The City of Ottawa has announced the 13 books shortlisted for the 2024 Ottawa Book Awards.

The annual awards recognize books of literary excellence in both English and French written by authors who live in Ottawa. Winners receive $7,500, and finalists receive $1,000.

English Fiction

• The Girl Who Cried Diamonds and Other Stories by Rebecca Hirsch Garcia (ECW Press)
• Elementary Particles by Sneha Madhavan-Reese (Brick Books)
• The Family Code by Wayne Ng (Guernica Editions) 
• An Unruly Little Animal by Scott Randall (DC Books)
• Vixen by Sandra Ridley (Book*hug Press)

English Nonfiction

• Keep My Memory Safe: Fook Soo Am, The Pagoda by Stephanie Chitpin (Baraka Books)
• Wine Witch on Fire: Rising From the Ashes of Divorce, Defamation, and Drinking Too Much by Natalie MacLean (Dundurn Press)
• Agent of Change: My Life Fighting Terrorists, Spies and Institutional Racism by Huda Mukbil (McGill-Queens University Press)
• Outsider: An Old Man, a Mountain and the Search for a Hidden Past by Brett Popplewell (HarperCollins Publishers)
• Clara at the Door with a Revolver: The Scandalous Black Suspect, the Exemplary White Son, and the Murder That Shocked Toronto by Carolyn Whitzman (University of British Columbia Press)

French Fiction

• Prise Deux by Pierre-Luc Bélanger (Les Éditions David) 
• Deux heures avant la fin de l’été by Sébastien Pierroz (Les Éditions David) 
• Jaz by Michèle Vinet (Les Éditions L’Interligne) 

Due to an insufficient number of entries, there will be no prize awarded for French nonfiction this year.

Winners will be announced on Oct. 16.