Bergen wins book of the year a fourth time

By: Ben Sigurdson Posted: 11:16 AM CDT Thursday, May. 20, 2021

For the fourth time in his literary career, Winnipeg author David Bergen took home the top prize at the 2021 Manitoba Book Awards.

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For the fourth time in his literary career, Winnipeg author David Bergen took home the top prize at the 2021 Manitoba Book Awards.

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For the fourth time in his literary career, Winnipeg author David Bergen took home the top prize at the 2021 Manitoba Book Awards.

Here the Dark, a collection of short stories and a novella published by Biblioasis, won the McNally Robinson Book of the Year award, which Bergen also won for his debut novel A Year of Lesser (1996) as well as 2005’s The Time in Between and 2009’s The Retreat. Here the Dark was also a finalist for the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize.

Among the competition for the top prize at this year’s Manitoba Book Awards, announced online on May 20, was David A. Robertson’s Black Water: Family, Legacy, and Blood Memory (HarperCollins), which won the 2021 Alexander Kennedy Isbister award for non-fiction as well as the Carol Shields Winnipeg book award, as well as Lara Rae’s Dragonfly, published by J. Gordon Shillingford, which won this year’s Chris Johnson award for best play by a Manitoba playwright.

MIKAELA MACKENZIE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES
Author David Bergen's collection of stories, Here the Dark, has won him the McNally Robinson Book of the Year Award for a fourth time. — MIKAELA MACKENZIE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Author David Bergen's collection of stories, Here the Dark, has won him the McNally Robinson Book of the Year Award for a fourth time.

Jonathan Ball added to his Manitoba Book Award collection, winning the Margaret Laurence award for fiction for his debut collection of short fiction, The Lightning of Possible Storms, published by Book*hug Press. Ball previously won in the poetry category, as well as the 2014 award for most promising Manitoba writer.

Colleen Nelson took home the best book for young people (older category) for her book Harvey Comes Home (Pajama Press), while Steinbach author Andrew Unger, creator of the Daily Bonnet satirical website, won the Eileen McTavish Sykes award for best first book for Once Removed (Turnstone Press). (Unger is the featured author at this month’s Free Press Book Club — for more, see wfp.to/bookclub.)

The Manitowapow award, presented every two years to two Indigenous writers or oral performers for their work, was won by Duncan Mercredi and Lenard Monkman. The Mary Scorer award for best book by a Manitoba publisher went to Making Believe: Questions About Mennonites and Art by Magdalene Redekop, published by University of Manitoba Press.

For a complete list of the finalists and winners in each of the 11 categories, see manitobabookawards.ca.

ben.sigurdson@freepress.mb.ca

Ben Sigurdson
Literary editor, drinks writer

Ben Sigurdson is the Free Press‘s literary editor and drinks writer. He graduated with a master of arts degree in English from the University of Manitoba in 2005, the same year he began writing Uncorked, the weekly Free Press drinks column. He joined the Free Press full time in 2013 as a copy editor before being appointed literary editor in 2014. Read more about Ben.

In addition to providing opinions and analysis on wine and drinks, Ben oversees a team of freelance book reviewers and produces content for the arts and life section, all of which is reviewed by the Free Press’s editing team before being posted online or published in print. It’s part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.

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Ben Sigurdson
Literary editor, drinks writer