May 12, 2012
BC Book Prizes Gala
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BC Book Prizes
#901-207 W. Hastings Street
Vancouver, BC V6B 1H7
Tel (604) 687-2405
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info@bcbookprizes.ca
April 27 | hosted by Patrick Lane
The seven stories in this collection explore family relationships — often within families that have splintered — and examine the experience of alienation and conflict between generations and cultures. Thien lives in Vancouver where she is completing an MFA in Creative Writing at UBC. More
In this sensuous debut novel, the lives of two women intersect and meander over many continents and political upheavals. Reid’s short story collection To Be There With You won the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize in 1995. Born in Australia, Gayla Reid has lived in Canada for more than thirty years. She currently lives in Burnaby, BC.
In this collection of stories, outsiders and lost souls worship at the altar of medical science while secretly praying for redemptive love. Roaming from Canada to Fiji to Australia, these stories glimpse a not-so-distant future, offering a healthy dose of preventive medicine while opening new frontiers of the imagination. Andrew Gray lives in Vancouver and is the coordinator of UBC’s Booming Ground. More
In this Giller Prize-nominated novel, a young chef who revels in local bounty, a long-unsolved murder, the homeless of Stanley Park, and a smooth-talking businessman named Danté are delicately and humorously entwined. Timothy Taylor is an award-winning short fiction and magazine writer who lives in Vancouver. More
This poignant and provocative coming-of-age novel gives voice to a small town adolescent woman who careens between defiance and vulnerability. Godfrey was born in Toronto, grew up in Victoria, and currently lives in New York City. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College, and recently published Under the Bridge, a non-fiction book about the death of Reena Virk. More
Through research, fictionalized accounts of key events in Emily Carr’s life, and the author’s own forays into Carr territory, Crean makes startling connections between Carr’s nineteenth-century sensibility and our present concerns with the environment, assimilation, and destruction of native culture, spirituality, and identity. A resident of the West Coast for many years, Susan Crean now lives in Toronto.
In this compassionate, reflective, and informative memoir about three-and-a-half years spent volunteering at a skid row drop-in centre in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, Campbell dismantles our hard-held notions about poverty, the disenfranchised, substance abuse, and the nature of charity. Bart Campbell lives in Vancouver and works as a medical laboratory technologist. More
Shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award, this exploration of craft as a contemplative and spiritual practice shows how one’s hands can serve as guides in the pursuit of wisdom. Born and raised in Vancouver, Ross A. Laird currently teaches Counselling and Psychology at Vancouver Community College. More
Heather Pringle takes readers on a journey over five continents and across nearly 7,000 years to reveal how mummies have been venerated as saints, fought over by politicians, collected as artistic treasures, analyzed for cures to ancient diseases, investigated for clues to drug use, and imitated by today’s cosmetic and beauty industries. Heather Pringle lives in Vancouver. More
In his third collection of essays, veteran journalist Stephen Hume takes readers on a journey through Western Canada, stopping at little-known places to take a good look around, talk to the people who live there, and absorb the local history and culture. Hume was raised in fishing, farming, and logging communities in Alberta and British Columbia, and currently lives in Sidney, BC. More
In this debut collection, a remarkably dark sense of humour is at work, but is tempered by a haunting vulnerability. Karen Solie was born in Moose Jaw and grew up on the family farm in southwest Saskatchewan. She currently teaches English in Victoria. More
Aislinn Hunter is an accomplished fiction writer (most recently, What’s Left Us), but poetry is her first love. Her poems have been nominated for a prestigious National Magazine Award and are widely praised and published. She received a BFA from the University of Victoria and an MFA from the University of British Columbia, and currently lives in Vancouver. More
Marlatt’s latest book of poems is a memory book — an album of love poems spanning twenty-five years — that weaves her motifs of departures and arrivals, the recurrence of wounds and loss, and the delight in what surrounds us. Daphne Marlatt was born in Melbourne and spent much of her childhood in Malaysia before immigrating to Canada in 1951. She currently lives and works in Vancouver. More
Finding inspiration in family life, this collection exposes moments of pathos, beauty, comedy, and desire to lift homely scenes out of the ordinary and make them resonate. Stephen Guppy is the author of two previous books of poetry and two collections of short fiction. He currently teaches English and Creative Writing at Malaspina University College on Vancouver Island. He lives in Nanaimo. More
Observant and attentive to the natural world, Catherine Owen mourns the loss of species and explores civilization’s pursuit of ecocide. She lives in Vancouver and recently published Cusp/Detritus, a book of photographs and narratives, and is currently working on the play Circe and Cougars, with La Leona Productions. More
A fascinating and beautifully produced comprehensive survey covering the physical and social history of the Stó:lo people’s traditional territory, including the Lower Fraser Valley and Metro Vancouver. More
This much-awaited final volume of The Birds of British Columbia completes what some have called one of the most important regional ornithological works in North America. More
In this tell-all memoir, the West Coast 1980s punk rock scene is exposed and detailed with wit and aplomb. John Armstrong was born and raised in White Rock. Hanging around with DOA et al., he started his own band, the Modernettes and later Los Popularos. He served on the editorial board of The Vancouver Sun, where he was a journalist since 1986. More
With a particular emphasis on the people and their stories, this vibrant illustrated history brings to life the extraordinary adventure of building British Columbia. Reksten, who died in July 2001, was an award-winning and critically acclaimed author of books on historical subjects. She devoted the last two years of her life to writing this book. More
The inspiring chronicle and photographic record of a couple’s 1,000-plus kilometre journey circumnavigating Vancouver Island. Maria Coffey and Dag Goering are a married writer/photographer team whose home base is Protection Island, near Nanaimo. More
In this humorous and tender novel, an eleven-year-old’s parents are lost at sea, but she knows — somewhere deep inside — that they are still alive. Polly Horvath’s acclaimed young adult books include When the Circus Came to Town and The Trolls. Everything on a Waffle was recently named a Newbery Honor Book. She lives in Metchosin, British Columbia. More
In this novel, a twelve-year-old girl and her younger sister embark on a secret weekend reunion with their estranged father, only to discover that things are not as harmless as they first appeared. Norma Charles lives in Vancouver. More
In this novel, a Grade 3 “problem child” rediscovers the joy of learning when a box of caterpillars arrives in the classroom. Maggie de Vries is a children’s book editor and teaches Children’s Literature courses at UBC. She divides her time between Vancouver and Victoria.
As part of a historical fiction series for girls, this account of a young Londoner’s adaptation to farm life brings the realities of immigrant experience to life. Sarah Ellis has won the Sheila A. Egoff Children’s Literature Prize twice: in 1997 for Back of Beyond (Groundwood) and in 1987 for The Baby Project (Douglas & McIntyre). She is a part-time reference librarian and lives in Vancouver. More
What do Superman, the long-distance phone call, and McIntosh apples have in common? They’re all Canadian accomplishments, as this eclectic collection points out. The book brings history to life with almost 150 entries in categories such as art, technology, sports, and food. Valerie Wyatt, a book editor and author of children’s books, lives in Victoria. John Mantha, an illustrator and courtroom artist, lives in Toronto. More
With a particular emphasis on the people and their stories, this vibrant illustrated history brings to life the extraordinary adventure of building British Columbia. Terry Reksten, who died in July 2001, was an award-winning and critically acclaimed author of books on historical subjects. She devoted the last two years of her life to writing this book. More
When Margaret Atwood suggested Will Ferguson follow up his runaway bestseller Why I Hate Canadians with a “tongue-in-cheek guidebook for newcomers on how to be Canadian,” Will thought it was a swell idea. He quickly recruited his brother, Toronto-based comedy writer Ian, to create the ultimate guide to Canadian cultural quirks. Will lives in Calgary. More
For more than twenty-five years, renowned anthropologist and plant explorer Wade Davis has travelled the world, studying the mysteries of sacred plants and celebrating the poetics of culture. In Light at the Edge of the World, he presents eighty-four images from the many thousands of photographs he has taken over the course of his explorations. Davis lives in Washington, DC. More
This photographic journey takes the reader from the high Chilcotin meadows to the fields of the Southern Okanagan, from cattle drives to modern marketing, from urban ranches to those in isolation. Photographer Rick Blacklaws’s most recent title, The Fraser River (text by Alan Haig-Brown), won the 1997 Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Book Prize. Author Diana French is Curator of the Museum of the Cariboo Chilcotin. More
A fascinating and beautifully produced comprehensive survey covering the physical and social history of the Stó:lo people’s traditional territory, including the Lower Fraser Valley and Metro Vancouver. More