Claire Tacon wins Metcalf-Rooke award

I could tell that Julian Assange had been rooting through my sock drawer, looking for secrets, because the condoms are still there. And although it seems likely that anyone reading this blog has already found this news elsewhere, I don’t want to be accused of hiding secrets.

So: Claire Tacon won the Metcalf-Rooke Award for her novel In The Field.

I am absolutely certain that this one must be about rabbits — I mean, look at the title. Or you could look at the publisher’s summary, if you believe that kind of thing.

2010 Metcalf-Rooke Award shortlist

One search term that hits this blog with regularity in the fall is “Metcalf-Rooke shortlist.” So, in the spirit of letting you know whatever I know (so that Julian Assange and his friends don’t start snooping through my underwear drawer), here’s the 2010 shortlist, just announced at Thirsty:

Laura Boudreau, Cat in Winter
Nancy Cullen, The Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Colette Maitland, Keeping the Peace
Anakana Schofield, Malarky: A Novel in Episodes
Claire Tacon, In the Field
Sonia Tilson, The Monkey-Puzzle Tree
Alice Peterson, All the Voices Cry

I note that my status as token male Metcalf-Rooke winner will remain intact this year.

Metcalf-Rooke shortlist

Turning aside from that Giller sideshow, in other literary award news, Biblioasis has released the shortlist for the 2009 Metcalf-Rooke Award:

Laura Boudreau. A Cat Starving Its Way Through Winter (Short Fiction)

Daniel Griffin. Stopping for Strangers (Short Fiction)

Lauro Palomba. Measuring Spoons (Novel)

A. J. Somerset. Combat Camera (Novel)

Cathy Stonehouse. Something About the Animals (Short Fiction)

Well. Ahem.

I’m gonna go have me a Scotch.

The major question now is, what to wear to the gala?