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Five finalists have been chosen from more than 2,300 entries from across the country
The Grand Prize winner, to be announced April 17, will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and a writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity
CBC Books, CBC’s online home for literary content, together with its partners the Canada Council for the Arts and Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, have announced the finalists for the 2025 CBC Short Story Prize.
The finalists are:
- Love is the Enemy by Vincent Anioke (Waterloo, Ont.)
- Ghostworlds by Trent Lewin (Waterloo, Ont.)
- You (Streetcar at Night) by Dorian McNamara (Halifax)
- Lessons from a peach by Emi Sasagawa (Vancouver)
- My Father's Soil by Zeina Sleiman (Edmonton)
The entries were selected from more than 2,300 submissions received from across Canada. The public can read the shortlisted stories on cbcbooks.ca. The winner of this year’s prize will be announced on Thursday, April 17.
The 2025 CBC Short Story Prize jurors are Conor Kerr, Kudakwashe Rutendo and Michael Christie.
Conor Kerr is a Métis/Ukrainian writer who hails from many prairie towns and cities, including Saskatoon. A 2022 CBC Books writer to watch, his previous works include the poetry collection Old Gods and the novel Avenue of Champions, which was longlisted for the 2022 Giller Prize, was a finalist for the 2022 Amazon Canada First Novel Award and won the ReLit award the same year. In 2024, his book Prairie Edge was shortlisted for the 2024 Giller Prize. Kerr currently teaches creative writing at the University of Alberta in Edmonton.
Kudakwashe Rutendo is an actor who fell in love with the stage by performing live poetry. Most recently, she starred in Backspot, a drama directed by D.W. Waterson and produced by Elliot Page and Page Boy Productions. Rutendo was selected as one of TIFF's 2023 Rising Stars and recently named by Hollywood Reporter as a rising star in the 2024 Women in Canada Entertainment issue. Rutendo was one of the Canada Reads 2024 contenders where she championed the linked short story collection Shut Up You're Pretty written by Téa Mutonji.
Michael Christie has become one of Canada's most acclaimed writers. His 2011 short story collection, The Beggar's Garden, won the Vancouver Book Award and was a finalist for the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize. His 2015 novel, If I Fall, If I Die, won the Northern Lit Award and was longlisted for the Giller Prize. His novel Greenwood won the 2020 Arthur Ellis Award (now the Canadian Crime Writing Awards) for best novel and was also longlisted for the Giller Prize.
The Grand Prize winner will receive a cash prize of $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity and will be published on the CBC Books website. The four other finalists will each receive $1000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and will be published on CBC Books.
Visit cbcbooks.ca for the complete CBC Short Story Prize longlist or for more information on the CBC Literary Prizes.
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About CBC Books
Home to Canada Reads, Bookends with Mattea Roach, The Next Chapter, and the CBC Literary Prizes, CBC Books connects Canadians with books, encouraging a shared love of reading and writing. For book news, writing challenges, reading lists, book recommendations and more, visit cbcbooks.ca
About CBC/Radio-Canada
CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada’s national public broadcaster. Through our mandate to inform, enlighten and entertain, we play a central role in strengthening Canadian culture. As Canada’s trusted news source, we offer a uniquely Canadian perspective on news, current affairs and world affairs. Our distinctively homegrown entertainment programming draws audiences from across the country. Deeply rooted in communities, CBC/Radio-Canada offers diverse content in English, French and eight Indigenous languages: Dëne Sųłıné, Dene Kǝdǝ́, Dene Zhatıé, Eastern Cree, Dinjii Zhuʼ Ginjik, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun and Tłı̨chǫ. We also deliver content in Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Punjabi and Tagalog, as well as both official languages, through Radio Canada International (RCI). We are leading the transformation to meet the needs of Canadians in a digital world.
About Canada Council for the Arts
The Canada Council for the Arts is Canada’s public arts funder, with a mandate to "foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts."
The Council’s grants, services, initiatives, prizes, and payments contribute to the vibrancy of a creative and diverse arts and literary scene and support its presence across Canada and abroad. The Council’s investments foster greater engagement in the arts among Canadians and international audiences.
The Council’s Public Lending Right (PLR) program makes annual payments to creators whose works are held in Canadian public libraries.
About Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity
Founded in 1933, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity is a learning organization built upon an extraordinary legacy of excellence in artistic and creative development. What started as a single course in drama has grown to become the global organization leading in arts, culture, and creativity across dozens of disciplines. From our home on Treaty 7 territory in the stunning Canadian Rocky Mountains, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity aims to inspire everyone who attends our campus – artists, leaders, and thinkers – to unleash their creative potential and realize their unique contribution to society through cross-disciplinary learning opportunities, world-class performances, and public outreach.
For further information, contact:
Donnicia Ellis-Dawson, CBC PR
donnicia.ellis-dawson@cbc.ca
