Reading by Nino Ricci at The Boston Athenaeum April 13, 2010

Nino Ricci is one of today’s foremost figures in Canadian literature and a two-time
winner of the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction. His most recent
masterpiece The Origin of Species is a funny, poignant, and visceral Darwin’s-eye view
of human relationships and the search for love and meaning.

“[Nino Ricci] is blessed with the rare ability to recreate a world entire and make us believe in it.”
—The Globe and Mail
“Ricci’s prose is simple, yet somehow always unexpected. Each sentence, each word, feels exactly
right, landing in our inner ear just so. The dire intelligence of the work is perhaps driven home
most exquisitely by the fact that, on top of all the thought-inducing social, religious and political
critiques, it is also bitterly, achingly funny... Ricci does more than survive. He triumphs utterly
here in rare achievement.”
—Toronto Star
“Exhilarating...Ricci’s stylistic range is impressive, spanning the parodic to the tragic.”
—Quill & Quire
“There is no doubt that Nino Ricci is one of Canada’s best novelists to appear for a long time.”
—The Spectator
“[Nino Ricci’s] assured prose is both naturalistic and lyrical.”
—The New York Times Book Review