I Am a Truck

Book excerpt: Finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize A National Post Best Book of the Year A tender but lively debut novel about a man, a woman, and their Chevrolet dealer. Agathe and R jean Lapointe are about to celebrate their twentieth wedding anniversary when R jean's beloved Chevy Silverado is found abandoned at the side of the road--with no trace of R jean. Agathe handles her grief by fondling the shirts in the Big and Tall department at Hickey's Family Apparel and carrying on a relationship with a cigarette survey. As her hope dwindles, Agathe falls in with her spirited coworker, Debbie, who teaches Agathe about rock and roll, and with Martin Bureau, the one man who might know the truth about R jean's fate. Set against the landscape of rural Acadia, I Am a Truck is a funny and moving tale about the possibilities and impossibilities of love and loyalty. 2017 Scotiabank Giller Prize Jury Citation: French or English, stick or twist, Chevy or Ford? Michelle Winters has written an original, off-beat novel that explores the gaps between what people are and what they want to be. For a short book I am a Truck is bursting with huge appetites, for love and le rock-and-roll and cheese, for male friendship and takeout tea with the bag left in. Within the novel's distinctive Acadian setting French and English co-exist like old friends - comfortable, supple to each other's whims and rhythms, sometimes bickering but always contributing to this fine, very funny, fully-achieved novel about connection and misunderstanding. And trucks. "The wonder-packed drama of I Am a Truck plays itself out in the impossible intersection of a Coen brothers movie, a James M. Cain novel and a Looney Tunes feature. Michelle Winters has created a fresh novel overflowing with mystery, emotional complexity and a new and welcome breed of goofy charm." - Stuart Ross, author of Snowball, Dragonfly, Jew