Congrats to Karolyn Smardz Frost, whose compelling work of narrative non-fiction Steal Away Home: One Woman’s Epic Flight to Freedom – And Her Long Road Back to the South is the winner of the 2017 Speaker’s Book Award. The Honourable Dave Levac, Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, made the announcement during a ceremony at the Ontario Legislature on March 5th, 2018. Steal Away Home will be featured at the Legislative Library, and available for purchase at the Legislative Assembly Gift Shop.
A beautiful review for a beautiful book! Quill & Quire gives a starred review to Bloom: A Story of Fashion Designer Elsa Schiaparelli authored by Kyo Maclear and illustrated by Julie Morstad.
We’re delighted to announce that Yak and Dove author Kyo Maclear has received the 2017 IODE Ontario Jean Throop Book Award. The award encourages excellence in Canadian children’s literature and is presented to an illustrator or author who resides in Ontario. Previous IODE Jean Throop Book Award winners include Dennis Lee, Barbara Reid, Kenneth Oppel, Chris Hadfield, and Terry and Eric Fan.
Kyo Maclear’s Birds Art Life and Kim Fu’s The Lost Girls of Camp Forevermore are on the Markham Reads 2018 shortlist! Markham Reads is an annual celebration of books, ideas, and community. For the seventh year running, they’re encouraging everyone in Markham to connect with new ideas and with one another by reading the same book. Programs and events related to the winning book will take place in July and August 2018.
Jamil Jivani, author of Why Young Men, joined Matt Galloway on CBC’s Metro Morning to discuss his new memoir and why young men turn to violence and radicalization. Listen to the interview here.
Congratulations to Alisa Smith, whose novel Speakeasy is on the UK-based Walter Scott Prize Academy’s recommended reading list for 2018. The list of 20 books includes historical novels from across the UK, Ireland, and Commonwealth countries.
We’re thrilled for Roz Nay, whose debut thriller Our Little Secret has been receiving fantastic reviews.
The thriller has also popped up on Us Weekly‘s list of Four Killer New Thrillers, Entertainment Weekly‘s 20 New Books to Read in April, and BookBub‘s list of 26 Books Like Gone Girl Coming in 2018.
The movie adaptation of Richard Wagamese’s novel Indian Horse, which boasts Clint Eastwood as Executive Producer, has been called, “so much more than just another Canadian movie” by Maclean’s. To read the full review, click here.
David Chariandy’s second novel Brother takes place in Scarborough, Ontario but the prize-winning work of fiction has grabbed the attention of critics across the pond. The Gaurdian‘s Dina Nayeri calls it, “an exquisite novel, crafted by a writer as talented and precise as Junot Díaz and Dinaw Mengestu. It is elegant, vital, indubitably dope – the most moving book I’ve read in a year.” In The Observer, Arifa Akbar calls the novel “A breathtaking achievement … a compulsive, brutal and flawless novel that is full of accomplished storytelling with not a word spare.”
We are thrilled for David Chariandy whose novel Brother won the 2018 Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize.
Chariandy grew up in Toronto and lives and teaches in Vancouver. His debut novel, Soucouyant, received stunning reviews and nominations from eleven literary awards juries, including a Governor General’s Literary Award shortlisting, a Gold Independent Publisher Award for Best Novel, and the Scotiabank Giller Prize longlist. Brother is his second novel.