Writers' Trust of Canada

Writers' Trust of Canada On a mission to support Canadian writers and writing.

06/24/2026

Anishinaabe writer, broadcaster and arts leader Jeese Wente pulls inspiration from these Canadian places. 🍁 From writers, to readers.

Canadian authors share their must-read Canadian books 🍁 Among the many special announcements and events slated for this ...
06/22/2026

Canadian authors share their must-read Canadian books 🍁

Among the many special announcements and events slated for this exciting year is the ongoing WT50 author video series currently releasing on our socials, where notable Canadian writers and WT honourees share the books, authors, and experiences that shaped them and our country.

From writers, to readers, follow along for their book recommendations.

LINK: https://www.writerstrust.com/recommended-reading/wt50-reading-list

06/20/2026

Who is one contemporary Canadian writer you should read right now?

Our Summer Reading List goes live this Monday, featuring must-read recommendations from Canadian literary legend Anuja Varghese and more. Join Canada’s biggest book club!

06/18/2026

Writers’ Trust of Canada has been dedicated to advancing, nurturing, and celebrating Canadian writers like Anuja Varghese for the last 50 years. Follow us and discover the books that shape Canada!

The Weston International Award Presents: An Evening with Hanif Abdurraqib Join us on Monday, September 14 at the Royal O...
06/17/2026

The Weston International Award Presents: An Evening with Hanif Abdurraqib

Join us on Monday, September 14 at the Royal Ontario Museum, for an evening with the 2026 Weston International Award winner, hosted by Ali Hassan of CBC’s Canada Reads (CBC Books). In a creative and wide-ranging talk, he will bring his unique and rare intellect to the role of nonfiction in our society, and his relationship to it as someone from an unconventional background. He’ll then sit down for wide-ranging and free-wheeling conversation with a member of the award jury and author Tessa McWatt.

The $75,000 Weston International Award honours the career achievement of an international author for a body of nonfiction work. The past winners are Robert Macfarlane, Pankaj Mishra, and Leslie Jamison. It is a companion prize to the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction, now in its 16th year and also valued at $75,000.

Both are supported by The Hilary and Galen Weston Foundation through a multiyear funding commitment. Collectively, the Weston Prizes deliver more than $230,000 to writers each year, including funds to finalists and adjudicators, representing one of the most generous commitments to nonfiction literature in the world. Writers’ Trust is grateful to the HGWF for its ongoing support of these essential prizes.

westoninternationalaward.com/Event

The selection process for the Weston International Award winner involves the creation of a confidential longlist of writ...
06/17/2026

The selection process for the Weston International Award winner involves the creation of a confidential longlist of writers by a three-person international advisory committee. A five-person Canadian jury of authors read books by the longlisted authors to select a sole prizewinner. Award eligibility requires the winning writer to have published a minimum of three nonfiction books of outstanding literary merit in the English language or in widely available translation.

The international advisory committee was composed of Jeffrey Brown (US), senior correspondent and chief arts correspondent for PBS NewsHour; David Shariatmadari (UK), British-Iranian author and literary editor at The Guardian; and Lola Shoneyin (Nigeria), author, literary festival director, and publisher.

The Canadian jury was comprised of Dean Jobb (Nova Scotia), columnist, professor and writer of historical true; Chase Joynt (Toronto), nonfiction writer and filmmaker; Tessa McWatt (London), author, librettist and professor of creative writing at the University of East Anglia; Christina Sharpe (Toronto), writer, scholar, past winner of the Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction; and Jenny Heijun Wills (Winnipeg), author and former Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Nonfiction winner.

Thank you to this year’s IAC and jury members for your work to select this year’s Weston International Award winner.

westoninternationalaward.com

Penguin Random House Canada

Congratulations to Hanif Abdurraqib, winner of the 2026 Weston International Award. Hanif Abdurraqib is an award-winnin...
06/17/2026

Congratulations to Hanif Abdurraqib, winner of the 2026 Weston International Award.

Hanif Abdurraqib is an award-winning essayist, cultural critic, and poet from Columbus, Ohio. His essays and music criticism have been published in The FADER, Pitchfork, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. His poetry has appeared in Muzzle and Vinyl, among other journals. Abdurraqib’s first collection of essays, They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us, was named a book of the year by NPR, Oprah Magazine, and The Chicago Tribune. His second collection, Go Ahead In The Rain, was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize (Kirkus Reviews) and was longlisted for the National Book Award (National Book Foundation). A Little Devil In America won the Andrew Carnegie Medal and the Gordon Burn Prize. In 2021, Abdurraqib was named a MacArthur Fellow and in 2024 a Windham-Campbell Prizes recipient. His newest release, There’s Always This Year, was longlisted for the National Book Award in Nonfiction and won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism.

◢ ◣ ◢ ◥ ◤

“The jury was enchanted by Hanif Abdurraqib’s ability to create a chorus of Black life through the shared languages of performance, music, and athleticism, that is utterly and authorially distinct. Whether writing on basketball, dance, music, or policing and violence, he calls out falsehoods, centres the marginalized, and affirms that ‘they can’t kill us until they kill us.’

Across Abdurraqib’s masterful and genre-bending work, the local and specific are spun inward and outward in ways that manifest a deep connection to people, place, and the world. He combines searing insights into Blackness and social inequality in the United States with themes of love and belonging, life and death. The work sings and stings and brings truths, both personal and communal, as he voices culture and its complexities with bold, compassionate lyricism and a real sense of love.”

—2026 Weston International Award Canadian jury (Dean Jobb, Chase Joynt, Tessa McWatt, Christina Sharpe, Jenny Heijun Wills)

westoninternationalaward.com

Penguin Random House Canada

06/15/2026

Anuja Varghese wants to talk romance. 💕 Our WT50 Summer Reading List goes live on June 22, fall in love with a new Canadian book!

06/12/2026

Graham Slaughter, winner of the 2026 RBC Award for Emerging Writers for his creative nonfiction work “The Perfect Home For Your Child”, extends heartfelt thanks to his friends, family, and the incredible writers who supported him.

06/11/2026

Julia Cottrelle, winner of the 2026 RBC Award for Emerging Writers for her short story “The Old Turtle Climb”, believes that talking about difficult subjects is one of the most essential parts of being human.

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