1. In 1996, then-Calgary city councillor Joe Ceci spearheaded the drive to create an annual literary prize for works by city writers, as part of The Calgary Awards. City Council approved the idea in 1996 for a $2000 annual prize

2. Edmonton beat us to it by one year, launching its Robert Kroetsch City of Edmonton Book Award in 1995

3. Joe Ceci credited Calgary-based writer and literary historian George Melnyk for the idea

W. O. Mitchell
(Photo: Canadian Encyclopedia)

4. George Melnyk suggested naming the prize in honour of beloved Calgary writer W.O. Mitchell, then battling cancer. Melnyk said Mitchell welcomed the idea of the prize “with gusto.” Mitchell saw the first prize awarded before he died in 1998

5. The prize is awarded by an independent jury to one Calgary writer each year. By 2010, the prize money was $5000. (FYI: winners of the City of Edmonton Book Award receive $10,000)

6. Eligible books include fiction, poetry, non-fiction, children’s literature or drama published by traditional presses and single authors in the designated year. Anthologies, textbooks and self-published works are not eligible. Over the course of the prize’s history, the winning books have included 11 nonfiction works, 10 books of fiction, 3 collections of poetry, and 1 book of plays

7. Eligible writers must have lived in Calgary for a minimum of two years including the year the book was published

8. The Writers’ Guild of Alberta administers the award. The first year, Calgary’s Sandpiper Books stepped up as co-sponsor. In subsequent years, sponsors have included the Writers’ Guild of Alberta, Pages Books, Chapters and Calgary’s McAra Printing

9. Requirements for the three-person jury? One Calgarian, one Albertan not from Calgary, and one Canadian not from Alberta

10. Each year, the jury selects three books. You can find the complete list of finalists and winners here

11. In the early years, Calgarians could pick up nomination forms at library branches and City facilities

12. In 1997, Lisa Christensen was awarded the inaugural prize for her book A Hiker’s Guide to the Art of the Canadian Rockies (Fifth House) – a book that won 6 literary prizes that year

13. Two writers have won the prize twice: Andrew Nikiforuk in 2001 for Saboteurs (Macfarlane, Walter & Ross) and in 2008 forTar Sands: dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent (Greystone Books); and Marcello Di Cintio in 2012 for Walls: Travels Along the Barricades (Goose Lane Editions) and in 2018 for Pay No Heed to the Rockets (Goose Lane Editions)

14. This year for the first time, a winner of the prize has won the Writers’ Guild of Alberta’s Golden Pen Award for lifetime literary achievement: poet Christopher Wiseman

15. Shortlisted authors are invited to deliver a reading each spring. You can watch this year’s finalists (fact #19) read here

16. Prize winners receive a leather-bound copy of the winning book

17. Copies of each of the winning books are placed in the Grant MacEwan Library at City Hall

18. Writers receive the award at the Calgary Awards Presentation held each June at City Hall

19. Contenders for this year’s prize? Julie Sedivy for Memory Speaks: On Losing and Reclaiming Language and Self (Harvard University Press); Jaspreet Singh for My Mother, My Translator(Véhicule Press), and Neil Surkan for Unbecoming (McGill-Queen’s University Press)

20. This year’s winner will be announced on June 15, 2022

21. You can find all past winners and finalists at the Writers’ Guild of Alberta and learn more about the City of Calgary W. O. Mitchell Book Prize here