The shortlists for the Atlantic Book Awards have been announced, and since The Miramichi Reader has reviews of seven of them (plus one children’s book), I thought it might be helpful to provide links to the reviews for the various nominees. The books that have been reviewed here will have links embedded in them and will open in a new window. Some of the links will redirect you to the Consumed by Ink website, should they happen to have a review there.
Out of all the books listed below, A Bird on Every Tree by Carol Bruneau is my favourite by far, as it won our 2017 “The Very Best!” Book Award for Fiction-Short Stories. The Homing Place by Rachel Bryant is an excellent, authoritative study of early Indigenous and Settler literature and I have reviewed it now. The Awards will be given out on Thursday, May 10, 2018.
2018 ATLANTIC BOOK AWARDS and FESTIVAL SHORTLIST
Alistair MacLeod Prize for Short Fiction
Scars and other Stories
By Don Aker
Publisher: Pottersfield Press
Barrelling Forward
By Eva Crocker
Publisher: House of Anansi Press
Peninsula Sinking
By David Huebert
Publisher: Biblioasis
Ann Connor Brimer Award for Children’s Literature
The Painting
By Charis Cotter
Publisher: Tundra Books
Polly MacCauley’s Finest Divinest, Wooliest Gift of All
By Sheree Fitch
Publisher: Running the Goat Books and Broadsides
The Memory Chair
By Susan White
Publisher: Acorn Press
Atlantic Book Award for Scholarly Writing, Sponsored by Marquis Book Printing
The Mill: Fifty Years of Pulp and Protest
By Joan Baxter
Publisher: Pottersfield Press
The Homing Place: Indigenous and Settler Literary Legacies of the Atlantic (Currently reading, and it’s an excellent book!)
By Rachel Bryant
Publisher: Wilfrid Laurier University Press
Steal Away Home: One Woman’s Epic Flight to Freedom
By Karolyn Smardz Frost
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Robbie Robertson Dartmouth Book Award (Non-fiction), Presented by the Kiwanis Club of Dartmouth
The Mill: Fifty Years of Pulp and Protest
By Joan Baxter
Publisher: Pottersfield Press
The Sea Was in Their Blood: The Disappearance of the Miss Ally’s Five-Man Crew
By Quentin Casey
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing
The Halifax Explosion: Canada’s Worst Disaster
By Ken Cuthbertson
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Democracy 250 Atlantic Book Award for Historical Writing
The Mill: Fifty Years of Pulp and Protest
By Joan Baxter
Publisher: Pottersfield Press
The Endless Battle: The Fall of Hong Kong and Canadian POWs in Imperial Japan
By Andy Flanagan
Publisher: Goose Lane Editions
Nova Scotia at War, 1914-1919
By Brian Douglas Tennyson
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing
Evelyn Richardson Non-Fiction Award
The Mill: Fifty Years of Pulp and Protest
By Joan Baxter
Publisher: Pottersfield Press
Run, Hide, Repeat: A Memoir of a Fugitive Childhood
By Pauline Dakin
Publisher: Viking Canada
The Long Way Home: A Personal History of Nova Scotia
By: John DeMont
Publisher: McClelland & Stewart
Jim Connors Dartmouth Book Award (Fiction), presented by Boyne Clarke LLP
A Bird on Every Tree
By Carol Bruneau
Publisher: Vagrant Press
The Unlikely Redemption of John Alexander MacNeil
By Lesley Choyce
Publisher: Roseway Publishing
Peninsula Sinking
By David Huebert
Publisher: Biblioasis
J.M. Abraham Poetry Award
Everything We’ve Loved Comes Back to Find Us
By Allan Cooper
Publisher: Gaspereau Press
I’d Write the Sea Like a Parlour Game
By Alison Dyer
Publisher: Killick Press
All the Names Between
By Julia McCarthy
Publisher: Brick Books
Lillian Shepherd Memorial Award for Excellence in Illustration
Illustrator: Angela K. Doak (nominee)
Atlantic Animal ABC
(Written by Angela K. Doak)
Publisher: Nimbus Publishing
Illustrator: Sydney Smith (nominee)
Smoot: A Rebellious Shadow
(Written by Michelle Cuevas)
Publisher: Tundra Books
Illustrator: Sydney Smith (nominee)
Town is By the Sea
(Written by Joanne Schwartz)
Publisher: Groundwood Books
Margaret and John Savage First Book Award – Non-Fiction sponsored by Weed Man Maritimes, Heritage House Law Office, I Love Renovations and Transdynamic Services Ltd.
Run, Hide, Repeat: A Memoir of a Fugitive Childhood
By Pauline Dakin
Publisher: Viking Canada
Just Jen: Thriving Through Multiple Sclerosis
By Jen Powley
Publisher: Roseway Publishing
Chasing Smoke: A Wildfire Memoir
By Aaron Williams
Publisher: Harbour Publishing
Margaret and John Savage First Book Award – Fiction Sponsored by Collins Barrow LLP, Royden Trainor and the family of John and Margaret Savage
The Greatest Hits of Wanda Jaynes
By Bridget Canning
Publisher: Breakwater Books Ltd.
All is Beauty Now
By Sarah Faber
Publisher: McClelland & Stewart
Crying for the Moon
By Mary Walsh
Publisher: HarperCollins Canada
Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award
A Bird on Every Tree
By Carol Bruneau
Publisher: Vagrant Press
All is Beauty Now
By Sarah Faber
Publisher: McClelland & Stewart
Blood Fable
By Oisin Curran
Publisher: Book*hug
The Atlantic Book Awards Society (ABAS) is a registered non-profit organization with the mandate “to promote and acknowledge excellence in Atlantic Canadian writing and book publishing through an annual awards ceremony and related events.”
Currently based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, the board of the Atlantic Book Awards Society is committed to being a truly regional organization with representation from all four Atlantic provinces.
