A Minor Chorus: A Novel
*WINNER OF THE 2023 BC AND YUKON ETHEL WILSON PRIZE*
*LONGLISTED FOR THE 2022 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE*
NATIONAL BESTSELLER

An urgent first novel about breaching the prisons we live inside from one of Canada's most daring literary talents.


An unnamed narrator abandons his unfinished thesis and returns to northern Alberta in search of what eludes him: the shape of the novel he yearns to write, an autobiography of his rural hometown, the answers to existential questions about family, love, and happiness.

What ensues is a series of conversations, connections, and disconnections that reveals the texture of life in a town literature has left unexplored, where the friction between possibility and constraint provides an insistent background score.

Whether he's meeting with an auntie distraught over the imprisonment of her grandson, engaging in rez gossip with his cousin at a pow wow, or lingering in bed with a married man after a hotel room hookup, the narrator makes space for those in his orbit to divulge their private joys and miseries, testing the theory that storytelling can make us feel less lonely.

Populated by characters as alive and vast as the boreal forest, and culminating in a breathtaking crescendo, A Minor Chorus is a novel about how deeply entangled the sayable and unsayable can become-and about how ordinary life, when pressed, can produce hauntingly beautiful music.
1140914151
A Minor Chorus: A Novel
*WINNER OF THE 2023 BC AND YUKON ETHEL WILSON PRIZE*
*LONGLISTED FOR THE 2022 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE*
NATIONAL BESTSELLER

An urgent first novel about breaching the prisons we live inside from one of Canada's most daring literary talents.


An unnamed narrator abandons his unfinished thesis and returns to northern Alberta in search of what eludes him: the shape of the novel he yearns to write, an autobiography of his rural hometown, the answers to existential questions about family, love, and happiness.

What ensues is a series of conversations, connections, and disconnections that reveals the texture of life in a town literature has left unexplored, where the friction between possibility and constraint provides an insistent background score.

Whether he's meeting with an auntie distraught over the imprisonment of her grandson, engaging in rez gossip with his cousin at a pow wow, or lingering in bed with a married man after a hotel room hookup, the narrator makes space for those in his orbit to divulge their private joys and miseries, testing the theory that storytelling can make us feel less lonely.

Populated by characters as alive and vast as the boreal forest, and culminating in a breathtaking crescendo, A Minor Chorus is a novel about how deeply entangled the sayable and unsayable can become-and about how ordinary life, when pressed, can produce hauntingly beautiful music.
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A Minor Chorus: A Novel

A Minor Chorus: A Novel

by Billy-Ray Belcourt

Narrated by Jesse Nobess

Unabridged — 4 hours, 13 minutes

A Minor Chorus: A Novel

A Minor Chorus: A Novel

by Billy-Ray Belcourt

Narrated by Jesse Nobess

Unabridged — 4 hours, 13 minutes

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Overview

*WINNER OF THE 2023 BC AND YUKON ETHEL WILSON PRIZE*
*LONGLISTED FOR THE 2022 SCOTIABANK GILLER PRIZE*
NATIONAL BESTSELLER

An urgent first novel about breaching the prisons we live inside from one of Canada's most daring literary talents.


An unnamed narrator abandons his unfinished thesis and returns to northern Alberta in search of what eludes him: the shape of the novel he yearns to write, an autobiography of his rural hometown, the answers to existential questions about family, love, and happiness.

What ensues is a series of conversations, connections, and disconnections that reveals the texture of life in a town literature has left unexplored, where the friction between possibility and constraint provides an insistent background score.

Whether he's meeting with an auntie distraught over the imprisonment of her grandson, engaging in rez gossip with his cousin at a pow wow, or lingering in bed with a married man after a hotel room hookup, the narrator makes space for those in his orbit to divulge their private joys and miseries, testing the theory that storytelling can make us feel less lonely.

Populated by characters as alive and vast as the boreal forest, and culminating in a breathtaking crescendo, A Minor Chorus is a novel about how deeply entangled the sayable and unsayable can become-and about how ordinary life, when pressed, can produce hauntingly beautiful music.

Editorial Reviews

Eden Robinson

"No one breaks your heart as elegantly as Billy-Ray Belcourt. Innovative, intimate, and meticulous."

Booklist - Kathy Sexton

"Following his essay collection, A History of My Brief Body, poet Belcourt, from the Driftpile Cree Nation, continues his exploration of Indigenous trauma and queerness in this erudite debut novel…Smart, thoughtful."

Jami Attenberg

"An absolutely dazzling confluence of big ideas and raw emotions, told in Billy-Ray Belcourt’s singular poetic voice. A Minor Chorus is about loving, questioning, and fighting for your life, and it’s as compelling a debut novel as I’ve read in years."

BookPage (starred review) - Laura Sackton

"A Minor Chorus is a feat of technical brilliance, a novel that questions the worth of writing even as it asserts its own value. It is a slippery, scholarly work, rooted in the layered complexity of Indigenous life."

Katherena Vermette

"A truly exceptional novel about how the disregarded sometimes live the most remarkable lives. A Minor Chorus is like a song that’s over too soon; I want to play it on repeat, to memorize the words so that I can sing them to myself."

Alicia Elliott

"A Minor Chorus is a rare gem of a book. We will be reading and rereading A Minor Chorus for decades to come."

Product Details

BN ID: 2940175610032
Publisher: Penguin Random House
Publication date: 09/27/2022
Edition description: Unabridged
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