5 Canadian books make shortlist for $100K Scotiabank Giller Prize

The prize is the biggest in Canadian literature.

By CBC Books

Books by Miriam Toews, Omar El Akkad, Angélique Lalonde, Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia and Jordan Tannahill have been shortlisted for the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize.

The $100,000 prize is the biggest in Canadian literature.

Toews, a writer from Winnipeg who now lives in Toronto, is a finalist for her latest novel, Fight Night. Fight Night is also a finalist for the 2021 Atwood Gibson Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize.

Toews has been nominated for the Giller Prize twice before: in 2004, she was a finalist for A Complicated Kindness and in 2014, she was shortlisted for All My Puny Sorrows.

The other finalists are making their first appearance on the Giller Prize shortlist.

Tannahill, a U.K.-based Canadian playwright who has won the Governor General’s Literary Award for drama twice, is nominated for his second novel, The Listeners.

Two first-time authors have made the shortlist: B.C.-based writer Lalonde for her debut short story collection Glorious Frazzled Beings and Onyemelukwe-Onuobia, who divides her time between Halifax and Lagos, is nominated for her debut novel The Son of the House.

Rounding out the crop of five finalists is Portland-based Canadian journalist Omar El Akkad, who is nominated for his second novel, What Strange Paradise. He is also the author of the novel American War, which was defended on Canada Reads 2018 by actor Tahmoh Penikett.

The winner will be announced on Nov. 8, 2021. Read more about the nominees at CBC Books.