As a midfielder for the Point Grey Legends, Alan Twigg wrote Full-Time: A Soccer Story (Douglas Gibson Books, McClelland & Stewart, 2008), a year-long account of how a team of Vancouverites travel to southern Spain and test themselves against European ex-professionals who turn out to be much younger, faster and stronger. The "soccer poor" Canadians are a mixed bunch with little chance of winning. The narrative frequently questions the nature of sport and how competitiveness can breed contempt. There are more than 800,000 registered soccer players in Canada but Full-Time is a rare literary investigation of the beautiful game from a Canadian perspective.

As well, he co-founded the B.C. Book Prizes in 1985 and he served as its executive director and chief fundraiser during a rebuilding stage in the 1990s, remaining as an advisor for another five years. He has also founded, and coordinated from 1992 to 2005, the VanCity Book Prize for best B.C. book pertaining to women’s issues. He founded, and has coordinated since 1995, British Columbia's annual George Woodcock Lifetime Achievement Award for an outstanding literary career in British Columbia. In 2004 he co-founded the George Ryga Award for Social Awareness, which he continues to support. He also coordinated the City of Vancouver Book Prize for five years and has organized various events to honour the province’s senior writers, including a series of events for and about British Columbia’s most prolific man of letters, George Woodcock.

Among the six documentary films he has written, produced and hosted are George Woodcock, Anarchist of Cherry Street; Jeannette Armstrong: Knowledge-Keeper; and Spilsbury’s Coast; which aired nationally on CBC. Other subjects have included Eric Nicol, Peter Trower and the B.C. Book Prizes. He hosted a CBC television series about B.C. authors and he frequently serves as a host for public events. He has been a contributor to books about Leonard Cohen, Robertson Davies, Margaret Atwood, Matt Cohen, the Georgia Straight and other anthologies. He has contributed to many publications such as Quill & Quire, BC Historical News, Georgia Straight, Globe & Mail, Toronto Star, Ottawa Citizen, Maclean's, Vancouver Sun, Step and Pacific Northwest Review of Books. From 1995 to 1998 he was an editorial page columnist for The Province.

In 2000, Alan Twigg was named the first recipient of the Gray Campbell Distinguished Service Award for outstanding contributions to literature and publishing. He received the first and only ABPBC Media Award in 1988, given for similar work. His first book of literary history, Vancouver & Its Writers, was shortlisted for the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize in 1987. First Invaders was shortlisted for the same award in 2005, the same year he won First Prize in the Lush Creative Non-Fiction contest, sponsored by subTerrain magazine. His award-winning memoir about the death of his father was re-published in The Utne Reader.

He was a founding board member of the Canadian Centre for Studies in Publishing and he has taught classes at the Simon Fraser University, University of British Columbia, University of Victoria and various high schools. He has served on the City of Vancouver's Public Art Committee and he has hosted many literary events that include Simon Fraser University’s third annual Symposium on the Novel at the Wosk Centre for Dialogue in 2004. In 1999 he coordinated a fundraising campaign for the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, an organization he continues to support.

In 2007, he organized and hosted Reckoning 07, a conference on the past and future of British Columbia writing and publishing, held at Simon Fraser University in conjunction with the 20th anniversary of BC BookWorld. In 2009, he hosted the 25th annual BC Book Prizes gala.

He created, writes and edits a public reference service about more than 9,000 British Columbia authors, hosted by Simon Fraser University, at www.abcbookworld.com.

BOOKS

Tibetans in Exile: The Dalai Lama & The Woodcocks (Ronsdale 2009).
Full-Time: A Soccer Story (Douglas Gibson Books, McClelland & Stewart 2008).
Thompson's Highway: British Columbia's Fur Trade, 1800-1850 (Ronsdale 2006).
Understanding Belize: A Historical Guide (Harbour 2006).
Aboriginality: The Literary Origins of British Columbia (Ronsdale 2005).
First Invaders: The Literary Origins of British Columbia (Ronsdale 2004).
101 Top Historical Sites of Cuba (Beach Holme 2004).
Intensive Care: A Memoir (Anvil Press 2002).
Cuba: A Concise History for Travellers (Harbour 2004; Penguin Books 2002; Bluefield Books 2000).
Twigg’s Directory of 1001 BC Writers (Crown Publications 1992).
Strong Voices: Conversations with 50 Canadian Writers (Harbour 1988).
Vander Zalm, From Immigrant to Premier: A Political Biography (Harbour 1986).
Vancouver and Its Writers (Harbour 1986).
Hubert Evans: The First Ninety-Three Years (Harbour 1985).
For Openers: Conversations with 24 Canadian Writers (Harbour 1981).

Contributor to Uncommon Ground: A Celebration of Matt Cohen (Knopf 2002), Take This Waltz: A Celebration of Leonard Cohen (The Muses Company 1994), Margaret Atwood, Conversations (Firefly 1990) and Conversations with Robertson Davies (University Press of Mississippi 1989), and others.

FILMS

Alan Twigg has produced, written and/or hosted the following:

For CBC Television, British Columbia

-- George Woodcock: Anarchist of Cherry Street
-- Eric Nicol: Look Back in Humour
-- Peter Trower: The Men They Were Then
-- Jeannette Armstrong: Knowledge-Keeper of the Okanagan

-- Spilsbury's Coast, about the life and times of pioneer entrepreneur and author Jim Spilsbury, which was televised nationally on CBC in 1992.

-- "And The Winners Are...", a film about B.C.'s book industry, aired on Knowledge Network, British Columbia.