When I first tried to determine the most challenging part of this season’s prize-list reading, I was about to stare down the Giller longlist.

Yes, you, with your 5318 pages, of which I have read only 4012.

I’m not giving up, and I still have a week! And I know I could just jump ahead to Michael Ondaatje’s novel, because you didn’t shortlist the others I’ve missed, but they might make my personal shortlist, so I’m still trying.

[Edited to add: it was close, but I did finish them all. Summary here.]

But, when I reconsidered, I think it was really the combination.

A reasonable reader would not have opted to read all these lists in a single season.

But I am an unreasonable reader, with more reading time than usual this autumn. (And there was some overlap between the lists.)

Admittedly, now that I am nearing the end of the stacks, I’m getting tired.

That’s the last of it up there. You can see that I’ve left a lot of the longer works to the end.

(But I actually finished The Free World on Saturday, and have nearly finished Dan Vyleta’s novel today, but it’s too late in the evening to read any more of it, because it scares me. And, no, it’s not even fully dark yet.)

I don’t mind calculating the number of pages left to read, but I don’t want to divide it out and see if I’ll have time to eat and sleep and still finish reading before the announcements. (That scares me too, in a different way.)

And I’m not a natural with numbers: I can’t tell at a glance just how crazy this might be. (But the whole thing has been a little crazy and I just kept saying One Page at a Time. I picked that up somewhere.)

There have been a lot of autumn days in which I left the house with a book and all I did was travel somewhere and read (and drink coffee and eat sugar-y things).

There have been a lot of autumn days in which I didn’t leave the house at all, and all I did was read (and drink coffee and eat sugar-y things).

There were even two autumn days in which I didn’t leave my bed, and all I did was read (and sleep).

If this sounds like fun, you should try it. But it’s got a good dose of crazy in there too.

Alongside a lot a lot a lot A LOT of good story-telling. (It’s been worth it.)

Have I missed something?

Go ahead: add to my reading list. (I’ve only got two to finish, and three others to read.)

Cuz when all this is done, I think I’ll be choosing stories about vampires to fill my winter months.

Toronto Book Award
* Awarded October 13th to Rabindranath Maharaj’s novel
James FitzGerald’s What Disturbs Our Blood (Random House)
James King’s Étienne’s Alphabet (Cormorant Books)
Rabindranath Maharaj’s The Amazing Absorbing Boy (Knopf)
Nicholas Ruddock’s The Parabolist (Doubleday)
Alissa York’s Fauna (Random House)

ReLit Awards
* Awarded October 22nd
…to Tony Burgess for his story collection Ravenna Gets (Anvil Press)
…to Dani Couture for her poetry collection Sweet (Pedlar Press)
…to Craig Frances Power for his novel Blood Relatives  (Pedlar Press)
(You can find links to all the ReLit nominees whose work I’ve sampled here.)

Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize
* Awarded November 1st [Edited to add:  Patrick de Witt!]
Clark Blaise’s The Meagre Tarmac (Biblioasis)
Michael Chrisie’s The Beggar’s Garden (HarperCollins)
Patrick deWitt’s The Sisters Brothers (House of Anansi)
Esi Edugyan’s Half-Blood Blues (Thomas Allen)
Dan Vyleta’s The Quiet Twin (HarperCollins)

Scotiabank Giller Prize
* Awarded November 8th [Edited to add: Esi Edugyan!]
The Free World, David Bezmozgis (HarperCollins)  [Finished, review here!]
The Meagre Tarmac, Clarke Blaise (Biblioasis)
The Antagonist, Lynn Coady (House of Anansi)
The Beggar’s Garden, Michael Christie (HarperCollins)
The Sisters Brothers, Patrick DeWitt (House of Anansi)
Extensions, Myrna Dey (NeWest Press) *Reader’s Choice  [In the wings]
Half-Blood Blues, Esi Edugyan (Thomas Allen)
The Little Shadows, Marina Endicott (Doubleday)   [Finished, review here!]
Better Living though Plastic Explosives, Zsuzsi Gartner (Hamish Hamilton)
Solitaria, Genni Gunn (Signature Editions)
Into the Heart of the Country, Pauline Holdstock (HarperCollins)
A World Elsewhere, Wayne Johnston (Knopf)
The Return, Dany Laferrière, Trans. David Homel (Douglas &McIntyre)
Monoceros, Suzette Mayr (Coach House)
The Cat’s Table, Michael Ondaatje (McClelland &Stewart)  [Finished, review here!]
A Good Man, Guy Vanderhaeghe (McClelland &Stewart)    [Finished, review here!]
Touch, Alexi Zentner (Knopf)

Governor General’s Award for English Fiction
* Awarded November 15th [Edited to add: Patrick deWitt!]
David Bezmozgis’ The Free World (HarperCollins)  [Finished, review here!]
Patrick deWitt’s The Sisters Brothers (House of Anansi)
Esi Edugyan’s Half-Blood Blues (Thomas Allen)
Marina Endicott’s, The Little Shadows (Doubleday Canada)  [Finished, review here!]
Alexi Zentner’s, Touch (Alfred A. Knopf Canada)