Canadians Take Home Three Lammy Awards for Best LGBTQ Literature

Lee Suksi Lambda Literary.jpeg
 

The winners of the 2021 Lammy Awards were announced last week, and literary circles north of the border were abuzz with excitement for three Canadians who took home prestigious prizes.

With categories that include humour, romance, and biography, the Lammy Awards recognize outstanding writing in LGBTQ literature and are held by the Lamba Literary Foundation, an organization based in New York, USA that serves LGBTQ writers and readers with literary festivals, writers retreats, and more.

In no particular order are the Canadian winners below:

LGBTQ Erotica

 LGBTQ Anthology

LGBTQ Mystery

Congrats to all involved in bringing these books into the world! Check out below for more info on each of these award-winning titles.

THE NERVES

Lee Suksi
Metatron Press

It’s no secret that we adore Suksi’s writing as Shrapnel has published an excerpt and a literary essay on The Nerves.

The Nerves subverts the literary approach to sexuality by treating the erotic not as a site of anxiety but of reverie. Set in an imaginary world where our sense memories tell us who we are.

Writing toward sensitivity and ecstasy, exploring touch as healing abandon, The Nerves is charged with desire, devotion, and creative fantasy. Through a series of joyful encounters, Suksi reminds us that pleasure can be abundant, nuanced and that it can heal. Engaging in a queer erotics of language, Suksi’s debut is a bundle of wet atmospheres, speaking to faith in touch.

LOVE AFTER THE END

Edited by Joshua Whitehead
Arsenal Pulp Press

This exciting and groundbreaking fiction collection showcases a number of new and emerging 2SQ (Two-Spirit and queer) Indigenous writers from across Turtle Island. These visionary authors show how queer Indigenous communities can bloom and thrive through utopian narratives that detail the vivacity and strength of 2SQness throughout its plight in the maw of settler colonialism's histories.

Here, readers will discover bioengineered AI rats, transplanted trees in space, the rise of a 2SQ resistance camp, a primer on how to survive Indigiqueerly, virtual reality applications, mother ships at sea, and the very bending of space-time continuums queered through NDN time. Love after the End demonstrates the imaginatively queer Two-Spirit futurisms we have all been dreaming of since 1492.

I HOPE YOU’RE LISTENING

Tom Ryan
Albert Whitman & Co.

This juvenile mystery novel features teenage gumshoes and a ’90s vibe—a great romp for fans of true crime.

In her small town, seventeen-year-old Delia “Dee” Skinner is known as the girl who wasn’t taken. Ten years ago, she witnessed the abduction of her best friend, Sibby. And though she told the police everything she remembered, it wasn’t enough. Sibby was never seen again. At night, Dee deals with her guilt by becoming someone else: the Seeker, the voice behind the popular true crime podcast Radio Silent, which features missing persons cases and works with online sleuths to solve them.

Nobody knows Dee’s the Seeker, and she plans to keep it that way. When another little girl goes missing, and the case is linked to Sibby’s disappearance, Dee has a chance to get answers, with the help of her virtual detectives and the intriguing new girl at school. But how much is she willing to reveal about herself in order to uncover the truth? Dee’s about to find out what’s really at stake in unraveling the mystery of the little girls who vanished.

If any Canadian winners of the 2021 Lammy Awards were left out of this article, please contact Jo Ramsay at editorial.director@shrapnelmagazine.com. Book descriptions are from the publishers’ sites, which are linked in this article.

 
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Jo Ramsay

is a Canadian media and publishing enthusiast who works as a literary assistant at P.S. Literary Agency as well as the editorial director of Shrapnel Magazine. She’s worked in publishing for over six years at places such as Simon and Schuster, Arsenal Pulp Press, PRISM International, Greystone Books, and This Magazine. She’s lived in Canada, the UK, and Japan.

Jo Ramsay