Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award
The Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award was established in 1991 with an endowment by Thomas Head Raddall himself, and it continues with ongoing support from the Raddall family. The award honours the work of fiction writers in the Atlantic region and, as its original benefactor envisioned, provides “the gift of time and peace of mind” so essential to the creation of new work.
Inaugurated as a $5,000 prize, the award has grown steadily under the Raddall family’s stewardship. Beginning in 2022, the prize amount was raised from $25,000 to $30,000.
Submissions and Guidelines
One prize ($30,000) is awarded each year for a novel or a book of short fiction that was written by a full-time resident of Atlantic Canada and published and/or distributed for the first time in Canada in the year prior to the submission deadline. Additional finalists each receive $500.
For complete submission details, please visit the Writers’ Federation of Nova Scotia, the administrator of the award.
Congratulations!
This year’s recipient of the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award is Nova Scotia author Jaime Burnet for her second novel, milktooth, Vagrant Press.
Of the book, the Raddall jury said, “milktooth is a breathtaking account of the insidiousness of intimate partner abuse and the immense strength and difficult untangling required to escape. Jaime Burnet offers a complex and sensitive look into the unsafe domestic space where early-thirties protagonist Sorcha is trying to conceive via IVF with a controlling and manipulative partner, Chris. Set between Cape Breton and Scotland, the story unravels against a backdrop of beautiful scenery. The power of found and chosen family and the Queer community shines through in a disturbing yet important story. Burnet has incredible skill, building momentum from the first page, and reaching a narrative climax that is extremely moving. Sorcha’s first steps toward freedom, despite her fear and doubt, are stunningly captured on the page.”