Cree author and lawyer Michelle Good has won the Amazon Canada First Novel Award.
Good was awarded the $60,000 prize at a virtual ceremony Thursday for "Five Little Indians."
The title, from HarperCollins Publishers, follows a group of residential school survivors trying to forge new lives in Vancouver.
Good, 64, is a member of the Red Pheasant Cree Nation in Saskatchewan and lives in Savona, west of Kamloops, B.C.
Established in 1976, previous winners of the First Novel Award include Michael Ondaatje, W.P. Kinsella, Nino Ricci, David Bezmozgis, Andre Alexis and Madeleine Thien.
The prize is co-presented by Amazon and the Walrus Foundation.
The runners-up, who each receive $6,000, are:
— "Butter Honey Pig Bread" by Francesca Ekwuyasi, published by Arsenal Pulp Press.
— "Happy Hour" by Marlowe Granados, published by Flying Books
— "You Are Eating an Orange. You Are Naked." by Sheung-King, published by Book*hug Press
— "Gutter Child" by Jael Richardson, published by HarperCollins Publishers
— "Vanishing Monuments" by John Elizabeth Stintzi, published by Arsenal Pulp Press
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 27, 2021.
The Canadian Press