Vancouver writer Rachel Rose longlisted for Scotiabank Giller Prize
The Octopus Has Three Hearts is Rose’s first book of fiction; also on the longlist from B.C. is Cedar Bowers
CRAB Park. Photo by Hailey Heartless
AWARD-WINNING LOCAL poet Rachel Rose’s first book of fiction is on the longlist for the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize
The Octopus Has Three Hearts (Douglas & McIntyre) is a collection of short stories about damaged people who have committed, witnessed, or survived terrible acts and who must make their way in an unforgiving world.
Rose’s characters include a goat farmer, suburban adulterer, violent child, and polyamorous marine biologist, all of whom have a deep connection to the animal world. The octopus, dogs, pigs, chameleons, and other creatures in their lives show compassion that the humans around them don’t.
“The strangeness of my childhood informed these stories, with its ricochet between Gulf Island Gothic (cults, communes, goats, violence) and Small Town America (addiction, unexpected compassion, religious fundamentalism and more violence),” Rose said in a release.
Rose is the author of four collections of poetry and a memoir, The Dog Lover Unit: Lessons in Courage from the World’s K9 Cops (St. Martin’s Press), which was shortlisted for the Arthur Ellis award for best non-fiction crime book in 2018.
She is also the recipient of the Bronwen Wallace Award for fiction from the Writers’ Trust, the Pat Lowther Memorial Award, a 2014 and 2016 Pushcart Prize, and a 2016 nomination for a Governor General’s Literary Award. The Poet Laureate Emerita of Vancouver, Rose has contributed to multiple publications and outlets, including the Globe & Mail, American Poetry Review, and Malahat Review, among others.
Also representing B.C. on the longlist is Cedar Bowers. Her debut novel, Astra (McClelland & Stewart, an imprint of Penguin Random House Canada), explores what we’re willing to give and receive from others and how well we ever really know the people we love the most.
Bowers, whose fiction has been published in Joyland and Taddle Creek, divides her time between Galiano Island, where she grew up, and Victoria.
The Scotiabank Giller Prize is Canada’s largest literary award. Founded in 1994 by Jack Rabinovitch in honour of literary journalist Doris Giller, the prize recognizes excellence in Canadian fiction—long form or short stories—and comes with a purse of $140,000.
The shortlist will be announced on October 5,, with the winner being announced on CBC on November 8.
All books on the 2021 Scotiabank Giller longlist can be found at https://scotiabankgillerprize.ca/.
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