What is Canada's richest literary award for

Could the Gillers get any sadder

The Gillers came and went. The $100,000 prize and four $10,000 prizes were distributed, and the five shortlisted titles, presumably the best of Canadian literary output in 2022, barely got reviewed in Canadian media. The Toronto Star reviewed three shortlisted books earlier in the year, one of which turned out to be the winner. That is the sum total of Canadian literary criticism around the Giller finalists in our legacy media. (A couple of other reviews can be found in small and specialist outlets.) The winner Suzette Mayr's book was reviewed in the Star by a freelancer – author Brett Grubisic, who had written about Mayr previously, including a review in the National Post and an interview in Plenitude Magazine. Are they buddies? I'm sure it's entirely coincidental that Mayr had this to say about Grubisic's fiction a few years back: “[T]his novel's satire sparkles in a way that is surprising, funny, and sharp. Grubisic's prose shines.”

To recap. A novel that just received the most prestigious Canadian literary reward garnered one review in Canada's wide-distribution papers and magazines — by someone whom she had positively reviewed herself on an earlier occasion.