Ann Connor Brimer Award for Children's Literature

K.V. Johansen, Nightwalker: The Warlocks of Talverdin (Orca Books)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author (by Chris Paul)

After his guardian dies, Maurey is reduced from student to unpaid servant at his grammar school and is taunted because of the black hair and eyes which make him look as if he were related to Nightwalkers, the sorcerers who once inhabited the island. When it is discovered that he is indeed a descendent of Nightwalkers, he is sentenced to be burned alive. Rescued by a young baroness, they set out on a dangerous journey to the hidden kingdom of Talverdin.  If he and Annot are to survive and prevent the destruction of the last refuge of the Nightwalkers, Maurey will have to call on human and inhuman skills he never knew he possessed, and win the trust of both sides of his family.

"If there is one book that has shaped what I think a book should do and what literature should be," medieval scholar K.V. Johansen says, "it is The Lord of the Rings." Like Tolkien, she is thorough in her research — a rich reward for readers. Johansen lives in a bit of another world herself.  She grows exotic trees indoors, from a Tasmanian blue gum that reached ten feet to several California redwoods. She shares her jungle home in Sackville, New Brunswick, with a large dog named Pippin and several enormous goldfish.

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Atlantic Independent Booksellers’ Choice Award AND Best Atlantic Published Book Award

Jacques Poitras, Beaverbrook: A Shattered Legacy (Goose Lane Editions)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author (by Tonë Meeg)

The very public battle over the ownership of millions of dollars worth of paintings at Fredericton’s Beaverbrook Art Gallery has had all the makings of best-selling pulp fiction – money, aristocracy, sex, family laundry and court intrigue.  It’s a story that might have appeared on the front pages published by its protagonist, press baron Max Aitken, Lord Beaverbrook.  In this fascinating account, Jacques Poitras explores the intertwined history of the Aitken family and the Beaverbrook Gallery. ‘A Shattered Legacy’ underscores the sea-change that has occurred since Gallery founding, when Beaverbrook could command obedience and obsequiousness from his fellow New Brunswickers, and today, when heirs joust with an independent and proud public institution.

Jacques Poitras has been CBC Radio’s provincial affairs reporter in New Brunswick since 2000. He has written numerous award-winning feature documentaries and has appeared on Radio-Canada, National Public Radio, and the BBC. His first book was the critically acclaimed The Right Fight: Bernard Lord and the Conservative Dilemma. He lives near Fredericton.

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Atlantic Poetry Prize

Don Domanski, All Our Wonder Unavenged (Brick Books)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author

All Our Wonder Unavenged was written over a seven year period, and continues Don Domanski’s exploration of the ordinary and the extraordinary, and the ways in which they illuminate each other, transforming through unexpected contexts.  Don is a poet of the holiness of subtleties, a master of mindfulness and being. His writing is a form of osmosis, spirit seeping through the details of each poem, creating a marvel of metaphysics and language distilled to purest energy. Living in the moment here is synonymous with being the moment, a transformation that is stunning to inhabit.

Born in 1950 in Sydney and raised on Cape Breton Island, Don’s first collection, The Cape Breton Book of the Dead, was published by House of Anansi Press in 1978.  Two of his collections have previously been nominated for the GG:  Wolf Ladder (Coach House, 1991) and Stations of the Left Hand (Coach House, 1994).  In 1999 he won the Canadian Literary Award for Poetry, and he has been published internationally in Czech, Portuguese and Spanish.  Don, who makes his home in Halifax, has participated several times in WFNS’s mentorship program, and is currently a writer in electronic residence with the Banff School.

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Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction

Beatrice MacNeil, Where White Horses Gallop (Key Porter Books)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author

It is 1939. England has declared war on Germany, and Canada will march beside her. Soon the lives of five young friends living in rugged, pristine Cape Breton will be changed forever. Fiddler Benny Doucet, prospective med student Calum MacPherson, and fisherman Hector MacDonald all decide to enlist. But Calum's handicapped brother Hamish is stuck at home, while Alex MacGregor, in love with the postmistress, hides in his mother's attic. The fate of these devoted friends, during and after the war, hinges on forces beyond their control in this lyrical, vibrant novel.

Beatrice MacNeil is the author of the novel Butterflies Dance in the Dark, and the story collection, The Moonlight Skater, both winners of the Dartmouth Book Award for Fiction. Her picture book, There is a Mouse in the House of Miss Crouse, won the Marianna Dempster Award. She has written ten plays, four of which have won awards, and two of which have been adapted for Halifax CBC Radio. She is the recipient of the Tic Butler Award for her outstanding contribution to Cape Breton writing and culture, and is the founder of Cape Breton's Reading Ceilidhs. She lives in Cape Breton.

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Dartmouth Book Award for Non-fiction AND Evelyn Richardson Prize for Non-fiction

Marq de Villiers, Witch in the Wind: The True Story of the Legendary Bluenose (Thomas Allen Publishers)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author (by Paul Orenstein)

Witch in the Wind is a fascinating journey into the backstory of a remarkable vessel.  She was a superb boat that emerged from a long boatbuilding tradition where skilled tradesmen built many wonderful vessels, and she was skippered by a skilled sailor at a time flush with some of the most accomplished sailors in the world.  De Villiers explores everything from the behind-the-scenes drama of her construction, to her hardscrabble existence as a fishing vessel, to her breathtaking races at a time when a shift was happening and a way of life, fast disappearing. 

Born in South Africa, Marq de Villiers is a veteran Canadian journalist and the author of eight books, including Windswept: The Story of Wind and Weather, Water: The Fate of Our Most Precious Resource (winner of the Governor General’s Award for Non- Fiction), Down the Volga in a Time of Troubles, and hasco-written with Sheila Hirtle, Into Africa: A Journey Through the Ancient Empires, and A Dune Adrift: The Strange Origins and Curious History of Sable Island, which won the Evelyn Richardson Award in 2005. He has worked as a foreign correspondent in Moscow and through Eastern Europe, and spent many years as editor and then publisher of Toronto Life magazine. Most recently, he was Editorial Director of WHERE Magazines International.

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Lillian Shepherd Memorial Award for Illustration

Richard Rudnick, Gracie, The Public Gardens Duck (Nimbus)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author

Gracie has an idyllic life in Halifax’s Public Gardens.  What delicious treats to savour from visitors to the park – muffins, popcorn, peanut butter sandwiches.  Gracie loves the attention, the visitors, but especially Gracie loves the food.  Suddenly, Gracie’s favourite people stop bringing treats.  Why won’t they share their lunch?  Aren’t they worried she’ll starve?  Despite best efforts, Gracie is reduced to…well…duck food.  And despite herself…she starts to enjoy it.  Gracie, The Public Gardens Duck is the funny and sweet saga of one hungry duck in search of supper.

Richard Rudnicki began drawing at a very young age, went on to study fine art and graphic design and, as an idealistic youth, became a resident artist with CUSO. A short time later he started a graphic design firm, which grew into a successful company. In 1994 he sold his business to return to drawing and painting, becoming a full-time visual artist. Richard lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

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Margaret and John Savage First Book Award

Stephanie Domet, Homing: the whole story (from the inside out) (Invisible Publishing)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author

Leah is haunted. By the things she's done, by the things she should have done, and by the ghost of her brother. She has to learn to let go of the past if she, or her brother, are ever going to move on. A funny, urban love story, Homing is about a woman who's grown afraid of the outdoors, a ghost that's lost its way, a musician who's trying to find his, and Sandy and Harold, a pair of homing pigeons that help bring it all back home.

Stephanie Domet is a writer-broadcaster who lives in Halifax. She owns a baby grand piano, a guitar and two harmonicas. She doesn't play any of them, but if you happen to drop by her place, you'd be welcome to. You may have heard her on CBC Radio, read her work in the Halifax Daily News, The Coast, or Halifax Magazine, or seen her in the 2005 Atlantic Fringe Festival performing her one-woman show, Cogswell!, or at the Atlantic Film Festival, appearing in a film of the same name. She has worked as a mall mascot, in a balloon factory, as a graveyard shift pastry chef and in many, many diners and bookstores. She vastly prefers writing books to just about anything else she's done.

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Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Prize

Don Hannah, Ragged Islands (Knopf Canada)

Hi-res pictures: cover, author (by Michael Holly)

It’s September 11, 2001:  Susan Ann Robert’s 85th birthday.  She lies dying in a Toronto hospital swathed in restraints of catheters, diapers and tethers when suddenly she’s on the dirt road leading to her childhood home in New Brunswick, fretting at the mystery of why she – among all her siblings – was given away as a child.  Accompanied by her long lost little dog, Sally, she continues along old roads, visiting the lost houses of her memory and fragments of the individuals who peopled her life.  A simple life lived, as mundane and as heroic as are all our lives.

Don Hannah was born in Shediac, New Brunswick, and now lives in Toronto and on the South Shore of Nova Scotia. His novels, The Wise and Foolish Virgins (shortlisted for the Thomas Raddall Award) and Ragged Islands are published by Knopf Canada. His plays include The Wedding Script (Chalmers Award), Rubber Dolly, Running Far Back, The Wooden Hill (AT&T OnStage Award), and Fathers and Sons. He has been writer in residence at the Tarragon Theatre, the Canadian Stage Company, the University of New Brunswick, and for the Yukon Public Library Service. He was the inaugural Lee Playwright in Residence at the University of Alberta, where he wrote While We're Young. He has written two musicals with singer/songwriter David Sereda, Love Jive and Siren Song, both of which premiered at Tarragon Theatre. Facing South, his opera, with composer Linda Catlin Smith, premiered at the 2003 World Stage Festival. For five years he was the director of the Tarragon Young Playwrights Unit. As a dramaturge, he has worked at the Playwrights Atlantic Resource Centre (PARC), the National Theatre School, and the Vancouver Playwrights Theatre Centre. He is currently on the faculty of the Banff PlayRites Colony.

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