Michael Fraser, Joseph Kakwinokanasum, Kasia Van Schaik among authors shortlisted for 2023 ReLit Awards
The ReLit Awards honour the best Canadian books published by independent presses
Books by Canadian authors Michael Fraser, Joseph Kakwinokanasum and Kasia Van Schaik are among the 39 titles up for consideration for the 2023 ReLit Awards.
The 2023 awards are divided into three categories: novels, poetry and short fiction. The prize is known for their long shortlists. The winners will be announced on Friday, Sept. 29.
Founded in 2000 by Newfoundland filmmaker and author Kenneth J. Harvey, the ReLit awards were created to honour the best titles released from independent presses in Canada. The awards are now run by Harvey's daughter, Katherine Alexandra Harvey.
After 23 years, the ReLit Awards announced a hiatus on Sept. 12 as the organization continues to seek new funding opportunities.
"We are encouraged to see that independent presses now have a higher profile, and hope that we have played some small part in that good news," she said.
Several of the past literary prize winners have been published by independent presses, including Suzette Mayr, Joshua Whitehead and Nicholas Herring. Last year, Mayr won the 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize for her novel The Sleeping Car Porter, which was released by independent book publisher Coach House Books. Whitehead's Jonny Appleseed won Canada Reads 2021, which was championed by Devery Jacobs.
Jonny Appleseed was published by independent press Arsenal Pulp Press, and was also longlisted for the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize. Some Hellish by Herring won the 2022 Atwood Gibson Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, a novel released by Goose Lane Editions.
The awards will be put on hiatus after the 2023 Relit Awards until further notice, according to Harvey.
On the shortlist for the novel category this year includes Cree-Austrian writer Joseph Kakwinokanasum for My Indian Summer. The coming-of-age story addresses themes of reconciliation, identity and survival, and follows 12-year-old Hunter who has been left on his own in Red Rock, with occasional care coming from a trio of elders and his two best friends.
Set during the summer of 1979, My Indian Summer explores intergenerational trauma, and the realization that some villains are also victims. My Indian Summer is Kakwinokanasum's debut novel.
Kakwinokanasum is a member of James Smith Cree Nation and a writer based in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia. He received a Canada Council for the Arts creation grant for Aboriginal peoples, writers and storytellers in 2014.
His short story Ray Says was a finalist for CBC's 2020 Nonfiction Prize. In 2022, Kakwinokanasum was one of five writers nominated for the 2022 Canada Trust Rising Stars. He was also published in the anthology, Resonance: Essays on the Craft and Life of Writing in early 2022.
Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah is another title on the novel shortlist. Set in 1986, Lebanese immigrant Muna Heddad has left her country's civil war behind as a widow with her son to Montreal. Nasrallah tells the tale of her struggle to overcome the challenges of immigration, which he based loosely on his mother's own story.
Nasrallah was shortlisted for the CBC annual book debate, Canada Reads, earlier this year. The novel was championed by Gurdeep Pandher. Hotline was also named one of the best works of Canadian fiction in 2022 by CBC Books, and longlisted for the 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize.
LISTEN | Dimitri Nasrallah on making the Canada Reads longlist:
Nasrallah is a writer from Lebanon who lives in Montreal, and works as the fiction editor at Véhicule Press. Other works of his include the novels The Bleeds, Niko and Blackbodying.
Here are the novel titles shortlisted for the 2023 ReLit Awards:
Category: Novel
- Fearnoch by Jim McEwen
- Good Girl by Anna Fitzpatrick
- Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah
- The Second Substance by Anne Lardeux
- Junie by Chelene Knight
- Possessed by Jowita Bydlowska
- Tear by Erica McKeen
- Querelle of Roberval by Kevin Lambert
- Wonder World by K.R. Byggdin
- The Wards by Terry Doyle
- My Indian Summer by Joseph Kakwinokanasum
- A Kid Called Chatter by Chris Kelly
Fraser is on the poetry shortlist for his collection The Day-Breakers. The Day-Breakers captures the selflessness of Black soldiers who fought during the American Civil War, which included hundreds who were African-Canadian. It tells the tale of their experiences fighting, paying homage to their struggles and their victories.
Fraser is based in Toronto and was the winner of the 2016 CBC Poetry Prize. He has published poetry collections The Serenity of Stone and To Greet Yourself Arriving.
Other titles on the 13 book poetry shortlist include Infinity Network by Jim Johnstone, who won 2nd Prize for the 2008 CBC Poetry Prize and was on the 2012 CBC Poetry Prize longlist, and Vox Humana by Adebe DeRango-Adem.
Here is the complete poetry shortlist:
- Pronounced/Workable by Candace de Taeye
- Vox Humana by Adebe DeRango-Adem
- Brat by Sophie Crocker
- Blood by Tyler Pennock
- The End Is In The Middle by Daniel Scott Tysdal
- But The Sun, And The Ships, And The Fish, And The Waves by Conyer Clayton
- The Affirmations by Luke Hathaway
- Dream Of Me As Water by David Ly
- The Day-Breakers by Michael Fraser
- Infinity Network by Jim Johnstone
- First-Time Listener by Jennifer Zilm
- Learned by Carellin Brooks
- Flyway by Sarah Ens
Van Schaik's story collection We Have Never Lived on Earth is on the short fiction shortlist.
We Have Never Lived on Earth explores the female experience in a world that is threatened by ecological crisis through transforming and intimate moments. It follows the journey of Charlotte Ferrier, a child of divorce who is being raised by a single mother after moving from South Africa to a small town in British Columbia.
The short story collection is also longlisted for the 2023 Scotiabank Giller Prize.
Van Schaik is a South African poet and writer based in Montreal and was named a CBC Quebec Writers' Federation writer-in-residence in 2021. Van Schaik holds a PhD in literature from McGill University, where she teaches creative writing. She was also a finalist for the 2017 CBC Short Story Prize for The Peninsula of Happiness, and made the 2021 CBC Nonfiction Prize longlist for An Ounce of Care.
Alberta-based writer Darcy Tamayose is on the short fiction shortlist for Ezra's Ghosts, a collection of fantastical stories set in a quiet prairie town called Ezra. The lives of residents intersect through past and present – whether it is the scholar writing home from the Ryukyu islands, the oldest man in town, or a seeker of truth who has become trapped there after her violent death. Their narratives are connected by grief, language and culture.
Ezra's Ghosts was a finalist for the 2022 Atwood Gibson Writers' Trust Fiction Prize, and a finalist for the 2023 George Bugnet Award for Fiction. The short story collection also won the 2023 Silver Medal for the Independent Publisher Book Awards for Short Story Fiction.
Tamayose is also the author of Odori and YA book Katie Be Quiet.
Among the 14 writers on the short fiction shortlist are Francine Cunningham for God Isn't Here Today and Elaine McCluske for Rafael Has Pretty Eyes. Cunningham was featured on the 2022 CBC Poetry Prize longlist while McCluske was on the 2019 CBC Short Story Prize longlist. Brent Van Staalduinen, who was on the 2020 CBC Short Story Prize longlist, also made the short fiction shortlist for Cut Road.
Here are the short fiction titles shortlisted for the 2023 ReLit Awards:
Category: Short Fiction
- Bodies In Trouble by Diane Carley
- Shimmer by Alex Pugsley
- Rafael Has Pretty Eyes by Elaine McCluskey
- World Naked Bike Ride by Lisa Fishman
- Taobao by Dan K. Woo
- Gaiety by Peter Abbot
- God Isn't Here Today by Francine Cunningham
- Cut Road by Brent Van Staalduinen
- All The Shining People by Kathy Friedman
- Ezra's Ghosts by Darcy Tamayose
- I Am Claude François And You Are A Bathtub by Stuart Ross
- We Have Never Lived On Earth by Kasia Van Schaik
- Ferry Back The Gifts by Kate Story
- Grin Reaping by Rod Carley
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
