Mary Swan, whose début novel, The Boys in the Trees, is on the Scotiabank Giller Prize short list, will make her Coast début at 8 p.m., Friday, Oct. 24, at the Sunshine Coast Arts Centre in Sechelt.
The Boys in the Trees explores how a fictitious, late 19th-century Canadian town deals with a horrific crime. When the father of a young family, newly arrived in Canada, becomes the centre of a local embezzlement scandal, he kills his family and is sentenced to death. The novel is then taken over by a cross-section of locals, who share their thoughts about the family. Reviewers praised the book, calling it an "arresting and devastatingly assured first novel," (Chatelaine magazine), and from the New York Times: "Swan's prose is tense, rhythmic and emotionally evocative."
Swan lives in Guelph, Ont. and comes to Sechelt between engagements at the Vancouver International Writers and Readers Festival. She is one of five writers named to the Giller prize short list. The winner will be announced Nov. 11 in Toronto.
In 2001, Swan won the prestigious O. Henry Award for short fiction for her story, The Deep. Her writing has appeared in several Canadian literary magazines, including The Malahat Review, the Ontario Review, and Best Canadian Stories, as well as U.S. publications such as Harper's magazine.
Mary Swan's reading, the first of the season, at the Arts Centre, is sponsored by the Canada Council for the Arts, with the assistance of the Arts Council's literary committee. Admission is free.
