Praises and Prizes

"Fresh from being named one of Britain's best young novelists, and from making the final cut for the Women's prize for fiction, Zadie Smith today received her third literary garlanding in just three days after she was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature's Ondaatje prize.

     For a book in any genre which best evokes 'the spirit of a place,' Smith was picked for her latest novel NW - also shortlisted yesterday [April 16, 2013] for the Women's Prize. The shortlist's 'places' range from South Africa to the Antarctic, but NW is set in Smith's childhood home of north-west London. Judges Julia Blackburn, Margaret Drabble and Ian Jack described the novel as 'tender and witty,' and said it 'shows London as chaotic and unfair, by turn happy and unhappy.'"
— Alison Flood, The Guardian
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"Terry Fallis [author of Up and Down] , who claimed the Stephen Leacock Medal For Humour in 2008, is one of five authors short-listed for the honour this year.
     'He won for Best Laid Plans, which was a self-published book,' recalled Todd Stubbs, vice-president of the Stephen Leacock Associates. 'So it was quite unique, the fact that it made it through the short list and was eventually chosen. We do get a large percentage every year of self-published books. They are long shots, without a doubt.'
     The Leacock Associates have awarded the medal annually since 1947 to honour the late author [Stephen Leacock], and to support humour writing in Canada."
— Frank Matys, Simcoe.com
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You can meet Terry Fallis on Sunday, May 26, at the Elora Writer's Festival; get the details here…

Find out more about Terry Fallis here…

"Politics beat out art on Monday [April 15, 2013] as historian author of Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith: Religion in American War and Diplomacy, won Andrew Preston, the 2013 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction.
     Considered a long shot, the book on U.S. diplomacy by an expatriate Canadian at Cambridge University beat three books devoted to culture and one other on high politics to win the prize."
—John Barber, The Globe and Mail
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Meet the winner of last year's winner of the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction, Andrew Westoll, at the 2013 Elora Writers' Festival; find out more here... 

 Buy all the books mentioned in this post (and books by Stephen Leacock)  here...

Meet the winner of the 2012 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction on May 26 in Elora

"At launch ceremony held on Monday, March 5, 2012 in the Sovereign Ballroom of downtown Toronto’s Le Meridien King Edward Hotel, author Andrew Westoll was named the winner of the 2012 Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction for his book The Chimps of Fauna Sanctuary: A Canadian Story of Resilience and Recovery, published by HarperCollins. Noreen Taylor, chair of the Charles Taylor Foundation, announced the winner’s name before a packed audience of invited guests, publishers, and media, and presented him with a cheque for $25,000 and a specially commissioned crystal award, designed by Toronto graphic designer Peter Enneson, and created by Cascade Crystal.

     The remaining nominees each received a $2,000 honorarium. [...]
     The previous winners of the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction are Wayne Johnston for Baltimore’s Mansion, published by Knopf Canada and awarded the prize on May 8, 2000; Carol Shields for Jane Austen, published by Penguin Books Canada and awarded the prize on April 22, 2002; Isabel Huggan for Belonging: Home Away From Home, published by Knopf Canada and awarded the prize on April 19, 2004; Charles Montgomery for The Last Heathen: Encounters With Ghosts and Ancestors in Melanesia, published by Douglas & McIntyre and awarded the prize on February 28, 2005; J. B. MacKinnon for Dead Man in Paradise, published by Douglas & McIntyre and awarded the prize on February 27, 2006; Rudy Wiebe for Of This Earth: A Mennonite Boyhood in the Boreal Forest, published by Knopf Canada and awarded the prize on February 26, 2007; Richard Gwyn for John A.: The Man Who Made Us, The Life and Times of John A. Macdonald, Volume One: 1815 – 1816, published by Random House Canada and awarded the prize on March 3, 2008; Tim Cook for Shock Troops: Canadians Fighting the Great War, 1917 – 1918, Volume Two, published by Viking Canada Canada and awarded the prize on February 9, 2009; Ian Brown for The Boy in the Moon: A Father’s Search For His Disabled Son, published by Random House Canada and awarded the prize on February 8, 2010; [and] Charles Foran for Mordecai: The Life & Times, published by Knopf Canada and awarded the prize on February 14, 2011."
— Charles Taylor Prize
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Find out more about Andrew Westoll and the 2013 Elora Writers' Festival lineup of authors here...

And buy all their books here...

The word is out... about Andrew Westoll

Join us on Sunday, May 26, 2013 (1 to 4 P.M.) at the Elora Centre for the Arts, 75 Melville Street, Elora for a relaxing yet thought-provoking afternoon of readings by Sonia Day, Terry Fallis, Carrie Snyder, Andrew Westoll, Ailsa Kay and Robert Rotenberg.
     For $20.00 (includes Reception) you get to enjoy readings by six of Canada's finest authors; a Q&A session; a "Schmooze-fest" replete with wine & appetizers… and BOOKS, BOOKS, BOOKS (Get them signed by the author[s].) courtesy of Roxanne's Reflections.

"In my previous life, I worked as a primatologist, which is just a fancy word for someone who studies monkeys in the jungle. For one whole year, I was like a male version of Jane Goodall, minus the physical endurance, scientific breakthroughs and universal acclaim.
     I traded the real jungle for the concrete one a long time ago, but my experiences with wild animals still inform a lot of my work. Most of my writing explores one corner or another of our fraught, curious and ever-evolving relationship with the natural world.





My latest book is the national bestselling The Chimps of Fauna Sanctuary, the true story of a remarkable family of chimpanzees who spent decades as test subjects in a medical research lab, and who are now slowly recovering in an animal sanctuary near Montreal. The Chimps won the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction, was shortlisted for the BC National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction, and was named a Book of the Year by the Globe and Mail, Amazon.ca, Quill and Quire and CTV’s Canada AM."

— Andrew Westoll, andrewwestoll.com
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More about Andrew Westoll's Charles Taylor Prize here...

Buy Andrew Westoll's book here...

And meet him in person at the Elora Writers' Festival on May 26.