Esi Edugyan (Alana Paterson)

Esi Edugyan has emerged as the 2018 award-season frontrunner with this morning’s Scotiabank Giller Prize shortlist announcement. The Victoria author’s epic novel, Washington Black, is nominated for the $100,000 award. She is also up for the Man Booker Prize and the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize.

Jurors Kamal Al-Solaylee, Maxine Bailey, Philip Hensher, and Heather O’Neill announced the shortlisted titles at an event in Toronto. Selected from the longlist of 12, the five finalists are:

• French Exit, Patrick deWitt (House of Anansi Press)
• Songs for the Cold of Heart, Eric Dupont; Peter McCambridge, trans. (QC Fiction/Baraka Books)
• Washington Black, Esi Edugyan (Patrick Crean Editions/HarperCollins)
• Motherhood, Sheila Heti (Knopf Canada)
• An Ocean of Minutes, Thea Lim (Viking Canada)

The finalists will embark on a seven-city reading tour before the winner is announced on Nov. 19 at a gala event hosted by Rick Mercer.