It is with great joy we announce that Joshua Whitehead‘s JONNY APPLESEED (Arsenal Pulp Press) has been long-listed for the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize! Each year the prestigious Scotiabank Giller Prize strives to acknowledge the best in Canadian fiction. This year marks the 25th anniversary of the prize.
From the esteemed five-member panel: “This list reflects the landscape of the current Canadian imagination: diverse, bold, edgy, exciting, reflective, aware, angry and joyous…These are stories about and beyond Canada, a list so exciting, exhibiting such 
pure excellence, it stands up to any list in the world, and it is great, great fun to read.”
Joshua Whitehead is a Two-Spirit/ Oji-Cree/nehiyaw member of Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1) in Manitowapow. He is currently a doctoral student at the University of Calgary where he focuses on Indigenous Literatures and Cultures in the English Department.
JONNY APPLESEED IS Joshua’s debut novel. Joshua is the author of full-metal indigiqueer (Talonbooks) and is currently working on a third book tentatively titled, Making Love to the Land – a hybrid form of nehiyaw storytelling that includes poetry, fiction, and personal essay on ways of reading the land from a queer Indigenous perspective. Pieces from the manuscript have been published with Arc Poetry Magazine, in Refuse: CanLit in Ruins, and forthcoming work in Prairie Fire’s NDN Country and The Fiddle.
The Scotiabank Giller Prize shortlist will be announced on October 1st. For the full long-list and for more information on the prize, please visit Scotiabankgillerprize.ca/2018-longlist.
Endless congratulations to Joshua, and to all the long-listed authors.