• Eating Dirt by Charlotte Gill, winner of the Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize
• The Chuck Davis History of Metropolitan Vancouver by Chuck Davis, winner of the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize and the Bill Duthie Booksellers’ Choice Award
• Half-Blood Blues by Esi Edugyan, winner of the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize
• crawlspace by John Pass, winner of the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize
• When I Was Small by Sara O’Leary and Julie Morstad, winner of the Christie Harris Illustrated Children’s Literature Prize
• Blood Red Road by Moira Young, winner of the Sheila A. Egoff Children’s Literature Prize

The contest runs from May 22 to June 18, with the five winners being drawn on June 25. To enter, visit one of the following bookstores:

• 32 Books, 3185 Edgemont Blvd, North Vancouver
• Blackberry Books, 110-1666 Johnston Street, Vancouver
• Black Bond Books, 1-15562 24th Avenue, Surrey
• Cadboro Bay Book Company, 3840b Cadboro Bay Road, Victoria
• Galiano Island Books, 76 Madrona Drive, Galiano Island
• Laughing Oyster Bookshop, 286 Fifth Street, Courtenay
• Misty River Books, 103-4710 Lazelle Avenue, Terrace
• Mosaic Books, 411 Bernard Avenue, Kelowna
• Mulberry Bush Bookstore, 102-280 East Island Hwy, Parksville
• Phoenix on Bowen, 209 Village Square, Bowen Island

• Basketball BC
• MusicFest
• Or Gallery
• Vancouver International Childrens Festival
• Steamworks Brewing Company
• Subeez Café Restaurant Bar
• Listel Hotel
• Festival Cinemas
• Caffè Artigiano
• Bard on the Beach
• The Wickaninnish Inn Tofino Hotel
• Stanley Park Horse-Drawn Tours
• Tradewind Books
• Rockford Wok Bar Grill
• The Watermark Beach Resort
• Harbour Cruises Ltd
• Ricky’s Restaurants
• Nuba
• Dance Vancouver
• Chemainus Theatre Festival
• Big Bus Tours
• Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden
• Gallery Gachet’s Youngshin Lee
• DOXA Documentary Film Festival
• Michael’s Fine Photography Ltd
• Bellagio Café

In addition to having performed at the Just For Laughs festival and as a regular guest on CBC’s The Debaters and This is That, Demers is the author of the books The Prescription Errors and Vancouver Special, the latter of which was shortlisted for the Hubert Evans BC Book Prize for Non-Fiction. He is a former co-host of The Citynews List, a nightly comedy television newspanel show, and has written and performed comedy for TV, stage, radio and web.

British Columbia’s Lieutenant Governor, the Honourable Steven Point, will present the award at the Lieutenant Governor’s BC Book Prizes Gala to be held at The Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at SFU Woodwards, Goldcorp Centre for the Arts on Saturday, May 12, 2012 in Vancouver. The event will be hosted by author, activist, and comedian Charles Demers.

This prize was established in 2003 by former Lieutenant Governor, the Honourable Iona Campagnolo, to recognize British Columbia writers who have contributed to the development of literary excellence in the province. The recipient receives a cash award of $5,000.00 and a commemorative certificate. The 2011 recipient was George Bowering.

This year’s Gala will be held at The Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at SFU Woodwards, Goldcorp Centre for the Arts on Saturday, May 12, 2012.  The Ceremony, where the winners of all seven prize categories will be revealed, starts at 8:00 pm and will be preceded by a Reception and followed by an After Party.

At the Soirée, the recipient of the 2012 Lieutenant Governor’s Award for Literary Excellence will be announced. This award was established in 2003 by the Honourable Iona Campagnolo to recognize British Columbia writers who have contributed to the development of literary excellence in the province. In 2011, the seventh annual award was presented to George Bowering.

The winners in the seven categories will be announced at the Lieutenant Governor’s BC Book Prizes Gala on Saturday, May 12, 2012 at The Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at SFU Woodwards, GOLDCORP CENTRE FOR THE ARTS, in Vancouver. British Columbia’s Lieutenant Governor, the Honourable Steven L. Point, OBC, will be in attendance.

A selection of the shortlisted authors (to be announced in the coming weeks) will be part of BC Book Prizes On Tour presented by Rio Tinto Alcan. This author reading tour will take finalists to schools, bookstores, and public libraries in many communities throughout BC April 25-May 11, 2012.

A list of the finalist books can be found here.

Hapa-palooza runs from September 7 to 10 and features three free public events and a ticketed cabaret evening. Here are the confirmed programs and guests:

MIXED VOICES RAISED: Writers, Poets and Spoken Word Artists in Dialogue. Writers Fred Wah, Joanne Arnott, and Tanya Evanson engage the audience in mixed-root dialogue and share their literary expression in fiction, poetry, and spoken-word performance. Sept. 7, 7-8:30 pm, Vancouver Public Library Central Branch, Alice MacKay Room. Free.

More info at: http://talonbooks.com/events/hapa-palooza-festival-vancouver-125

For winning bidders, check out our website:
http://www.bcbookprizes.ca/events/archive/summer-2011-online-auction-opens-july-27th-2011/

Since 1992, the Hope in Shadows project has brought the stories and perspectives of people living in the Downtown Eastside into thousands of homes and workplaces around the country, while providing meaningful and flexible employment to hundreds of low income people. The project’s success has always depended on supporters who believe that the residents of the Downtown Eastside have the capacity to tell their own stories about their lives and their community.

Connect with Hope in Shadows photographers and calendar vendors and hear about some new projects they’ve been working on, including being commissioned to create new photography for an interdisciplinary dance performance and being published in Megaphone Magazine‘s Voices of the Street. There will also be a photo competition.

There is no cover charge to this event but capacity is limited to 70 people so please register here if you will be attending.

We also wish congratulations to all the publishers, authors, editors, and illustrators honoured by the Alberta Book Publishers’ Association’s annual Alberta Book Awards.

Here are some other BC Book Prize alumni and friends who are also shortlisted: The Doctrine of Affections by Paul Headrick (Freehand Books) is shortlisted for the Trade Fiction Book Award; The Collected Works of Pat Lowther by Pat Lowther, edited by Christine Wiesenthal (NeWest Press) is shortlisted for the Poetry Award as well as the Lois Hole Award for Editorial Excellence.

Marshall McLuhan knew exactly what the Internet was going to be… the only thing he didn’t know is what it was actually going to look like. It’s why so much of what he said and wrote in the 1960s and 1970s alienated critics. He was trying to be poetic and theoretic…al about what we now simply call interfaces, links and apps.

And now, from the hindsight of 2011, we can surf, via YouTube, our rich collective consciousness as it finally revealed itself online. Our collective being takes the form of cute cat videos, videos of Japanese devastation, mid-East political revolution, trampoline disasters and… well, would Marshall have been horrified or fascinated? Probably both.

Coupland, with his recent biography of Marshall McLuhan, offers a more precise look at ourselves via the ultimate manifestation of the global village: YouTube. Expect a back-and-forth experience between the audience, Coupland and the world itself.

Thursday, May 26, 2011
Doors open at 8:00 pm
Admission is free
The Waldorf Hotel (1489 East Hastings, Vancouver)

Ross King has been shortlisted for the Lela Common Award for Canadian History for his book Defiant Spirits: The Modernist Revolution of the Group of Seven, published by Douglas & McIntyre.

Also, BC poet Garry Gottfriedson has been shortlisted for the CAA Award for Poetry for Skin Like Mine, published by Ronsdale Press.

The winners will be announced at the CAA Literary Awards banquet on Saturday, July 23, 2011, during the Leacock Summer Festival at the Leacock Museum National Historic Site in Orillia, Ontario.

The Audre Lorde Award is one of The Publishing Triangle’s annual awards, honouring gay and lesbian publishing. Congrats Jen!