Sask. Book Awards proceeding online after COVID-19 cancellation

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There are 36 books shortlisted in 13 categories.

Candace Savage, Ida Tremblay and Miriam Korner, Jason Heit, and Harold Johnson are also well represented in the short list.

Jason Heit’s book, Kaidenberg’s Best Sons: A Novel in Stories, is shortlisted for three awards, including the First Book Award. Set in the early 1900s, it’s described as “an unvarnished view of the lives of settlers in the early days of immigration to the Canadian prairies.”

Previous winners Candace Savage and Harold Johnson each have three nominations, including Book of the Year and Non-Fiction Award.

Savage’s non-fiction book, Strangers In The House: A Prairie Story of Bigotry and Belonging, is her investigation into the family that first owned Savage’s Saskatoon home.

Johnson’s book, Peace and Good Order: The Case for Indigenous Justice in Canada, is his “condemnation” of Canada’s justice system, which he was inspired to write after the deaths of Colten Boushie and Tina Fontaine.

Ida Tremblay and Miriam Korner’s book, When We Had Sled Dogs, is also nominated in three categories. A children’s book inspired by Tremblay’s memories of childhood, it’s a story of the seasonal cycle of trapline, told in English and Woodland Cree.

amartin@postmedia.com