Scotiabank Giller Prize to feature 2023 longlisted writers in online book club
The 2024 edition of the Giller Book Club will run from January until June
The Scotiabank Giller Prize is back with its monthly book club series.
This year's edition of the Giller Book Club features the authors of the 2023 longlist in conversation with notable writers, critics, past jury members and academics. The interviews will be streamed live and run from January until June.
You can find out more about the conversations and register at the Scotiabank Giller Prize website. Check out the full schedule below, including details on each book.
Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
This event has been cancelled. The Giller Prize hopes to reschedule in the future.
Study for Obedience explores themes of guilt, abuse and prejudice through the eyes of its unreliable narrator. In it, a woman leaves her hometown to move to a "remote northern country" to be a housekeeper for her brother, whose wife recently left him. Soon after her arrival, the community is struck by unusual events from collective bovine hysteria to a potato blight. When the locals direct their growing suspicions of incomers at her their hostility grows more palpable.
Bernstein is a Montreal-born author and creative writing teacher. Her other books include her 2021 novel The Coming Bad Days and her collection of prose poems Now Comes the Lightning. Study for Obedience was also shortlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize. Bernstein was named one of Granta's best young British novelists in 2023. She currently lives in Scotland.
The Double Life of Benson Yu by Kevin Chong
Kevin Chong discussed The Double Life of Benson Yu with Perry Chafe on Feb. 6.
The Double Life of Benson Yu recounts the difficult adolescence of the titular character growing up in a housing project in 1980s Chinatown. The story takes a metafictional twist, when Yu's grip on memory and reality falters. The unique structure provides a layered and poignant look into how we come to terms with who we are, what happened to us as children and that finding hope and healing lies in whether we choose to suppress or process our experiences.
Chong is a Vancouver-based writer and associate professor at the University of British Columbia Okanagan. His other books include the nonfiction book Northern Dancer and fiction titles like The Plague and Beauty Plus Pity. He was announced as a juror for the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize.
Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton
Eleanor Catton discussed Birnam Wood with Sharon Bala on Feb. 20.
Birnam Wood is an engaging eco-thriller set in the middle of a landslide in New Zealand. Mira, the founder of a guerilla gardening collective that plants crops amid other criminal environmental activities, sets her sights on an evacuated farm as a way out of financial ruin. The only problem is the American billionaire Robert Lemoine has already laid claim to it as his end-of-the-world lair. After the same thing for polar opposite reasons, their paths cross and Robert makes Mira an offer that would stave off her financial concerns for good. The question is: can she trust him?
Catton is a London, Ont.-born currently based in New Zealand author. She won the 2013 Booker Prize for fiction and the 2013 Governor General's Literary Award for fiction for her second novel, The Luminaries.
The Islands: Stories by Dionne Irving
Dionne Irving discussed The Islands with Donna Bailey Nurse on March 5.
Set across the United States, Jamaica and Europe from the 1950s to present day, The Islands details the migration stories of Jamaican women and their descendants. Each short story explores colonialism and its impact as women experience the on-going tensions between identity and the place they long to call home.
Irving is a writer and creative writing teacher from Toronto. She released her first novel, Quint in 2021 and her work has been featured in journals and magazines like LitHub, Missouri Review and New Delta Review. The Islands is her debut short story collection.
All The Colour In The World by CS Richardson
CS Richardson discussed All the Colour In the World with Cary Fagan on March 19.
All the Colour In the World is a story of a young boy named Henry who discovers a passion for art which carries him through the many misadventures of his life in the 20th century. From his first set of colouring pencils he is gifted at his grandmother's place to the worlds of academia, war and sweeping romance, Henry's art stays alongside his enduring story.
Richardson is a Toronto-based writer and award-winning book designer. His previous novels include The End of the Alphabet which won the 2008 Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best First Book and The Emperor of Paris which was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize in 2012.
The Clarion by Nina Dunic
Nina Dunic discussed The Clarion with Gail Anderson-Dargatz on April 16.
The Clarion is a debut novel about two siblings struggling to find a sense of purpose and belonging. Peter is a trumpet player and kitchen staff and his sister Stasi is making her attempt to work in corporate which ultimately leads to therapy. As the siblings endure the many trials and tribulations of their generation like promotions and absent lovers, can they find their sense of self and keep their connection strong?
Dunic is a freelance writer and journalist living in Scarborough, Ont. She has been longlisted for the CBC Short Story Prize four times: in 2023 for The Artist, in 2022 for Youth, in 2020 for Bodies and in 2019 for an earlier version of Bodies. The Clarion is her first novel.
We Meant Well by Erum Shazia Hasan
This event has been cancelled.
We Meant Well is a novel that poses a difficult moral dilemma for its protagonist, Maya, an aid worker who must decide who to believe when her coworker at the orphanage, Marc, is accused of assaulting her former protégé, Lele. Caught between worlds with protests raging outside the orphanage, Maya must also balance the fate of the organization against the accusations. Navigating around these variables provides both challenge and insight as the complexity of the situation reveals the character of everyone involved.
Hasan is a Toronto-based writer and a sustainable development consultant for various UN agencies. We Meant Well is her debut novel.
Wait Softly Brother by Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer
Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer will discuss Wait Softly Brother on May 14.
After Kathryn leaves her long and tumultuous marriage she returns to her childhood home to write about her stillborn brother. Wait Softly Brother is a novel which weaves together family histories and traumas as Kathryn unearths the story of an ancestor who fought in the American Civil War. As she begins to question her memory and that of her parents, Kathryn weaves together stories of surprising beauty and hope.
Kuitenbrouwer is a writer and teacher at the University of Toronto. Her other novels include All Broken Things and The Nettle Spinner which was shortlisted for the 2005 Amazon First Novel Award. She currently lives in Prince Edward County, Ont.
The Rooftop Garden by Menaka Raman-Wilms
Menaka Raman-Wilms will discuss The Rooftop Garden with Andrew Sullivan on May 22.
The Rooftop Garden follows Nabila and her childhood friend Matthew, who played on Nabila's rooftop garden in an imaginary world that has flooded from climate change. Nabila comes from an educated, middle-class family, while Matthew had been abandoned by his father and was often left to deal with things on his own. Their childhood experiences reveal how their lives are on different trajectories, even at an early stage.
Raman-Wilms is a writer and journalist based in Toronto. She's the host of The Decibel, the daily news podcast from the Globe and Mail. She's also worked as a parliamentary reporter for the Globe and as an associate producer at CBC Radio One. Raman-Wilms was shortlisted for the 2019 CBC Short Story Prize for her story Black Coffee.
We Have Never Lived on Earth by Kasia Van Schaik
Kasia Van Schaik will discuss We Have Never Lived on Earth on June 11.
We Have Never Lived on Earth is a short story collection following the tale of Charlotte Ferrier, raised by a single mother in small town B.C. after immigrating from South Africa. Focusing on themes of ecological crisis and womanhood, Charlotte and her mother endure forest fires, disappearances and memories which transform them.
Van Schaik is a South African poet and writer living in Montreal. We Have Never Lived On Earth is her first story collection. In 2021, she was named one of the CBC Quebec Writers' Federation writers-in-residence.
Girlfriend on Mars by Deborah Willis
Deborah Willis will discuss Girlfriend on Mars with Rebecca Makkai on June 18.
Girlfriend on Mars is a story about love in the age of commercial space travel. Amber Kivinen is one of 23 reality TV contestants vying for two spots aboard the first commercial trip to Mars aboard MarsNow, a space shuttle commissioned by the billionaire Geoff Task. Amber is surrounded by a cast of unlikely characters, including an Israeli soldier and social media influencers, while her long-term partner, Kevin, stays at home with the plants and starts to wonder: why does his girlfriend feel such a desire to leave the planet?
Willis is a writer from Calgary. She debuted in 2009 with Vanishing and Other Stories which was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award. She followed it up with a collection of short fiction entitled The Dark and Other Love Stories in 2017, which was longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and won the Georges Bugnet Award for best work of fiction published in Alberta.
Corrections
- An earlier version of this article included an event with David Bergen. He is no longer available.Jan 22, 2024 12:31 PM EST
