| Birth Date: | 17 November 1935 |
| Honorific Suffix: | OC |
| Birth Name: | Audrey Grace Callahan |
| Nationality: | Canadian |
| Occupation: | Novelist and short story writer |
| Awards: | Marian Engel Award (1987) Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize (1984, 1990, 1995) |
| Birth Place: | Binghamton, New York |
| Years Active: | 1965–2014 |
| Education: |
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Audrey Grace Thomas, OC (née Callahan; born 17 November 1935)[1] [2] is a Canadian novelist and short story writer who lives on Galiano Island, British Columbia. Her stories often have feminist themes and include exotic settings.[3] She is a recipient of the Marian Engel Award.
Thomas was born 17 November 1935 in Binghamton, New York. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Smith College in Massachusetts in 1957,[4] then studied at St. Andrews University in Scotland before teaching in England. In 1959, she immigrated to Canada,[5] where she received a Master of Arts degree from University of British Columbia in 1963. In 1994, she received an honorary doctorate from Simon Fraser University.
From 1964 to 1966, Thomas lived in Ghana, and some of her stories are set there and in other distant places.[6] [7]
She published her first story, "If One Green Bottle...", in 1967.
Thomas lived in Edinburgh, Scotland in the 1980s, and wrote articles for Saturday Night Magazine.[8]
Beginning in 1990, Thomas was a visiting professor at Concordia University in Montreal. She also spent time as writer-in-residence at the University of Victoria, University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, and David Thompson University Centre.
In 2014, she published her eighteenth book, Local Customs.[9]
From 1984 to 1986, Thomas received the Canada-Scotland Writer's Literary Fellowship, and in 1987, she won the Marian Engel Award for her body of work. In 1989, she receive the Canada-Australia Literary Prize. In 2003, she won the Terasen Lifetime Achievement Award, and in 2008, she was made an Officer of the Order of Canada.[10]
| 1966 | "If One Green Bottle..." | Atlantic First Award | Winner | ||
| 1984 | Intertidal Life | Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize | Winner | [11] | |
| 1984 | Intertidal Life | Governor General's Award for English-language fiction | Finalist | [12] | |
| 1990 | Wild Blue Yonder | Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize | Winner | ||
| 1995 | Coming Down from Wa | Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize | Winner | ||
| 1996 | Coming Down from Wa | Governor General's Award for English-language fiction | Finalist | [13] | |
| 2006 | Tattycoram | Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize | Shortlist |