FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Saskatchewan Foundation for the Arts announces 2024 Glengarry Book Award – Trevor Herriot for ‘The Economy of Sparrows’
Regina – February 3, 2025– Launched by the Saskatchewan Foundation for the Arts (SFFA) in 2021, the Glengarry Book Award was created to support and foster Saskatchewan’s literary culture. An annual award for the first edition of an English language novel or book of short fiction the Glengarry Award was the vision of donor and book lover Claire Kramer, a founding trustee of the SFFA.
The annual $20,000 (CAD) prize recognizes authors with Saskatchewan roots. In 2024, the SFFA is proud to announce Trevor Herriot as the recipient of the Saskatchewan’s largest annual literary prize.
“The Economy of Sparrows, celebrates the prairies, sharing a narrative of a deep connection rooted to land and nature. Our fourth year is a proud moment as we continue to support Saskatchewan writers who share stories and inspire readers beyond our borders,” says Kramer.
Herriot says, “I am delighted to be receiving the Glengarry Award from the Saskatchewan Foundation for the Arts. It’s gratifying to be placed with our province’s most important literary figures. The Glengarry is a pleasure to receive from the generous heart of Claire Kramer, someone who grew up on the prairie of Southwestern Saskatchewan, and fell in love with its stories and story tellers.”
The Economy of Sparrows, connects today’s settler culture and natural science to their roots in colonial empire-building. The richly observed story of Nell Rowan, who inherited her family’s prairie farmstead and returned after decades away, shares a tale of prairie life, as she finds the people who might help her come to some peaceful resolution of her life’s challenges. Readers are faced with questions of how we engage with and value the natural world, how its truths illuminate both history and our present lives, and how we justify ourselves to the wild things of the earth.
Managed and administered by the SFFA, The Glengarry Book Award jury is selected from a pool of Canadian authors, literary publishers and organizations. Chaired by Valerie Creighton, CEO of the Canada Media Fund, the 2024 jury included, Rachel Stapleton, Senior Acquisitions Officer of the University of Regina Press, author and playwright Kelly Jo Burke and public figure and politician John Nilson.
Shortlisted novels, Marina Endicott’s The Observer, was noted for its beautiful writing, eloquent prose and examination of stress adjacent trauma. Dave Margoshes A Simple Carpenter, was noted for the interweaving of a biblical fable, magic realism and political intrigue through the wanderings of the main character.
Herriot joins previous Glengarry recipients and award-winning authors Diane Warren for The Diamond House (2021 Recipient), Guy Vanderhaeghe for August into Winter (2022 recipient.), and Sharon Butala for Leaving Wisdom (2023 recipient).
Gursh Barnard says, “The Glengarry Book Award follows a long history of patrons fostering the arts. Our thanks to Claire Kramer and our dedicated juries for continuing to support Saskatchewan’s largest literary prize.”
Trevor Herriot is a naturalist, grassland conservationist, and author of several award-winning books, including Grass, Sky, Song and the national bestseller River in a Dry Land, which were short-listed for the Governor General’s Award for Non-fiction. Towards a Prairie Atonement, published in October 2016, took two Saskatchewan Book Awards. His most recent book, a novel, The Economy of Sparrows, was released in 2023. He is a recipient of the Kloppenberg Award for Literary Merit and the Saskatchewan Order of Merit. His essays and articles have appeared in The Globe & Mail, The Narwhal, Brick, Border Crossings, Canadian Geographic, and several anthologies. For more than twenty years he has been the voice of Birdline on CBC Radio Saskatchewan’s Blue Sky noon show.
About the Saskatchewan Foundation for the Arts
The Saskatchewan Foundation for the Arts (SFFA) is a public Foundation dedicated solely to creating a legacy of financial support for the arts and artists in Saskatchewan, through the generous financial support of individuals, organizations, and corporations.
http://www.saskartsfoundation.com/
Gursh Barnard: CEO & Chair.
Tel: 306-737-8980
E-mail: info@saskartsfoundation.com