Governor General's Literary Award - Fiction

On Tuesday, Linda Spalding won the 2012 Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction with her historical novel The Purchase. I have not yet had a chance to read this book, but it sounds intriguing:

"Pennsylvania 1798. Daniel Dickinson, a young Quaker father and widower, leaves his home to establish a new life with his 5 children and a 15-year-old orphan wife. In an act of misplaced compassion, Daniel buys a young slave boy, Onesimus, setting off a chain of events that sweep over several generations."

Spalding was also nominated for the Rogers Writers' Trust Prize for Fiction, won by Siege 13 by Tamas Dobozy; Dobozy, in turn, was shortlisted for the GG Award. However, neither book was nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize, won by Will Ferguson for 419. This marks a broad year for Canadian fiction, with three very different books winning the big three awards. In 2011, the awards lists were dominated by two novels, Half-Blood Blues and The Sisters Brothers.

Read more about Linda Spalding at Maclean's, Quill & Quire, and CBC.