Kathryn Mockler and Raina Delisle are the winners of the 2024 Victoria Book Prizes.
The awards celebrate the best adult and children’s titles of the year written by a Victoria author. Each winner receives $5000.
Mockler won the City of Victoria Butler Book Prize for her fiction collection Anecdotes.
In four parts, Anecdotes examines the pressing realities of sexual violence, abuse and environmental collapse. During a time when so much is changing and so much is uncertain, these pieces of fiction highlight truth and immerse readers.
Anecdotes was also nominated for the 2023 Danuta Gleed Literary Award.
Mockler is the author of five books of poetry. She co-edited the print anthology Watch Your Head: Writers and Artists Respond to the Climate Crisis and is the publisher of the Watch Your Head website. She runs Send My Love to Anyone, a literary newsletter, and is an assistant professor at the University of Victoria where she teaches screenwriting and fiction.
Mockler was longlisted for the 2012 CBC Poetry Prize for a collection of poems titled Ice Fishing, Neighbours, Stones, Looking for Crayfish as well as in 2009 for Onion Man.
Delisle won the City of Victoria Children’s Book Prize for her nonfiction book Breaking News: Why News Matters, which was illustrated by Julie McLaughlin.
Breaking News: Why News Matters teaches young readers how to be critical thinkers when they consume news. Giving background on the news industry and the current challenges it faces, the book shows how reliable information can save lives.
Delisle is a writer whose work has been published in Today’s Parent, Chatelaine, CBC and the Globe and Mail. She is also the author of the book Fashion Forward: Striving for Sustainable Style.
“Both winners of this year’s City of Victoria book prizes demonstrate an acute awareness of the society we inhabit and the need for individual engagement,” said Lynne Van Luven, president of the Victoria Book Prize Society, in a press statement.
“Kathryn Mockler’s stories in Anecdotes address feminism and difference. Raina Delisle’s Breaking News gives young readers a vital education about the challenges of today’s media.”
The City of Victoria Book Society are responsible for appointing the juries and administering the competition. The City of Victoria Butler Book Prize is a partnership between the City of Victoria and Brian Butler of Butler Brothers Supplies.
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