Emily St. John Mandel, Emma Donoghue, Silvia Moreno-Garcia among 2020 nominees for Goodreads Choice Awards
CBC Books | | Posted: November 3, 2020 5:41 PM | Last Updated: November 3, 2020
Emily St. John Mandel's The Glass Hotel, Emma Donoghue's The Pull of the Stars and Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic are among the nominees for the 2020 Goodreads Choice Awards.
The Goodreads Choice Awards are given out in 20 categories across several genres and are voted on by readers.
The Glass Hotel has been nominated in the fiction category.
The Glass Hotel, which is also on the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize shortlist, weaves together several narratives as it tells a story of financial corruption, greed and a massive Ponzi scheme. Inspired by the Bernie Madoff financial fraud scandal, the novel is a character study of people who profit and the lives that are compromised as a result.
The Pull of the Stars is a finalist in the historical fiction category.
The Pull of the Stars is set during the 1918 Spanish flu outbreak and tells the story of three women — a nurse, a doctor and a volunteer helper — working on the front lines of the pandemic in an understaffed maternity ward. The timely tale explores how these women change each other's lives in unexpected ways, while witnessing loss and delivering new life. The Pull of the Stars was on the longlist for the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize.
Mexican Gothic is a nominee in the horror category.
In Mexican Gothic, a young woman named Noemi Taboada is called by her cousin to save her from doom in her countryside home. Set in 1950s Mexico, this gothic horror novel is a haunted house story underpinned with themes of feminism and class commentary.
The Jane Austen Society by Natalie Jenner is the only Canadian book that is nominated in two categories. It is a finalist in in both the the historical fiction and debut novel categories
The Jane Austen Society is a novel about community and the quiet triumph and tragedies of everyday life in post-Second World War Britain. In Chawton, an English village that was the last home of iconic novelist Jane Austen, a small group of locals decide to do what they can to preserve Austen's home and legacy, and hopefully revitalize the town in the process. The group comes together in surprising ways and, despite being very different, unite through their common goal.
10 Canadian books are among the 2020 nominees across 20 categories:
- The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel in the fiction category
- The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue in the historical fiction category
- The Jane Austen Society by Natalie Jenner in the historical fiction and debut novel categories
- Agency by William Gibson in the science fiction category
- Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots in the science fiction category
- Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia in the horror category
- Dearly by Margaret Atwood in the poetry category
- home body by Rupi Kaur in the poetry category
- Evolving Vegan by Mena Massoud in the food and cookbooks category
- Fangirl, Vol. 1: The Manga (Volume 1) by Rainbow Rowell, adapted by Sam Maggs & illustrated by Gabi Nam
Goodreads nominates 15 books in each of the 20 categories by analyzing statistics from the millions of books rated and reviewed on their platform. The nominees must have an average rating of 3.50 or higher when the awards kick off.
Goodreads users can vote for their favourite books in the opening round on the Goodreads website now. Opening round voting closes Sunday, Nov. 8, 2020. The semifinal round will take place Nov. 10-15, 2020. The final round of voting will happen Nov. 17-30, 2020.
The winners will be announced on Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2020.
Past winners include The Testaments by Margaret Atwood, Antoni Porowski's Antoni in the Kitchen, co-authored by Mindy Fox, and How to Be a Bawse by Lilly Singh.