‘Brotherless Night’ wins 2024 Carol Shields Prize

Brotherless Night by V V Ganeshananthan (Penguin) has won the 2024 Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, worth US$150,000 (A$226,385).

The judging jury—made up of Jen Sookfong Lee (chair), Laila Lalami, Claire Messud, Dolen Perkins-Valdez and Eden Robinson—said Ganeshananthan’s work was ‘an ambitious and beautifully written novel’ that ‘explores how ordinary people can be swept up in political violence and, despite their best efforts, eventually be swallowed by it’.

‘Through her sensitively crafted characters, V V Ganeshananthan asks us to consider how history is told, whom it serves, and the many truths it leaves out,’ said the judges. ‘A magnificent book.’

Ganeshananthan’s novel was chosen from a shortlist of five that included Birnam Wood by Aotearoa New Zealand author Eleanor Catton (Granta).

First presented in 2023, the Carol Shields Prize for Fiction recognises ‘creativity and excellence in fiction by women and non-binary writers in Canada and the United States’ and is open to books published in the US or Canada by a US or Canadian publisher. Each of the four runners-up receives US$12,500 (A$18,864).

The winner of the inaugural prize was When We Were Sisters (Fatimah Asghar, Little, Brown).

Category: International news