Award-winning author Sharon Butala’s new novel, Struck in the Heart, is a

Prairies-set literary thriller that plays out during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic

In Struck in the Heart, the next release from Shadowpaw Press in Regina, Saskatchewan, Sharon Butala, the multi-award-winning literary writer of novels, short stories, and memoirs (The Perfection of the Morning), turns her prodigious narrative skills for the first time to a gripping story of greed, violence, and even ghosts, played out against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, with spellbinding results.

Struck in the Heart releases on September22 and launches in Saskatoon at McNally Robinson Booksellers on Thursday, September 24, at 7 p.m. The launch will also be livestreamed at youtube.com/live/1Ie0ThFm81s.

“Shadowpaw Press is thrilled to be able to offer this complex, fascinating novel by a literary writer of Sharon Butala’s stature,” says publisher Edward Willett. “I hope readers find it as compelling, engrossing, and thought-provoking as I did.”

“Struck in the Heart, my twenty-fourth published book, is a novel of suspense that I wrote when I was locked alone in my condo during the COVID crisis,” says Butala. “But publishers didn’t want COVID novels then, so the finished manuscript went onto a shelf, and every once in a while I’d revise it and then, later, revise it again. I’d about decided it wasn’t going to be published and was feeling pretty glum about it, when I heard of Shadowpaw Press. I think every writer loves their completed work and feels even heartsick at rejection, whatever they might say out loud, so imagine my delight when Ed Willett took the novel at once and proposed to have it out in the fall.

“This is a new genre for me, and I found working within its conventions challenging, interesting, and often refreshing as the boundaries I was used to were broken, such as abrupt switches of points of view. I owe a debt to the many well-known writers of mysteries who were my teachers in how to write in the genre. As with other writers of literary fiction before me, I wanted to write my suspense novel focusing also on ethical and moral questions and especially on my protagonist’s character as he at last confronts his own failings and weaknesses. I seem to be unable, so far, to write a character who can kill with nothing but hate and rage in their heart; my killings are, I hope, more nuanced, sometimes even more puzzling in terms of questions of fate.

“How well I have succeeded in all of this, the reader will have to decide.”

More about Struck in the Heart

In the grip of the pandemic, accountant Rick Phillips bundles his wife, Jill, and their two young children out of their suburban home in Radiance and drives them to the remote prairie farm where he grew up. What he hopes will be a safe haven becomes something far darker when old grudges, buried secrets, and a violent intrusion shatter the fragile peace.

As the virus claims lives in the city and death visits the farm itself, Rick is forced to confront the consequences of the double life he has carefully hidden from his family: the cash he has been stashing for a dangerous local operator, the hidden revolver he never should have kept, and a teenage mistake whose shadow still reaches across decades.

With his parents gone, his marriage strained, and ruthless men circling for what he owes, Rick must decide what he is willing to sacrifice―and what he is willing to bury―to protect the people he loves.

Struck in the Heart is a taut, emotionally charged novel of family, guilt, and moral reckoning set against the stark beauty and isolation of the Canadian prairies during a time of collective crisis.

Praise for Struck in the Heart

“Under the cover of a world-wide pandemic, greed, deception and family dysfunction emerge in Sharon Butala’s Struck in the Heart. Simultaneously harsh and compassionate, with morally ambiguous characters, the novel invites readers to question whether its sparse prairie setting and COVID-era backdrop are merely a veneer, concealing ugly truths that were there all along.”—Anthony Bidulka, author of Going to Beautiful, Crime Writers of Canada 2023 Best Crime Novel, and QUANT: Russell Quant Mystery #9

“Sharon Butala has crafted far more than a compelling mystery. Struck in the Heart is a deeply humane novel that explores guilt, family, and the fragile choices that shape a life. Rich with psychological insight and moral complexity, it reminds us that even in our darkest moments, compassion remains possible.”―George Tsougrianis, director of Wild Prairie Man

“Set in a time of pandemic, Sharon Butala’s Struck in the Heart is both fast-paced thriller and in-depth character study. Butala’s use of interiority at moments of violence and high emotion is remarkable, and her insights into human nature are often astonishing. A brilliant writer at the top of her game.”―Dwayne Brenna, author of The Laundryman

More about the author

Sharon Butala is the author of twenty-four books of fiction and nonfiction, numerous essays and articles, poetry, and five produced plays. Her first novel, Country of the Heart, published in 1984, was nominated for the Books in Canada First Novel Award. It was closely followed by a collection of short stories, Queen of the Headaches, which was short-listed for the Governor General’s Award. Born in Nipawin, Saskatchewan, Sharon graduated from the University of Saskatchewan and taught English in her home province and in Nova Scotia. She eventually returned to Saskatchewan and lived for three decades on the ranch belonging to her husband, Peter Butala.

About Shadowpaw Press

Shadowpaw Press, located in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, was founded in 2018 by award-winning author Edward Willett. Shadowpaw Press is a member of Literary Press Group (Canada) and the Association of Canadian Publishers and publishes an eclectic selection of books by both new and established authors, including adult fiction, young adult fiction, children’s books, nonfiction, and anthologies.