20-05-2025
Greg Kearney, Patricia J. Parsons and Natalie Sue finalists for $25K Leacock Medal for Canadian humour writing
Canadian writers Greg Kearney, Patricia J. Parsons and Natalie Sue have made the shortlist for the 2025 Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour.
The $25,000 prize is one of the oldest of its kind, established in 1947 to support the growth of Canadian humour writing.
Kearney is on the shortlist for his book An Evening With Birdy O'Day, which follows Roland Keener, an aging hairstylist in Winnipeg who enjoys a quiet, predictable life with his partner of 25 years, Tony.
That calm is disrupted when Birdy O'Day —Roland's first love — returns to the city for his debut concert, forcing Roland to confront the complicated past that took them from lovers to strangers.
Kearney is a writer who divides his time between Toronto and Winnipeg. His previous works include the short story collections Mommy Daddy Baby and Pretty, which received a ReLit Award, as well as the novel The Desperates, which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award. His plays have been staged at Theatre Passe Muraille and Buddies in Bad Times Theatre.
Parsons is recognized for her novel We Came From Away: That Summer on the Rock. In We Came From Away: That Summer on the Rock, Nora Houlihan, a proud Newfoundlander nearing her 100th birthday, insists her far-flung children and grandchildren return home to celebrate.
She plans a cross-island tour to reconnect them with the province they left — but unexpected family secrets emerge, changing everyone in surprising ways.
Parsons is a Toronto-based writer with a background in health communications and academic textbook writing.
Sue is on the shortlist for her book I Hope This Finds You Well, which follows Jolene, an anxious admin for Supershops, Inc., as she navigates a workplace of unsatisfactory colleagues.
Jolene copes with the frustrations of her office job through passive aggressive messages in emails that are never meant to be seen.
When she is caught and reprimanded, an IT mishap results in her having access to the confidential messages of her superiors. Can Jolene use this to the advantage of her career?
Sue is a Calgary-based writer of Iranian and British descent. I Hope This Finds You Well is her debut novel.
The winner will be revealed on June 21.
The prize is named in honour of Ontario writer Stephen Leacock, a humorist and popular author in the first half of the 20th century. His books include Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town, published in 1912, and Literary Lapses, published in 1910.
The prize has been funded by the Dunkley Charitable Foundation since the fall of 2020. The organization is based in Orillia, Ont., the town that inspired the fictional community of Mariposa in Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town. Leacock had a summer estate there.
Last year's winner was Patrick deWitt for The Librarianist.
Other past winners include Wayne Johnston, Heidi L.M Jacobs, Robertson Davies, Pierre Berton, Farley Mowat, Paul Quarrington, Mordecai Richler, Stuart McLean, Terry Fallis, Susan Juby and Cassie Stocks.
The Stephen Leacock Associates also announced the winners of the 2025 Student Humorous Short Story Competition.
Nina Yu from Marc Garneau Collegiate Institute won first place for Error 404: The Life of a Search Engine. The runners-up are A Scroll Down Memory Lane by Iris Matthews and The Great Escape by Hamza Siddiqi.
