TORONTO — It’s been a banner week for Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize finalist Gil Adamson.
The Writers’ Trust announced on Wednesday that the Toronto author’s sophomore novel, “Ridgerunner,” published by House of Anansi Press, is one of five books up for the $50,000 honour.
Adamson’s western-meets-mystery also secured a spot on the Scotiabank Giller Prize short list on Monday.
The Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize winner will be named at a virtual event on Nov. 19. Each finalist receives $5,000.
Acclaimed writer Thomas King from Guelph, Ont., is among the authors vying for the literary prize with his anti-travelogue “Indians on Vacation,” from HarperCollins Publishers.
Also in the running are debut novelists Maria Reva, Michelle Good and Zsuzsi Gartner.
Vancouver-raised, Texas-based Reva, who received the RBC Bronwen Wallace Award for Emerging Writers in 2018, has graduated to the big leagues with a nomination for her novel-in-stories set in Soviet-era Ukraine, “Good Citizens Need Not Fear,” published by Knopf Canada.
Good, a Cree writer and lawyer, earned a nod for “Five Little Indians,” from HarperCollins Publishers. The book follows a group of residential school survivors grappling with their traumatic pasts while trying to forge new lives in Vancouver.
Gartner, Vancouver-based author of the 2011 Giller-nominated short story collection “Better Living through Plastic Explosives,” is being recognized for her long-form talents in “The Beguiling.” Published by Hamish Hamilton Canada, the gothic-inflected read centres on a lapsed Catholic thrust into the role of confessor for strangers’ sins.
The short list was selected by a jury composed of writers Elisabeth de Mariaffi, Waubgeshig Rice and Yasuko Thanh. Organizers say 123 titles from 61 publishers were submitted for consideration.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 7, 2020.