A P.E.I. writer is in the running for one of Canada’s biggest awards, but the book touches each of the Maritime provinces.
Five finalists have made the shortlist for the Giller Prize, including Nicholas Herring, for his novel Your Breath in Charcoal.
It is published by Goose Lane Editions, a New Brunswick company, and begins with an islander who makes a trip to the northern part of the province to pick up an acquaintance’s brother from a mental hospital.
Plans change and they decide to head to Toronto. They start a “heady working-class odyssey rife with metaphorical richness and references to literature, film, and 90s music, Your Breath in Charcoal peers into the mind of its irrepressible and relentlessly quotable East Coast everyman,” according to the summary on the Goose Lane website.
The other finalists and their novels include:
- Tara Gereaux for Wild People Quiet
- Michelle Good for Eliza Sunshine
- Nazanine Hozar for The Small Ones
- Patmeena Sabit for Good People
The finalists are also on tour as part of the Between the Pages series, which gives the public an evening with the writers.
They visit Calgary and Ottawa before coming to their only East Coast stop on the tour at the Halifax Central Library on Nov. 4th. If you want to visit, details are few, but it is a first-come-first-serve event.
The final tour stop is in Toronto on Nov. 13, and the winner is announced on Nov. 16 in the city.
