CBC Bookies Nominees List

Best Science Fiction or Fantasy Book

Darwin's Bastards (ed. Zsuzsi Gartner)

A Book of Tongues (Gemma Files)

Under Heaven (Guy Gavriel Kay)

Zero History (William Gibson)

Watch (Robert J. Sawyer)

 

Best Thriller, Mystery or Horror Book

Revenge of the Lobster Lover (Hilary MacLeod)

Negative Image (Vicki Delany)

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (Stieg Larsson)

Crime Machine (Giles Blunt)

The Passage (Justin Cronin)

 

Best Romance Book

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (Helen Simonson)

Happy Ever After (Nora Roberts)

I'll Be Home for Christmas (Fern Michaels)

Iron Duke (Meljean Brook)

Bayou Moon (Ilona Andrews)

 

Best Young Adult Book

Dear George Clooney, Please Marry My Mom (Susin Nielsen)

Mockingjay (Suzanne Collins)

Plain Kate (Erin Bow)

The Reckoning (Kelley Armstrong)

The Secret Fiend (Shane Peacock)

 

Best Poetry Collection

Indexical Elegies (Jon Paul Fiorentino)

Patternicity (Jim Johnstone)

For and Against (Sharon McCartney)

Bloom (Michael Lista)

Nox (Anne Carson)

 

Best Short Story Collection

Greedy Little Eyes (Billie Livingston)

This Cake is for the Party (Sarah Selecky)

Light Lifting (Alexander MacLeod)

Chimerascope (Douglas Smith)

Alone With You (Marisa Silver)

 

Best Comic or Graphic Novel

Tangles (Sarah Leavitt)

Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour (Bryan Lee O'Malley)

Sweet Tooth Vol. 1 (Jeff Lemire)

 X'ed Out (Charles Burns)

Duncan the Wonder Dog (Adam Hines)

 

Best Non-Fiction Book

One Bird's Choice (Iain Reid)

The Tiger (John Vaillant)

Animal Talk (Joyce Grant Smith)

Cleopatra: A Life (Stacy Schiff)

Let's Take the Long Way Home (Gail Caldwell)

 

Best Relationship

Henry and L from L (and things come apart) (Ian Orti)

Iain and his parents from One Bird's Choice (Iain Reid)

Skippy and Ruprecht from Skippy Dies (Paul Murray)

Parrot and Olivier from Parrot and Olivier in America (Peter Carey)

Gail and Caroline from Let's Take the Long Way Home (Gail Caldwell)

 

Best Character

Major Karnage from Major Karnage (Gord Zajac)

Armand Gamache from Bury Your Dead (Louise Penny)

Jean Vale Horemarsh from Practical Jean (Trevor Cole)

Nanabush from Motorcycles and Sweetgrass (Drew Hayden Taylor)

Vicki Dolson from Cool Water (Dianne Warren)

 

Best Scene

Jack's escape in Room (Emma Donoghue)

Wayne asks for a bathing suit in Annabel (Kathleen Winters)

Amy protects Peter in The Passage (Justin Cronin)

The guide fashions skis in The Tiger (John Vaillant)

Finding Crispin Salvador in Ilustrado (Miguel Syjuco)

 

Best Book Cover

The Imperfectionists (Tom Rachman)

Cigar Box Banjo (Paul Quarrington)

Apocalypse for Beginners (Nicolas Dickner)

Kiss the Joy as it Flies (Sheree Fitch)

Fauna (Alissa York)

 

Best Overall Book

Far to Go (Alison Pick)

This Cake is for the Party (Sarah Selecky)

The Tiger (John Vaillant)

Annabel (Kathleen Winter)

Room (Emma Donoghue)

 

Best Opening Line

"One bullet can really f**k up your day." -- Baked (Mark Haskell Smith)

"The house my father left behind in Fargo, North Dakota was never really a house at all. Always, instead, it was an idea of itself." -- The Sentimentalists (Johanna Skibsrud)

"Today I'm five. I was four last night going to sleep in Wardrobe, but when I wake up in Bed in the dark I'm changed to five, abracadabra. Before that I was three, then two, then one, then zero. 'Was I minus numbers?' 'Hmm?' Ma does a big stretch. 'Up in Heaven. Was I minus one, minus two, minus three - ?' " -- Room (Emma Donoghue)

"George Washington Crosby began to hallucinate eight days before he died." -- Tinkers (Paul Harding)

"Air this thin turns anyone into a mystic." -- Every Lost Country (Steven Heighton) 

 

Best Book-based Movie

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

True Grit

Barney's Version

The King's Speech

127 Hours

 

Best New Writer

Tom Rachman

Sarah Selecky

Alexander MacLeod

Matthew Hooton

Johanna Skibsrud

 

The Bookies will be revealed on February 24.