Laurier announces finalists for 2024 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction

Oct. 1, 2024
For Immediate Release

WATERLOO – Wilfrid Laurier University has named three finalists for the 2024 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction, a $10,000 prize that recognizes Canadian writers for a first or second work of creative non-fiction that includes a Canadian locale or significance.

The 2024 finalists are authors Karen Pinchin for Kings of Their Own Ocean: Tuna, Obsession, and The Future of Our Seas; Brett Popplewell for Outsider: An Old Man, a Mountain, and the Search for a Hidden Past; and Josie Teed for British Columbiana: A Millennial in a Gold Rush Town.

“Whether you’re interested in learning more about fish, ultramarathon runners, or Millennials, this year’s shortlist has something for everyone,” said Bruce Gillespie, an award juror and associate professor in the User Experience Design program at Laurier’s Brantford campus. “It’s one of the most wide-ranging shortlists we’ve had in years, and I think that speaks to the growing appeal of the genre to all kinds of readers in Canada.”

Established and endowed by the late writer and award-winning journalist Edna Staebler in 1991, the Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction is administered by Laurier and the oldest national literary award bestowed by a university in Canada.

“This year’s shortlisted books clearly demonstrate that creative non-fiction is not just one type of writing: it’s a genre that encompasses an almost endless range of subjects, styles, and points of view,” said Gavin Brockett, vice-dean of the Faculty of Arts. “As different as this year’s finalists are, they share a commitment to profiling some fascinating people and providing insight into their unique motivations, experiences and obsessions.”

Judges’ citations:

Kings of Their Own Ocean: Tuna, Obsession, and The Future of Our Seas by Karen Pinchin

In Kings of Their Own Ocean, Karen Pinchin explores the history of the Atlantic bluefin tuna. She charts the emergence of the fish as a delicacy in the 1970s, spawning a lucrative industry off the coast of North America and subsequent debate about over-fishing, quotas, and conservation. At the same time, Pinchin leans into the licence that creative non-fiction affords to depict the life of one particular tuna, which she calls Amelia, from its birth in 2004 and its early forays off the coast of Rhode Island to its death in 2018, when it unknowingly swam into a deep-ocean fish farm off the coast of Portugal before being killed and shipped to a market in Madrid. Deeply researched and elegantly written, the book is full of insight.

Outsider: An Old Man, a Mountain and the Search for a Hidden Past by Brett Popplewell

In 2015, journalistic curiosity led Brett Popplewell to make the first of innumerable trips to meet and befriend Dag Aabye, the world’s first extreme skier. At that time, the 74-year-old lived in a rusting school bus deep in the Okanagan forest and ran some three hours a day through the mountainous terrain to maintain his status as one of the oldest living ultramarathon runners. As Popplewell learned, part of what propelled Dag on his unusual path was the mystery of his childhood, when he was abandoned and then adopted as a young child in Nazi-occupied Norway. Outsider is the result of Popplewell’s combining his own research with Dag’s years of personal journals, all woven into a fascinating, ultimately satisfying story of an extraordinary, unique person.

British Columbiana: A Millennial in a Gold Rush Town by Josie Teed

In her first published work, Josie Teed represents her generation’s aspirations and anxieties. What should one do with one’s life? Are feelings trustworthy? Are people genuine? Does this go with that? What does my therapist think? With a sharp comic eye, Teed chronicles her own coming-of-age during a year spent working in the heritage village of Barkerville, deep in the BC interior, dramatizing daily life in a 19th century gold rush town. But the real drama arises from the cast of eccentric Gen-Xers and cliquey Gen-Zedders who spend the summer bringing Barkerville’s past to life while pursuing—much to Teed’s consternation—their own generational predilections. From Boomers to Zedders, Teed’s narrative will engage, bemuse, and amuse readers in equal parts.

The winner of the 2024 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction will be announced on November 4. An award ceremony will be held at Laurier’s Waterloo campus in the spring.

Learn more about the Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction.