No sooner has Donna Bailey Nurse finished reading true stories as a member of the 2018 Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Non-fiction jury than she will begin immersing herself in novels and short fiction as a member of the jury for the 2019 Scotiabank Giller Prize. Nurse is one of five individuals announced today as the jury of Canada’s most lucrative prize for English-language fiction.

Elana Rabinovitch, executive director of the Giller Prize, revealed the five-person jury for the award’s 26th anniversary. Novelist and academic Randy Boyagoda will serve as jury chair; the other members are José Teodoro, Scottish-born writer Aminatta Forna, and Bosnian-American author Aleksandar Hemon.

Boyagoda, who is vice-president of St. Michael’s College at the University of Toronto, is the author, most recently of the novel Original Prin. His debut, Governor of the Northern Province, was nominated for the Giller in 2006.

Nurse is a literary critic, editor, and journalist who has also worked as curator of reading series with the Toronto Public Library and the Art Gallery of Ontario.

Teodoro is a playwright and film critic, and also a frequent reviewer for Q&Q.

Born in Scotland, raised in Sierra Leone, and now resident of Arlington, Virginia, Forna’s 2010 novel The Memory of Love won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for best book. She is a previous recipient of the Windham Campbell Award.

Hemon is best known as the author of the novel The Lazarus Project and the story collection Love and Obstacles. He has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and a MacArthur Foundation genius grant, among other awards and recognitions.

Once again, Rakuten Kobo is providing e-readers for each of the five jurors, who will be able to read submissions electronically as well as in print. The five-member jury will determine a longlist of books that will be unveiled in St. John’s, Newfoundland, in September. The shortlist will be announced later that month, followed by the winner in November. The Scotiabank Giller Prize carries a cash purse of $100,000 for the winner and $10,000 for each of the finalists.