The regional shortlists for the 2011 Commonwealth Writers' Prize were recently announced and Canada swept the Best Book and Best First Book lists for our region, Canada and the Caribbean.

At the LPG we're especially happy to congratulate two of the authors and their publishers on the Best First Book list -- Alexander MacLeod for Light Lifting (Biblioasis) and Katrina Best for Bird Eat Bird (Insomniac Press).

The regional winners will be announced on March 3rd before going on to compete in the finals, which will take place at the Sydney Writers' Festival in Australia in May.

For the full shortlist in all categories, please visit the Commonwealth Writers' Prize website.