Gary Barwin, Drew Hayden Taylor and Amy Jones are the 2017 Leacock Medal finalists
Jane van Koeverden | CBC | Posted: May 10, 2017 2:04 PM | Last Updated: July 5, 2017
Two debut novels and a collection of sci-fi stories have been named to the 2017 Leacock Medal shortlist.
The $15,000 prize annually celebrates the best in Canadian literary humour.
Gary Barwin is a finalist for Yiddish for Pirates, a nautical odyssey narrated by a wise-cracking, polyglot parrot. The novel was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and Governor General's Literary Award for fiction.
Drew Hayden Taylor is nominated for Take Us to Your Chief, a collection of nine tales that marry sci-fi with Indigenous storytelling. Recently, Taylor was named among 150 Indigenous artists to receive a REVEAL Indigenous Art Award.
Amy Jones' debut novel We're All in This Together rounds out the shortlist. The tragicomic book follows a family forced to face their demons when their matriarch survives going over a waterfall in a barrel and becomes Internet famous. Jones won the 2006 CBC Short Story Prize.
The winner of the prize will be announced on June 10, 2017.
Last year's winner was Republic of Dirt by Susan Juby.