Mona Awad, Eddy Boudel Tan, Emma Donoghue, Emma Knight, and Souvankham Thammavongsa have been named as the top five contenders for the prestigious 2025 Giller Prize, which awards $100,000 annually to outstanding Canadian fiction writers. The 2025 shortlist showcases a diverse range of narratives, spanning from an 1800s train tragedy in Emma Donoghue’s “The Paris Express” to the exploration of family turmoil in Eddy Boudel Tan’s “The Tiger and the Cosmonaut” and the portrayal of life in a nail salon in Souvankham Thammavongsa’s “Pick A Colour.”
Souvankham Thammavongsa, a previous Giller Prize winner for her collection “How To Pronounce Knife,” and Emma Donoghue, a past Giller Prize nominee, are among the shortlisted authors for 2025. Additionally, Mona Awad, also a former Giller Prize nominee, has been recognized for her novel “We Love You, Bunny,” while Emma Knight has been acknowledged for her debut work, “The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus.”
The books shortlisted for the 2025 Giller Prize are accessible through the National Network for Equitable Library Services and the Centre for Equitable Library Access. The shortlist was selected by jury chair Dionne Irving and jurors Loghan Paylor and Deepa Rajagopalan from a pool of over 100 submissions. The Giller Prize award ceremony for 2025 will be hosted by comedian Rick Mercer and will be televised on CBC TV and CBC Gem on November 17th at 9 p.m. ET, with a live stream available on CBC’s YouTube channel and broadcast on CBC Radio One.
Last year’s Giller Prize was awarded to Anne Michaels for her novel “Held.” The Giller Prize was established in 1994 by Toronto businessman Jack Rabinovitch in memory of his late wife, Doris Giller. In a recent development, the Giller Prize has severed ties with Scotiabank as a sponsor following public concerns and protests related to the bank’s affiliations.
For more details about the shortlisted books and their authors, readers can explore the individual synopses provided below.