All of Karen Hines' plays have been collected and published by Coach House Books. She has been honoured with two Alberta Writers Guild Awards, and a nomination for the Governor General’s Award for Drama. All are available through Coach House Books, Pages, Amazon.com and others.
DRAMA: Pilot Episode
Now available on Coach House Books in paperback or digital. DRAMA: Pilot Episode
Hines is superb at depicting in a few words the despair of people who feel forced to live lives bereft of meaning … I can't imagine a person in the Western world who would be left untouched by the great drama of souls Hines creates here. (Alberta Views)
Hello...Hello
Available on Coach House Books in paperback or Ebook (PDF). Hello...Hello
The momentum and perspicacity of this inventive play is evident on the page. It is also obvious why Hines is lauded as one of the nation's premier dramatists.
– Eye Weekly, Hello...Hello
The Pochsy Plays
Available on Coach House Boooks paperback or Ebook (PDF). The Pochsy Plays
'Whether she's sending up loneliness and love or shallow ambition
and greed, Hines's satire is dead-on ... Along with Hines's illuminating,
intelligent introduction to the character and her style, photos
and performance stills provide readers a fair sense of Pochsy's
stage effect.'
– Border Crossing
Essays, excerpts, short plays and articles
From an imaginary pitch for an impossible tv show, to a twenty-minute musical about suicidal telemarketers, Hines' essays, excerpts, short plays and articles have been included in a number of literary anthologies and magazines, with more to come. Watch here for a full library, coming some time soon....
DRAMA: Pilot Episode by Karen Hines
When a troubled young television writer hangs himself with his Banff Television Festival conference lanyard, urgent spirits creep up through the fracks, and connections are drawn between pregnant oil wives, the 44-minute television hour and the future of the human soul. A deep dark comedy for all souls, set in Canada's wild new west.
Drama does what drama does best – holds up a mirror to the audeince and makes them think their individual concerns are part of a larger drama being played out in the world. I can't imagine a person in the Western world who would be left untouched by the great drama of souls Hines creates here. – Alberta Views
See the collected reviews and features on "Drama" HERE
Hello... Hello (A Romantic Satire) by Karen Hines
Karen Hines's genre-defying 4-person play with songs has been presented at Toronto's Factory Theatre and Tarragon Theatre, and was a multiple Dora, Chalmers and Canadian Comedy Award nominee, as well as winner of the 2007 Alberta Writers Guild Award for Drama.
In the vast, unnamed metropolis of Hello … hello, art and commerce have finally and completely conjoined; stylish cafés serve up zebra mussels and the air is thick with a gentle rain of sparrows plummeting down from the mirrored office towers. Everywhere, people are falling for an edgy new fashion accessory: a shiny ball filled with poison that hangs from a delicate chain...
From the reviews:
The momentum and perspicacity of this inventive play is evident
on the page. It is also obvious why Hines is lauded as one of the
nation's premier dramatists.'
– Eye Weekly
A deliciously dark slice of urban whimsy ... who else [but Hines]
could take the horrible image of birds crashing into mirrored skyscrapers
and plummeting to their deaths and imbue it with such melancholy
charm?
– Books in Canada
With influences as diverse and seemingly mismatched as Greek
tragedy and mid-century Hollywood musicals, Karen Hines's latest
satire is a bizarrely compelling work.
– Quill & Quire
For a list of Book Reviews: Go Here
For synopsis and more information on "Hello..Hello": Go Here
To order “Hello…Hello” go here:
WEB: Coach House
Books
EMAIL: mail@chbooks.com
Other sources: Pages Book Store (Toronto) | TheatreBooks (Toronto) | Amazon.ca
The Pochsy Plays by Karen Hines

Finalist for the 2004 Governor General’s Award for Drama; Winner of the 2005 Alberta Writers Guild Award for Drama; Finalist for Chalmers Award for best play. Also nominated for six Dora Awards; Dora Award for performance. Now in its second printing.
Beckett meets Betty Boop in this trilogy of monologues by Canadian cult heroine Pochsy. In The Pochsy Plays, Hines remodels and melds traditions like stand-up, absurdism, clowning and neo-cabaret to create some of the most original and cutting satire to hit the stage - and, now, the page. Pochsy garbles ad slogans, self-help mantras and desperate grabs at meaning into a postmodern pastiche that is hilarious and harrowing, sweet and bitter at the same time. With extensive photos, musical scores by Greg Morrison, the collaboration of director Sandra Bacovskeand an introduction by Darren O'Donnell.
From the reviews:
'This beautifully produced collection is a valuable record of
Hines's work ... The Pochsy Plays is a welcome record of a unique
creation that should also allow this cult figure to become more
widely known.'
– Letters in Canada
'Whether she's sending up loneliness and love or shallow ambition
and greed, Hines's satire is dead-on ... Along with Hines's illuminating,
intelligent introduction to the character and her style, photos
and performance stills provide readers a fair sense of Pochsy's
stage effect.'
– Border Crossing
Pochsy is a startling and original character: smart, bitter,
hopeful, savage – and terribly funny. Hines has created a
weirdly familiar world where the hurt arrives a single heartbeat
after the joke."
– From the GG Nominations Page
To read a Review from Canadian Literature: Go Here
For a list of Book Reviews: Go Here
For synopsis and more information on "Hello..Hello": Go Here
Buy the book online or on foot at:Coach
House Books (Toronto)
Theatrebooks (Toronto)
Pages Books (Toronto)
Pages on Kensington (Calgary)
McNally Robinson (Calgary)
Biz Books (Vancouver)
Chapters/ Indigo (Canada)
Amazon Canada (On-line only)
The Pochsy Plays - Media Contacts:
Toronto: Alana Wilcox Coach House Books, 416 979
2217, or alana@chbooks.com
National Magazine Award-winner for her Swerve Magazine pieces "The One Hundred Thousand Dollar Boyfriend" and "My Little House of Horrors," Hines has contributed everything from an imaginary pitch for an impossible tv show, to a twenty-minute musical about suicidal telemarketers. Her essays, excerpts, short plays and articles have been included in the following:
Swerve Magazine
Coach House Books' State of the Arts | The Brick Literary Journal | Geist | Border Crossings
As well as in anthologies such as Snappy Shorts at Tarragon Theatre and Taking the Stage and Actors Theatre of Louisville's Heaven and Hell on Earth