NDN COPING MECHANISMS by Billy-Ray Belcourt (House of Anansi Press) is a finalist for the Stephan G. Stephansson Award for Poetry and has been chosen for the The 2020 Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Prize Shortlist! Billy-Ray Belcourt (he/him) is a writer and academic from the Driftpile Cree Nation. His debut book of poems, This Wound is a World, won the 2018 Griffin Poetry Prize and the 2018 Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Prize, and was named the Most Significant Book of Poetry in English by an Emerging Indigenous Writer at the 2018 Indigenous Voices Award. It was also a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award, the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award, and the Raymond Souster Award. It was named by CBC Books as one of the best Canadian poetry collections of the year. Billy-Ray is a Ph.D. student and a 2018 Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation Scholar in the Department of English and Film Studies at the University of Alberta. He is also a 2016 Rhodes Scholar and holds a Master’s degree in Women’s Studies from Wadham College at the University of Oxford. Billy-Ray is represented by Stephanie Sinclair.
IN THE KEY OF NIRA GHANI by Natasha Deen (Running Press Kids) has been chosen as a finalist for the R. Ross Annett Award for Children’s Literature. Award-winning author Natasha Deen spent the first part of her life in Guyana, then her family moved to Calgary, Alberta, which she found terribly exciting until her first minus-forty-degree winter day, at which point she began to question the sanity of the grown-ups around her. She currently lives in Edmonton, Alberta with her husband, dogs, and cats, and regularly entices the muses to her office with offers of cupcakes and tea. Natasha is represented by Amy Tompkins.
SEASON OF FURY AND WONDER by Sharon Butala (Coteau Books) is a finalist for the Georges Bugnet Award for Fiction. Sharon Butala is the author of nineteen books of fiction and nonfiction, numerous essays and articles, some poetry and five produced plays. She published her first novel in 1984, Country of the Heart, which was nominated for the Books in Canada First Novel Award, followed closely by a collection of short stories, Queen of the Headaches. She was born in Nipawin, Saskatchewan. After graduating from the University of Saskatchewan, she taught English in Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Nova Scotia. She eventually returned to Saskatoon, before moving near Eastend, Saskatchewan, to live on her husband, Peter Butala’s ranch. Sharon is represented by Marilyn Biderman.
To see the full list of honorees, please visit: https://writersguild.ca/2020-alberta-literary-awards-and-city-of-edmonton-book-prize-finalists-announced/