The shortlist for the Carol Shields Prize has been announced, with five books in the running for the award that honors “exceptional writing from women and nonbinary authors from the United States and Canada.”
Eleanor Catton was named a finalist for her novel Birnam Wood, which was a finalist for last year’s Kirkus Prize. The prize’s jurors praised the book as “witty, often scathing, and painfully emotionally accurate.”
V. V. Ganeshananthan made the shortlist for her “ambitious and beautifully written” Brotherless Night, along with Claudia Dey for Daughter, which the jurors said “ricochets between uncomfortable emotions and social constructs with fearlessness and intent.”
Also named finalists were Kim Coleman Foote for her “formally inventive and emotionally captivating” Coleman Hill, which was also longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, and Janika Oza for A History of Burning, which the jurors dubbed a “remarkable, symphonic debut.”
The jurors for this year’s prize are Jen Sookfong Lee, Laila Lalami, Claire Messud, Dolen Perkins-Valdez, and Eden Robinson.
The Carol Shields Prize, named after the Canadian author of The Stone Diaries and Unless, was first awarded last year, to When We Were Sisters by Fatimah Asghar. The winner of this year’s award, which comes with a cash prize of $150,000, will be announced at an event in Toronto, hosted by poet Natasha Trethewey, on May 13.
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
