Nalo Hopkinson won the C$3,000 (about US$2,160) Sunburst Award for Excellence in Canadian Literature of the Fantastic for her novel Blackheart Man. The author is now a three-time winner of the prize, having previously taken the honors for Skin Folk (2003) and The New Moon's Arms (2008).
The judges wrote: "Blackheart Man is sublime, bringing an extraordinary landscape of literary, magical, and cultural history together in a new world. The influence of magic is discreet, almost invisible, a sweet low hum that sets the tone as a whole: good natured, optimistic, fun, but serious, too. The characters' struggles are multivalent; interpersonal, political, and ethical questions are explored through a complex narrative that places identity within and without the individual. The novel gains strength from the windows it opens into our world--the history of slave revolts, the history of colonialism, the slightly topsy-turvy effect of living in a world so like (and unlike) our own. Ultimately, Blackheart Man is a magical book with depth, wisdom, and lightness of touch, challenging the reader to widen their scope on the genre."