Thomas Raddall
Atlantic Fiction Award

New writers: those with less than two years&#8217; creative writing experience and/or no short-form publications (e.g., short stories, personal essays, or poems in literary magazines, journals, anthologies, or chapbooks).
Emerging writers: those with more than two years&#8217; creative writing experience and/or numerous short-form publications.
Early-career authors: those with 1 or 2 book-length publications or the equivalent in book-length and short-form publications.
Established authors: those with 3 or 4 book-length publications.
Professional authors: those with 5 or more book-length publications.

One prize ($30,000) is awarded each year for a novel or a book of short fiction that was written by a full-time resident of Atlantic Canada and published and/or distributed for the first time in Canada in the year prior to the submission deadline. Additional finalists each receive $500.

The Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award was established in 1991 with an endowment by Thomas Head Raddall himself, and it continues with ongoing support from the Raddall family. The award honours the work of fiction writers in the Atlantic region and, as its original benefactor envisioned, provides “the gift of time and peace of mind” so essential to the creation of new work.

Inaugurated as a $5000 prize, the award has grown steadily under the Raddall family’s stewardship. Beginning in 2022, the prize amount was raised from $25,000 to $30,000.

A writer may win the Thomas Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award a maximum of three times. Young adult (YA) titles are ineligible for this award and should be submitted to the Ann Connor Brimer Award.

For more about this award, read “The Gift of Time” in Atlantic Books, a history of the Raddall Award by Alexander MacLeod.