Rama Altaleb Wins the Youth Short Story Category for "Lost Childhood"

SEATTLE, May 27, 2021 /CNW/ - (NASDAQ: AMZN) - Today, Amazon Canada and The Walrus announced that Michelle Good, author of Five Little Indians (HarperCollins Publishers Ltd/Harper Perennial) is the winner of the 45th annual Amazon Canada First Novel Award (www.amazon.ca/firstnovelaward), which celebrates first-time Canadian novelists. Good, a member of Saskatchewan's Red Pheasant Cree Nation who now resides in Savona, British Columbia, received a cash prize of $60,000.

Set in the 1960's, Five Little Indians chronicles the criss-crossing lives of residential-school survivors struggling to overcome the trauma they endured during their years at the school. Taken from their families when they were very young and sent to a remote, church-run residential school, Kenny, Lucy, Clara, Howie, and Maisie are barely out of childhood when they are finally released after years of detention. Alone and without any skills, support, or family, the teens find their way to the seedy and foreign world of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside neighbourhood, where they cling together, striving to find a place of safety and belonging in a world that doesn't want them. The paths of the five friends intertwine over the decades as they struggle to overcome, or at least forget, the trauma they endured during their years at the school.

Five Little Indians is available in print and Kindle editions on Amazon.ca, as well as in audiobook format through Audible.ca.

Good's book was chosen from a shortlist of six works that also included:

• Butter Honey Pig Bread, Francesca Ekwuyasi (Arsenal Pulp Press)
• Happy Hour, Marlowe Granados (Flying Books)
• You Are Eating an Orange. You Are Naked., Sheung-King (Book*hug Press)
• Gutter Child, Jael Richardson (HarperCollins Publishers Ltd/Harper Avenue)
• Vanishing Monuments, John Elizabeth Stintzi (Arsenal Pulp Press)

Each shortlisted novelist received a $6,000 cash prize. All of the shortlisted books are available in print and Kindle editions on Amazon.ca. Butter Honey Pig Bread and Gutter Child are also currently available as audiobooks through Audible.ca.

Rama Altaleb Wins the Youth Short Story Category

Now in its fourth year, the Youth Short Story category celebrates authors between the ages of thirteen and seventeen who have written a short story under 3,000 words. Seventeen-year-old Altaleb was chosen as the winner by the First Novel Award's panel of judges. The prize for her winning short story, "Lost Childhood," is $5,000, a virtual mentorship workshop with editors of The Walrus and her story will be published on thewalrus.ca later this year.

"What was encouraging about this process was finding out that so many young Canadians are putting a lot of heart and passion into their writing," said judge Kagiso Lesego Molope.

For more information about the finalists and the Amazon Canada First Novel Award, visit amazon.ca/firstnovelaward or thewalrus.ca/fna.

About Amazon

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About The Walrus

The Walrus provokes new thinking and sparks conversation on matters vital to Canadians. As a registered charity, we publish independent, fact-based journalism in The Walrus and at thewalrus.ca; we produce national, ideas-focused events, including our flagship series The Walrus Talks; and train emerging professionals in publishing and non-profit management.

The Walrus is invested in the idea that a healthy society relies on informed citizens.

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SOURCE Amazon Canada

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