The SWG is pleased to announce the winners of the 2025 John V. Hicks Long Manuscript Awards in Fiction:
First place: Louisa Ferguson for A Return
Blooming with lyricism that is both moving and poignant, A Return is a beautiful and timeless story of healing through connection, whether that be family, love, or the land that calls us home.
Louisa Ferguson is a multidisciplinary artist and writer whose work spans fiction, theatre, and visual art. A cofounder of Dancing Sky Theatre, she served as general manager and performer for over 25 years.
Recently, she returned to the role of storyteller in this summer's production of Fireside Stories III: Tell the Bees. Ferguson holds an MFA in Studio Art from the University of Saskatchewan, where her research explored artistic practice as an embodied response to landscape. She was awarded the University of Saskatchewan Graduate Thesis Award (Master's) in Fine Arts and Humanities, in recognition of outstanding research achievement.
Her current work engages with the more-than-human world, emphasizing reciprocity, kinship, and ecological entanglement.
Second place: Carol Gossner for Francine
Francine provides a rare and refreshing portrayal of an aging woman. Independent, fierce, and funny, Francine holds readers' attention as she navigates the treacherous terrain of family betrayal and secrecy. This novel celebrates not only forgiveness and mending of familial wounds but also the power and importance of intimate communities, those families we choose for ourselves.
Carol Gossner has been writing since childhood, but for several decades, this compulsion was delegated to composing Christmas letters and school subject lesson plans. It is only since her retirement that she has pursued publication. Since then, she has written a novel and a collection of short stories under the pseudonym Roberta Sommerfeld. Currently, she is polishing a third novel, revising a fourth, and composing a first draft of travel memoirs. Carol Gossner lives on a farm with her husband, Tom, and in close enough vicinity of their adult children and darling grandchildren. Her life is full.
Third place: Jason Heit for The Buck
The Buck is a tale of childhood and self-discovery, beautifully nostalgic in its capturing of the youthful point of view. Duplicitous in its seeming simplicity, the novel explores complex themes of hardship and survival, loss and love, confusion and clarity, failure and redemption.
Jason Heit was raised on a third-generation Saskatchewan grain farm and currently lives on an acreage near Pike Lake with his wife and children. His previous book, Kaidenberg’s Best Sons (Coteau 2019; Guernica Editions 2020) won two Saskatchewan Book Awards. The Buck is his first work for children.
Honourable Mention to Roni Muench for The Marginals
The Marginals is a gentle portrayal of the simple and subtle ways our family shapes our grief, growth, and identity. Rich and moving in its isolation, this story serves as a reminder that there is meaningful connection in the places and moments that divide us.
Roni Muench is a Registered Nurse. She won first place with Grain Literary Magazine in 2019. She was published with Grain prior and received an honourable mention with the Grain short fiction contest in 2023. She made the short list for the Craft Literary short fiction contest in 2025. Roni is currently editing her novel, The Marginals. Nursing and the North shapes much of her writing. Her roots on a small farm and travel in the Middle East, Russia, and, primarily the Canadian North also contribute to her stories. The land is much a part of her writing, as is nursing.
Our jury consisted of Canadian fiction writers Angie Abdou and Karen McBride:
Angie Abdou holds a Ph.D. in Creative Writing from the University of Calgary and has published seven books (and edited two collections of essays). Her first novel, The Bone Cage, was a finalist for Canada Reads 2011. Her most recent novel, In Case I Go (2017), was a finalist for the 2017 Banff Mountain Book Award in the fiction and poetry category. Angie's first book of nonfiction, a memoir called Home Ice: Reflections of a Reluctant Hockey Mom, hit the Canadian bestseller list and the #1 spot on Amazon Canada’s bestselling hockey books. She most recently released a mother-daughter-wilderness memoir called This One Wild Life. Angie is a Professor of Creative Writing at Athabasca University.
Karen McBride is an Algonquin Anishnaabe storyteller and artist from Timiskaming First Nation. Her acclaimed debut novel, Crow Winter, was shortlisted for the Ottawa Book Awards, the PMC Indigenous Literature Award, and the Sunburst Award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic. You can usually find her sipping coffee in her backyard with her sister and their wonderful dogs, Rosemerry and Pippin. Follow her on Instagram @kmcbridewrites.
The awards will be officially presented at the John V. Hicks Long Manuscript Awards in Fiction ceremony at the SWG Conference at the Parktown Hotel in Saskatoon on Friday, October 24, 2025, at 7:00 pm. This is a free public event: all are welcome. The three winners receive awards of $1,000, $650, and $350, respectively and will read from their winning manuscripts. More information about our conference is available here: https://skwriter.com/events-and-workshops/annual-conferenceagm
The SWG congratulates the winners of this year’s Awards, and thanks all of our submitting writers.
