Oonah McFee
BornOonah Browne
September 11, 1916
Newcastle, New Brunswick
DiedDecember 19, 2006
Occupationnovelist, short stories
NationalityCanadian
Period1970s
Notable worksSandbars
SpouseAllan McFee

Oonah McFee, née Browne (September 11, 1916 – December 19, 2006)[1] was a Canadian novelist and short story writer,[2] who won the Books in Canada First Novel Award for her 1977 novel Sandbars.[3]

Born in Newcastle, New Brunswick and raised in the Ottawa Valley area,[1] she worked for CBC Radio One's Ottawa station CBO-FM in the 1930s, and married her colleague Allan McFee in 1941.[1] They later moved to Toronto, where Allan was an announcer for the CBC's national network, while Oonah began to study creative writing in the 1960s,[4] publishing her first short story in Texas Quarterly in 1971.[1]

Following her award win for Sandbars, she was writer in residence at Trent University in 1979,[4] and continued to publish short stories and journalism.[4] Sandbars was originally planned as the first volume in a linked quartet of novels,[5] of which the first sequel was to be titled Silent Eyes,[4] but the later books were never published.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Oonah McFee's Obituary
  2. ^ William H. New, The Encyclopedia of Literature in Canada. ISBN 0-8020-0761-9.
  3. ^ "And the winner is..." The Globe and Mail, April 1, 1978.
  4. ^ a b c d e Oonah McFee Collection. University of Toronto.
  5. ^ "Sandbars". The Globe and Mail, April 2, 1977.