Eliza Sunshine

Eliza Sunshine

Michelle Good

#4083 of 8,085 books · #640 in Historical Fiction

Shortlisted for the Giller Prize (2026).

Eliza Sunshine was a finalist for the 2026 Giller Prize and a national bestseller. Sometimes I feel that I wasn't born at all, rather sculpted and formed by the storms of my grandmother's life. When Eliza comes home from her first year at residential school, she is barely recognizable to her Nôhkom, Swan. Once bright-eyed and curious, Eliza is now stick-thin with roughly shorn hair and dull, listless eyes. Gathering bag in hand, Swan gently leads Eliza on long walks through untouched prairie grasses, harvesting medicines, certain that the power of the land will heal her. And as they walk, she shares stories of her own suffering when her traditional ways of being and living collided with the greed and violence of encroaching settlers. For Eliza, Swan's journey offers a master class in how to face unspeakable adversity and remain true to herself. Decades later, Eliza and her daughter are at a crossroads. When Ella comes home from her first year at university wearing bell-bottoms, braids, and a beaded headband, Eliza is horrified. Eliza fought her whole life to be free of the oppression that comes with being Cree, and she can't fathom why her daughter would choose to proclaim her heritage so proudly, disregarding the consequences. With a steaming cup of tea in hand, Eliza follows in her grandmother's footsteps, sharing with Ella the story of the adversities she faced in her own relentless pursuit of freedom. But Ella's idea of freedom isn't the same as Eliza's. And when tragedy strikes, Ella must decide how to build her life in the aftermath and navigate how best to keep the stories of her family alive when the world around her seems to want them buried along with the legions of the missing and the dead.