01:36 PM

I just returned from a major book fair at the Metro Convention Centre – and, whilst I was there signing copies of Recipe For Hate (Humblebrag Alert: we ran out of copies), I saw this for the first time, in Dundurn’s 2018 catalogue:

What’s it about? Well, it’s about to get me in a lot of trouble, I reckon. It’s the most controversial book I’ve ever written, I’d say. (And it’s the second instalment in the X Gang trilogy.)  Recipe For Hate has been well-received – as seen here and here and here – and I’m hoping New Dark Ageswill be, too.

Pumped.  Now, back to writing the final book in the series.


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Globe and Mail: Recipe For Hate “shines…Kinsella nails it…absorbing, jarring and raw”!

— 12.28.2017 09:18 AM

Wow! This is a great way to end 2017.

And, I am honoured. The Globe and Mail has reviewed Recipe For Hate – and they like it! Their review:

Recipe for Hate

by Warren Kinsella

Dundurn, 304 pages, $14.99

Warren Kinsella’s many professions include author, political strategist and commentator. Is YA author now on the list? Yes and no. Kinsella’s latest book is published for teens and, in many ways, shines as a book for mature younger readers. It focuses on two teenage best friends – Kurt Blank and X – leaders in Maine’s burgeoning 1978 punk scene. When their friend is brutally murdered outside of a club, it’s the beginning of a very dark, violent time for Kurt, X and their punk crew. Portrayals of rebellious and non-conforming teens can feel reductive or contrived but Kinsella nails it without any stereotyping or embellishment. Though this authenticity will have big teen appeal, the novel is also part police procedural, part detailed history on the emergence of punk and part gritty murder mystery, all elements that skew more adult. Classification aside, it’s absorbing, jarring and raw.


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