Author Wayne Grady at the King Edward Hotel in Toronto.Gloria Nieto/The Globe and Mail
Wayne Grady has won the Amazon.ca First Novel Award in recognition of his debut novel, Emancipation Day. The prize was awarded in Toronto on Wednesday.
Grady, an esteemed non-fiction writer and translator, receives $7,500. His book was selected from a shortlist that also included Kenneth Bonert (The Lion Seeker), Krista Bridge (The Eliot Girls), Susan Downe (Juanita Wildrose: My True Life) and D.W. Wilson (Ballistics). The finalists were awarded $750 gift certificates to Amazon.ca. The shortlist was selected by Stuart Woods, the editor of Quill and Quire magazine; Grady's book was chosen from that shortlist by a jury consisting of authors Kamal Al-Solaylee, Angie Abdou and and Brian Francis.