Best Canadian Fiction: The 2023 Karissa Reads Books Literary Awards

Hello and welcome to the Sixth Annual Karissa Reads Books Literary Awards! This is my annual occasion of looking back at what I’ve read and choosing the best ones in categories I’ve selected. It’s an entirely arbitrary process as I both choose the categories and the winners and the prize is nothing more than whatever warm feeling the author may have inside if they ever stumble across this corner of the internet.

Today we begin with the category of Best Canadian Fiction. I always try and read as much Canadian writing as I can and I may be biased (probably) but I believe there is some truly fantastic writing and creativity coming out of our country. And where much of our media and arts seems to be overshadowed and influenced by the United States, I find that in our creative writing, Canada still holds a unique voice.

I read a lot of great Canadians this year and so here is a list of some of the best from my 2023 reading:

Sea of Tranquility – Emily St. John Mandel

Pull of the Stars – Emma Donoghue

We Should Not Be Afraid of the Sky – Emma Hooper

The Certainties – Aislinn Hunter

Bad Cree – Jessica John

Away From the Dead – David Bergen

And the Winner:

Girlfriend on Mars – Deborah Willis

Each time I’ve had Best Canadian Fiction as a category in these awards, I’ve struggled with whether it means Best Book Written by a Canadian or Best Book that Says Something About Canada. (You can see previous year’s winners here, here, here, and here.) This year as I looked over my favourites from Canadian writers, I saw once again a wide variety of settings and voices. Sea of Tranquility is set partially in Canada but also partially on the Moon. Pull of the Stars is set in Ireland while We Should Not Be Afraid of the Sky takes place in the Roman Empire. Away From the Dead takes place in what is now Ukraine but reveals a Canadian connection at the end.

This year I opted not to limit myself to books that speak specifically to a Canadian experience, primarily because that isn’t the type of book I see when I look over this list. I chose Girlfriend on Mars mostly because I just really enjoyed and found a lot in it that resonated with me. I did enjoy the parts set in Vancouver (Even though those parts featured a character who actually never left his apartment.) Having lived for 12 years in Vancouver, so much of the setting there felt familiar and accurate. From the types of characters who live in the city to the park Kevin goes to that I used to live down the street from to the food they eat and the culture they exist within. But Girlfriend on Mars is also a story that takes the reader to, well, Mars. And maybe that captures something about Canadians too.