Authors Ohlin, Wangersky make prestigious Giller Prize short list

TORONTO – Just a few weeks ago, Montreal author Alix Ohlin had never been a finalist for any major literary prize.

Now, her novel “Inside” is up for two of them: the $25,000 Rogers Writers’ Trust of Canada Fiction Prize, which revealed its finalists last month, and the $50,000 Scotiabank Giller Prize, which announced its short list on Monday.

“I’m totally thrilled, of course. I don’t even know what to say. I’m just very happy,” a stunned Ohlin, 40, said in a telephone interview shortly after Monday’s Giller short list came out.

“I’m still absorbing it, I guess. It’s a good kind of surreal.”

“Inside” (House of Anansi Press), Ohlin’s second novel that also made Oprah’s Book Club Summer Reading Pick list, features three main characters as it explores the theme of helping a person in crisis.

Its Giller competition includes Montreal-based Kim Thuy’s debut novel, “Ru” (Random House Canada), an immigrant tale translated by Sheila Fischman from the original French version that won a 2010 Governor General’s Literary Award.

Halifax-raised, St. John’s-based Russell Wangersky, who made the Giller long list in 2006, is a finalist this year for his short story collection “Whirl Away” (Thomas Allen Publishers).

The 19th annual Giller short list is rounded out by the globetrotting thriller “419” (Viking Canada), by Calgary-based novelist and travel writer Will Ferguson, and the post-war immigrant story “The Imposter Bride” (HarperCollins Canada), by Montreal’s Nancy Richler.

Jury members Roddy Doyle of Ireland, Gary Shteyngart of New York and Toronto-based Anna Porter read 142 works of fiction submitted by 51 publishing houses from across Canada. They deliberated via email and telephone, but never in person, to draft a long list of 13 titles in early September and then the five finalists.

“I have read, of course, all the Giller winners over the years and most of the finalists. In fact, I think probably all of them. But I think this year’s is a phenomenal collection of outstanding talent — really, really good writers,” said Porter, author and founder of Key Porter Books.

This year’s short list is also diverse with no common thread, she added.

“That’s one of the problems with trying to get it down to five, because they have nothing in common with each other except that they’re all really, really accomplished novels,” said Porter.

Shteyngart noted the five shortlisted books are “heartfelt” and have “a real emotional investment.”

“You know that somebody invested their blood and guts into every line of these works,” said the novelist, who teaches creative writing at Columbia University.

The finalists are also “so international,” he added.

“It seems like Canada is, in some ways, almost like a launching pad and then people go elsewhere to explore, which is similar to American literature. But I think Americans are still more obsessed with the idea of the Great American Novel that will finally explain to the world what happened to us.”

“Inside,” Ohlin’s second novel after “The Missing Person,” is among the Giller finalists with an international spin.

The story traverses Montreal, New York, Los Angeles, Rwanda and other areas as it follows two therapists and an actress over the course of about 10 years, during which each character has the occasion to reach out and help another person.

“The book is really about why we attempt to try to help other people and why the attempt itself has value, whether or not we’re able to actually succeed each time,” Ohlin said while en route from Los Angeles to Pennsylvania, where she’s an English professor at Lafayette College.

Ohlin, who has also written two story collections (“Babylon and Other Stories” and “Signs and Wonders”) began writing “Inside” five years ago.

She set the opening scene in a landscape that helped shape her childhood: Montreal’s Mount Royal Park.

Part of her research for the book involved speaking with therapists.

“I also had this lovely undergraduate research assistant who went around and talked to some therapists and then she would write down for me what their offices looked like and things,” she said.

Ohlin isn’t sure why her novel is resonating with prize juries but noted it has a universal theme.

“I guess my hope is that people do relate to either having needed help or having given it in their lives,” she said.

The Giller Prize was established in 1994 by businessman Jack Rabinovitch in honour of his late wife, literary journalist Doris Giller. It recognizes the best Canadian novel or short story collection published in English, and has become one of Canada’s most distinguished literary awards.

“It’s a lot of money, damn! We want it too!” Shteyngart said with a laugh.

“It’s amazing, it really is amazing — $50,000. To most writers that’s a life-changing event, at least for here. The National Book Award, for example, in the States has a slight bump up the bestseller list — not really.

“But this is major. It’s definitely a testament of Canada’s love of literature.”

This year’s Giller prize will be handed out at a Toronto gala broadcast on CBC-TV and hosted by Jian Ghomeshi on Oct. 30.