Chatter THE MOST VALUABLE AUTHOR

The Scotiabank Giller Prize addressed a long-standing problem this year by cutting down the number of entries: while in previous years, the jurors had around six months to read over 150 books, this year, the number was down to 112. The change only sort-of solved the problem, however, as jurors still must read a book every day-andhalf – and it created a new one, as publishers limited to one entry were suddenly in a position where they had to pick a favourite child.

The grumbling around the changes has not affected the quality of the jury’s longlist itself — which is an excellent cross-section of great Canadian literature — but it does raise the question of whether there is a selection process that will make the publishers feel all their books and authors have a fair chance, while ensuring the long-suffering jurors don’t have to read as if they’re cramming for an exam every day for six months.

Luckily, a useful system already exists, and it comes from the most non-literary of sources: the National Hockey League.

Each year, the NHL hands out the Hart Trophy to the league’s MVP. The Hart is voted on by members of the Professional Hockey Writers Association; each voting member submits a ballot of their top-five choices, with each assigned points on a 10-7-5-3-1 basis. The top point-getter is named MVP.

There is no real equivalent to the PHWA in Canadian publishing, but there is a group that spends its time closely reading books the country has to offer: the lowly book critics. A group of 50 or so critics, chosen from a diverse set of publications across the country, would among them have read pretty much every Canadian book published in any given year. With each submitting a ballot using the tiered points system, the top 15 point-getters would be a fair and comprehensive longlist. The Giller jury can take it from there.

One tweak I’d make to the NHL system would be to have all the ballots be public, so that number-one picks that don’t make the longlist get a bit of attention, and so that critics can both defend their choices and generate some publicity for the books they champion.

The most appealing part of this system is that it opens up the prize to every work of fiction published, which should make authors and publishers happy. And having the heavy lifting of longlist selection done by a group of people who are already closely reading the books would save the jurors. The only people who might suffer in the end are the critics, who would have to deal with publishers letting them know their opinions are wrong. But we’re used to that.