Alan Cumyn

Alan Cumyn (born 8 January 1960) is a Canadian novelist who lives in Ottawa, Ontario.

Biography

Born in Ottawa, Alan Cumyn studied at Royal Roads Military College in 1983, and Queen's University before earning an M.A. in Creative Writing and English Literature at the University of Windsor. He has lived across Canada and in China and Indonesia, and worked variously as a geologist's assistant, group home manager, tai chi instructor, English teacher, program officer in international development, human rights researcher and freelance writer. Cumyn's fiction focuses on personal and political relations, often in a cross-cultural context. He now lives in Ottawa with his wife and two daughters.

In 2016, he won the Writers' Trust of Canada's Vicky Metcalf Award for Literature for Young People for his body of work.

Works Waiting for Li Ming - 1993 Between Families and the Sky - 1995 Man of Bone - 1998 - (Winner of the Ottawa Book Award) Burridge Unbound - 2000 - shortlisted for the 2000 Giller Prize Losing It - 2001 The Secret Life of Owen Skye - 2002 (Received a Mr. Christie's Book Award; nominated for a Governor General's Award)