SUDBURY—Scrivener Press of Sudbury announced this week that all four of its 2013 titles have been shortlisted for the Ontario Library Services-North, 2014 Northern Lit Awards, including Kagawong’s Paula Mallea for her work ‘From Homestead to Community: A Women’s History of Western Manitoulin.’
“Paula Mallea’s ‘From Homestead to Community: A Women’s History of Western Manitoulin,’ seems to have struck a chord with Islanders,’ Laurence Steven, of Scrivener Press, told The Expositor. “Since publication in May 2013, it has gone through a first printing, and is half way through a second. It’s selling in a variety of venues, from the Chi-Cheemaun in the south, to Turners and The Expositor’s Printshop Books in the northeast, to the Meldrum Bay Inn in the far west. And of course, directly from the author and from Scrivener Press online.
“The announcement by Ontario Library Services-North (OLS-N) that ‘From Homestead to Community’ has been shortlisted for the Louise de Kiriline Lawrence award for Non-Fiction only confirms what the publisher, the readers, and well-known writer on the Island, Shelley J. Pearen, already know: “It’s enchanting, entertaining, and inspiring—a tribute to the women who went before us that will be enjoyed by everyone.”
The winner will receive the award at the OLS-N conference banquet at the Radisson Hotel in Sudbury, on Wednesday, September 24.
Other Scrivener 2013 authors, including Sault Ste Marie’s Mary-Lynn Murphy, author of the novel ‘Finding Grace,’ and Sudbury’s Colin Hayward, author of the short story collection ‘Dark Enough to Dance,’ are poised to win the OLS-N award for Adult Fiction. Sudbury’s Suzanne F. Charron, author of the biography ‘Wolf Man Joe LaFlamme: Tamer Untamed’ are in the home stretch for the Louise de Kiriline Lawrence Award for Non-Fiction.
Since the OLS-N Northern Lit Awards began in 2006, Scrivener Press has had three winners of the Louise de Kiriline Lawrence Award for Non-Fiction: Elizabeth Creith’s ‘Shepherd in Residence’ (2013), Roger Spielman’s ‘Anishnaabe World: A (Survival) Guide for Building Bridges Between Canada and First Nations’ (2012), and Dieter K. Buse and Graeme S. Mount’s ‘Come On Over: Northeastern Ontario A to Z’ (2011). The regional publisher also had five earlier fiction titles shortlisted for the Adult Fiction Award: Scott Overton’s ‘Dead Air’ (2013), Bonnie Kogos’s ‘Manhattan, Manitoulin’ (2013), Ric DeMeulles’ ‘Ramasseur’ (2009), Sean Costello’s ‘Here After’ (2009) and Colin Hayward’s ‘Other Times, Other Places’ (2007).
Scrivener Press publisher Laurence Steven feels that the wins and short-listings the press has received for this uniquely Northern Ontario prize “are a testament to the quality of the writers in our region.”
