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Carrie Snyder, Miriam Toews among finalists for Writers' Trust Fiction Prize

Author Carrie Snyder is shown in a handout photo. When celebrated short story writer Snyder decided to explore her newfound love for long-distance running through her first novel two years ago, she found inspiration from the 1928 Summer Olympics, when women's athletics debuted. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO
Original Publication Date October 01, 2014 - 8:10 AM

TORONTO - When celebrated short story writer Carrie Snyder decided to explore her newfound love for long-distance running through her first novel two years ago, she found inspiration from the 1928 Summer Olympics, when women's athletics debuted.

"It was the first Games that women were allowed to compete at in track and field events, and Canada sent quite a small team," she said in a telephone interview from her home in Waterloo, Ont. "They were called the Matchless Six, so there were six women on the team and they came back with a bunch of medals.

"They did really, really well, really performed above expectations."

Snyder then imagined a fictional female character competing in the 800-metre race at those Games and made her the protagonist of "Girl Runner" (House of Anansi), which on Wednesday made the short list for the $25,000 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.

Other finalists for this year's prize include Toronto-based Miriam Toews, who won the award for 2008's "The Flying Troutmans" and is in the running now with "All My Puny Sorrows" (Knopf Canada). The heartbreaking story of a writer dealing with her sister's depression is also on the long list for the Scotiabank Giller Prize.

"It felt like I'd been zapped with an electrical shock when I saw the news," Snyder said of hearing she'd made the Writers' Trust short list. "It was kind of unexpected, because the book wasn't on the Giller long list."

Yet "Girl Runner" did have a tremendous amount of buzz surrounding it at last year's Frankfurt Book Fair, according to her publisher, and it's since been sold into nine territories. Snyder said its U.S. publication through HarperCollins is set for February and its U.K. release is scheduled for March.

"It's a Canadian setting, a Canadian heroine, a Canadian story, and yet somehow it's connected elsewhere," said the 2012 Governor General's Literary Award finalist for the short-story collection "The Juliet Stories."

"I think it's the narrator herself. She's just such a strong character and kind of a complex, haunted character, in a way. She's just so interesting. I still find myself wondering about her and thinking about her."

That narrator is Aganetha (Aggie) Smart, who competed in 800-metre race at the 1928 Olympics and is now 104, living in a nursing home in southern Ontario, "alone and forgotten by history." Her life takes an unexpected turn when two young strangers bring her to her childhood family farm.

Snyder said Aggie's 104-year-old voice came to her even before she knew who the character was. As she wrote in that voice, she also wrote from the perspective of a younger Aggie, and eventually pieced the two together.

During her research, she pored over archives of the Toronto Daily Star on microfilm and "was fascinated to discover that the 1920s was a time when, at least in Toronto and urban areas, there were women sports."

"Women were part of teams and softball was very popular and the games were reported on in the newspapers," said Snyder, a mother of four who took up running in 2011 and has since completed a triathlon and a marathon.

"The softball games were being reported on like news, women's softball, and track and field events, too. So it was almost like there was this little period of time when women as athletes were being accepted and then it sort of vanished again with World War Two. It shrank a lot during the Depression and then it just vanished all together.

"It was almost shocking to discover."

Other shortlisted authors for this year's Writers' Trust fiction prize include 1998 finalist Andre Alexis of Toronto for "Pastoral" (Coach House Books), Steven Galloway of New Westminster, B.C. for "The Confabulist" (Knopf Canada) and Toronto's K.D. Miller for "All Saints" (Biblioasis).

Jury members Neil Bissoondath, Helen Humphreys and George Murray chose the finalists from 127 books submitted by 52 publishers.

Organizers also announced finalists for this year's $10,000 Writers' Trust/McClelland and Stewart Journey Prize, which recognizes short stories by new and developing writers.

They are Tyler Keevil of Cheltenham, England for "Sealskin" (The New Orphic Review), Vancouver's Lori McNulty for "Monsoon Season" (Descant) and Clea Young of Vancouver for "Juvenile" (The Fiddlehead).

Winners will be announced Nov. 4 in Toronto.

— Follow @VictoriaAhearn on Twitter.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2014
The Canadian Press

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