12 best Canadian fictions to read in 2019

Canada's top literary award for fiction writing, the Giller Prize is an annual award given for excellence in Canadian fiction and the winner is awarded C$100,000 ($75,330). The award was established in 1994 by Toronto businessman Jack Rabinovitch in honour of his wife and late literary journalist Doris Giller. The longlist of 12 books for this year's prize was announced on September 3 at an event hosted by 2018 winner Esi Edugyan. Prominent authors including Margaret Atwood and Andre Alexis have been longlisted out of 117 submissions, for their new books among 10 other authors. Meanwhile, the shortlist of five authors will be announced on September 30, and the winner will be revealed on November 18. Here we list down the 12 best Canadian fictions longlisted for the Giller Prize. Read on!

(Photo: Giller Prize official website)

'The Testament' is a sequel of 'The Handmaid's Tale' and it takes the popular dystopian story ahead. The book is also shortlisted for Booker Prize 2019.

(Photo: Chatto & Windus)

Set in Toronto's Eglinton West neighbourhood called Little Jamaica, 'Frying Plantain' is about Kara Davis who is caught between her Canadian nationality and her desire to be a Jamaican in the true sense. This debut book by Zalika depicts the mother-daughter equations and the tensions, and black identity in a white society.

(Photo: Dialogue Books)

'Dual Citizens' is about sisterhood, motherhood, art, personal goals and self-awareness. The novel traces the complicated lives of two sisters and the invisible strings that bind us to our loved ones for the best.

(Photo: Knopf)

'Immigrant City' is Bezmozgis' first collection of stories about immigrants. 'In these deeply felt, slyly humorous stories, Bezmozgis pleads no special causes but presents immigrant characters with all their contradictions and complexities, their earnest and divided hearts,' reads the book's blurb.

(Photo: HarperCollins Publishers)

The novel is 'A dazzling, immersive generational saga that charts a family's rise and fall, its secrets and inherited crimes, and conflicted relationship with the source of its fortune—trees,' reads the book's blurb.

(Photo: Hogarth)

'The Innocents' is a richly imagined story of hardship and survival of a brother and a sister. The story explores the bond between the siblings and is about the barbarity of the world, and the wonders and strangeness of individuals.

(Photo: Doubleday Canada)

'In the Sicily of the ’50s, still haunted by memories of Fascism and the war, Giuseppe Tomasi, the last Prince of Lampedusa, struggles to complete the novel that will be his lasting legacy, 'The Leopard',' reads the book's blurb.

(Photo: Picador)

Set in Toronto, 'Reproduction' is a poignant love story. As the title suggests, it explores the way families are created. 'Reproduction is a profoundly insightful exploration of the bizarre ways people become bonded that insists that family isn't a matter of blood,' reads the book's blurb.

(Photo: Audible Audiobook)

Inspired by Alex Colville's paintings, 'Late Breaking' is about a small and aging community. This is a collection of short fictions which are linked. The story explores the vulnerability of the elders and highlights that love, sex, and heartbreak are not only experienced by the young.

(Photo: Biblioasis)

This is Megan Gail Coles’ debut novel is Gothic story set in 21st century Newfoundland. It is about two women who face the traumas of their past in order to overcome the present and have a better a future.

(Photo: House of Anansi)

'Dream Sequence' is a story about psychological damage, stalking, and the perils of being a celebrity. The story follows a young, narcissistic actor Henry Banks and newly-divorced Kristin. Henry is brilliant at his job but can go to any extent to be the best; unknowingly he has become an important part of Kristin's life. She is obsessed with the actor, so much that she decides to fly to London to meet Henry to take theri relationship ahead.

(Photo: Jonathan Cape)