Daniel Francis

Reading the National Narrative

And the Prize Goes to...?

Nov 3, 2019

Is the City of Vancouver Book Award the most ineptly publicized book prize in the country? It feels like it.

The annual award was handed out last month in a ceremony at the Vancouver Public Library. My pal Rob Watt had a book in the running -- his gorgeous volume on the indigenous artist Susan Point -- and I was interested in knowing if he had won.

But just try to find out.

Neither of the local daily papers reported the event, at least not so far as I could discover on their websites. The city itself lists the five books nominated for this year's award but two weeks after the event still no mention of who won.

Rob's book, People Among the People, was published by Figure One Publishing and I was finally able to track down the result on the company's website. And yes, Rob won. So kudos to him. But why hand out an award and then not tell anyone about it? 

If a tree falls....