Griggs

Terry Griggs was born and raised on Manitoulin Island, which is in Lake Huron in Ontario, and is the largest freshwater island in the world. Her parents ran a fishing lodge there, and Griggs spent her young years exploring the forests, shoreline, and many of the smaller islands nearby. From the time she was nine or ten, she knew she would become a writer. Though the family sold the lodge and relocated to London, Ontario, when Griggs was a teenager, she has recently moved back to Manitoulin...See more

Terry Griggs was born and raised on Manitoulin Island, which is in Lake Huron in Ontario, and is the largest freshwater island in the world. Her parents ran a fishing lodge there, and Griggs spent her young years exploring the forests, shoreline, and many of the smaller islands nearby. From the time she was nine or ten, she knew she would become a writer. Though the family sold the lodge and relocated to London, Ontario, when Griggs was a teenager, she has recently moved back to Manitoulin Island with her husband and her son. Just as Manitoulin Island has never left Terry Griggs's heart, it's spirit has permeated her writing. After the success of her first published collection of stories called Quickening, which was shortlisted for the 1990 Governor General's Award, Griggs went on to write her first novel, The Lusty Man." Published in 1995, the book is set in a small island community full of peculiar characters, and received widespread praise for the originality of the writing and the "rampant comic geography" Griggs brought to life. Her next novel, for young readers, was published in 2000 and is called Cat's Eye Corner; it has been shortlisted for multiple children's writing awards. Rogues' Wedding" marks Griggs's return to writing adult fiction and to the Manitoulin setting. Through the travels of Griffith Smolders and Avice Drinkwater, Griggs brings the natural beauty of the Lake Huron area and the uniqueness of small-town island life into existence for her readers. After its publication in 2002, Rogues' Wedding" was shortlisted for the Rogers Fiction Prize and appeared on many lists of the best books of that year, including "The Globe and Mail's. Terry Griggs also won theWriters' Trust of Canada's Marian Engel Award in 2003. Griggs is currently working on two sequels to Cat's Eye Corner" and another novel. See less