Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction

The Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction is a Canadian literary award, presented annually by the Writers' Trust of Canada to the best work of non-fiction by a Canadian writer.

Canada's most lucrative non-fiction prize, the winner receives a prize of Can$60,000 and all finalists receive Can$5,000.^[1][2]

Sponsorship history

First established in 1997, the award's original corporate sponsor was Viacom. Pearson Canada, an educational book publishing company, took over the award in 1999, and Nereus Financial, a stock brokerage, became the sponsor from 2006 to 2008. After Nereus dropped its sponsorship, the award had no corporate sponsor until 2011,^[3] when philanthropist and former Lieutenant Governor of Ontario Hilary Weston was announced as the award's new sponsor.^[1]

Prior to Weston's patronage of the award, the prize was Can$15,000 for the winner and Can$2,000 for the finalists.

Nominees and winners

A list of past winners and finalists is published at the official website of the Writers' Trust of Canada.^[4]

Year	Winner	Finalists
1997	Ernest Hillen, Small Mercies: A Boy After War	Charlotte Gray, Mrs. King: The Life and Times of Isabel Mackenzie King John Bentley Mays, Power in the Blood: Land, Memory, and a Southern Family Ruth Teichroeb, Flowers on My Grave Eileen Whitfield, Pickford: The Woman Who Made Hollywood
1998	Rudy Wiebe and Yvonne Johnson, Stolen Life: The Journey of a Cree Woman	Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life David Manicom, Progeny of Ghosts: Travels in Russia and the Old Empire Linda Spalding, The Follow Charles Wilkins, The Circus at the Edge of the Earth
1999	Modris Eksteins, Walking Since Daybreak: A Story of Eastern Europe, World War II and the Heart of our Century	Robert Bringhurst, A Story as Sharp as a Knife: The Classical Haida Mythtellers and Their World Jacalyn Duffin, History of Medicine: A Scandalously Short Introduction Moira Farr, After Daniel: A Suicide Survivor’s Tale Wayne Johnston, Baltimore’s Mansion: A Memoir
2000	Erna Paris, Long Shadows: Truth, Lies and History	Donald Harman Akenson, Saint Saul: A Skeleton Key to the Historical Jesus Hugh Brody, The Other Side of Eden: Hunters, Farmers and the Shaping of the World Taras Grescoe, Sacré Blues: An Unsentimental Journey Through Quebec John Stackhouse, Out of Poverty: And into Something More Comfortable
2001	Clark Blaise, Time Lord	Kevin Major, As Near to Heaven by Sea Heather Pringle, The Mummy Congress Carol Shields, Jane Austen Jack Todd, The Taste of Metal: A Deserter’s Story
2002	Jake MacDonald, Houseboat Chronicles: Notes from a Life in Shield Country	Katherine Ashenburg, The Mourner’s Dance: What We Do When People Die Andrew Clark, A Keen Soldier: The Execution of Second World War Private Harold Pringle Marni Jackson, Pain: The Fifth Vital Sign Lorie Miseck, A Promise of Salt
2003	Brian Fawcett, Virtual Clearcut, or The Way Things Are in My Hometown	Mark Abley, Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages J. Edward Chamberlin, If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories? Finding Common Ground Taras Grescoe, The End of Elsewhere: Travels Among the Tourists Marq de Villiers and Sheila Hirtle, Sahara: A Natural History
2004	Elaine Dewar, The Second Tree: Of Clones, Chimeras, and Quests for Immortality	Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall, Down to This: Squalor and Splendour in a Big-City Shantytown Trevor Herriot, Jacob’s Wound: A Search for the Spirit of Wildness Patrick Lane, There is a Season: A Memoir in a Garden Charles Montgomery, The Last Heathen: Encounters With Ghosts and Ancestors in Melanesia
2005	John Vaillant, The Golden Spruce: A True Story of Myth, Madness and Greed	Rebecca Godfrey, Under the Bridge: The True Story of the Murder of Reena Virk Stephen Lewis, Race Against Time: Searching for Hope in AIDS-Ravaged Africa J.B. MacKinnon, Dead Man in Paradise
2006	Dragan Todorovic, The Book of Revenge	Charlotte Gray, Reluctant Genius: The Passionate Life and Inventive Mind of Alexander Graham Bell Barbara Kingscote, Ride the Rising Wind: One Woman’s Journey Across Canada Noah Richler, This is My Country, What’s Yours? A Literary Atlas of Canada Rudy Wiebe, Of This Earth: A Mennonite Boyhood in the Boreal Forest
2007	Anna Porter, Kasztner's Train: The True Story of Rezso Kasztner, Unknown Hero of the Holocaust	Katherine Ashenburg, The Dirt on Clean: An Unsanitized History Tim Bowling, The Lost Coast: Salmon, Memory and the Death of Wild Culture Barry Gough, Fortune’s a River: The Collision of Empires in Northwest America Douglas Hunter, God’s Mercies: Rivalry, Betrayal and the Dream of Discovery
2008	Taras Grescoe, Bottomfeeder: How to Eat Ethically in a World of Vanishing Seafood	Carl Honoré, Under Pressure: Rescuing Childhood from the Culture of Hyper-Parenting Mark Kingwell, Concrete Reveries: Consciousness and the City Margaret Visser, The Gift of Thanks: The Roots, Persistence and Paradoxical Meanings of a Social Ritual Russell Wangersky, Burning Down the House: Fighting Fires and Losing Myself
2009	Brian Brett, Trauma Farm: A Rebel History of Rural Life	Wade Davis, The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World Trevor Herriot, Grass, Sky, Song: Promise and Peril in the World of Grassland Birds Erika Ritter, The Dog by the Cradle, the Serpent Beneath: Some Paradoxes of Human-Animal Relationships Eric Siblin, The Cello Suites: J.S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece
2010	James FitzGerald, What Disturbs Our Blood: A Son's Quest to Redeem the Past	Ross King, Defiant Spirits: The Modernist Revolution of the Group of Seven Sarah Leavitt, Tangles: A Story About Alzheimer's, My Mother and Me John Theberge and Mary Theberge, The Ptarmigan's Dilemma: An Exploration into How Life Organizes and Supports Itself Merrily Weisbord, The Love Queen of Malabar: Memoir of a Friendship with Kamala Das
2011	Charles Foran, Mordecai: The Life & Times	Charlotte Gill, Eating Dirt: Deep Forests, Big Timber, and Life with the Tree-Planting Tribe Richard Gwyn, Nation Maker: Sir John A. Macdonald: His Life, Our Times; Volume Two: 1867-1891 Grant Lawrence, Adventures in Solitude: What Not to Wear to a Nudist Potluck and Other Stories from Desolation Sound Ray Robertson, Why Not? Fifteen Reasons to Live
2012	Candace Savage, A Geography of Blood: Unearthing Memory from a Prairie Landscape^[5]	Kamal Al-Solaylee, Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes Modris Eksteins, Solar Dance: Genius, Forgery, and the Crisis of Truth in the Modern Age Taras Grescoe, Straphanger: Saving Our Cities and Ourselves from the Automobile JJ Lee, The Measure of a Man: The Story of a Father, a Son, and a Suit
2013	Graeme Smith, The Dogs Are Eating Them Now: Our War in Afghanistan	Thomas King, The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America J.B. MacKinnon, The Once and Future World: Nature As It Was, As It Is, As It Could Be Andrew Steinmetz, This Great Escape: The Case of Michael Paryla Priscila Uppal, Projection: Encounters with My Runaway Mother
2014	Naomi Klein, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate	Susan Delacourt, Shopping for Votes: How Politicians Choose Us and We Choose Them Charles Montgomery, Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design Paula Todd, Extreme Mean: Trolls, Bullies, and Predators Online Kathleen Winter, Boundless: Tracing Land and Dream in a New Northwest Passage
2015^[6]	Rosemary Sullivan, Stalin’s Daughter: The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyeva^[7]	Eliott Behar, Tell it to the World: International Justice and the Secret Campaign to Hide Mass Murder in Kosovo Douglas Coupland, Kitten Clone: Inside Alcatel-Lucent Dean Jobb, Empire of Deception: From Chicago to Nova Scotia – The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation Lynette Loeppky, Cease: A Memoir of Love, Loss and Desire
2016	Deborah Campbell, A Disappearance in Damascus: A Story of Friendship and Survival in the Shadow of War^[8]	Ian Brown, Sixty: A Diary of My Sixty-First Year: The Beginning of the End or the End of the Beginning? Matti Friedman, Pumpkinflowers: An Israeli Soldier’s Story Ross King, Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies Sonja Larsen, Red Star Tattoo: My Life as a Girl Revolutionary
2017^[9]	James Maskalyk, Life on the Ground Floor: Letters from the Edge of Emergency Medicine^[10]	Ivan Coyote, Tomboy Survival Guide Kyo Maclear, Birds Art Life: A Field Guide to the Small and Significant Carol Off, All We Leave Behind: A Reporter's Journey into the Lives of Others Tanya Talaga, Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths in a Northern City
2018	Elizabeth Hay, All Things Consoled: A Daughter’s Memoir	Will Aitken, Antigone Undone: Juliette Binoche, Anne Carson, Ivo Van Hove, and the Art of Resistance Terese Marie Mailhot, Heart Berries Judi Rever, In Praise of Blood: The Crimes of the Rwandan Patriotic Front Lindsay Wong, The Woo-Woo: How I Survived Ice Hockey, Drug Raids, Demons, and My Crazy Chinese Family
2019	Jenny Heijun Wills, Older Sister. Not Necessarily Related^[11]	Alicia Elliott, A Mind Spread Out on the Ground Anna Mehler Paperny, Hello I Want to Die Please Fix Me: Depression in the First Person Tanya Talaga, All Our Relations: Finding the Path Forward Ayelet Tsabari, The Art of Leaving
2020	Jessica J. Lee, Two Trees Make a Forest: Travels Among Taiwan’s Mountains and Coasts in Search of My Family’s Past^[12]	Lorna Crozier, Through the Garden: A Love Story (with Cats) Steven Heighton, Reaching Mithymna: Among the Volunteers and Refugees on Lesvos Tessa McWatt, Shame on Me: An Anatomy of Race and Belonging David Neel, The Way Home
2021	Tomson Highway, Permanent Astonishment^[13]	Jordan Abel, Nishga^[14] Ken Haigh, On Foot to Canterbury^[14] Darrel J. McLeod, Peyakow^[14] Ian Williams, Disorientation^[14]
2022	Dan Werb, The Invisible Siege: The Rise of Coronaviruses and the Search for a Cure^[15]	Geoff Dembicki, The Petroleum Papers: Inside the Far-Right Conspiracy to Cover Up Climate Change^[16] Tara McGowan-Ross, Nothing Will Be Different: A Memoir^[16] Debra Thompson, The Long Road Home: On Blackness and Belonging^[16] Joshua Whitehead, Making Love with the Land^[16]

References

1. "Writers' Trust non-fiction prize bumped up to $60,000". The Globe and Mail, May 11, 2011.
2. M.A. Orthofer, "Writers' Trust of Canada Prize for Non-Fiction ", complete review, 26 October 2011.
3. "Nominees for Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Non-Fiction announced" Archived 2013-01-04 at archive.today. National Post, September 20, 2011.
4. "Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction". Writers' Trust of Canada. Retrieved August 14, 2022.
5. "Candace Savage’s prairie meditation takes Writers’ Trust Nonfiction Prize". Toronto Star, November 12, 2012.
6. "Douglas Coupland, Rosemary Sullivan among Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Non-fiction finalists". Quill & Quire, September 16, 2015.
7. "Biography of Stalin’s daughter wins Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize". The Globe and Mail, October 6, 2015.
8. "Rogers Writers’ Trust: Celebrating the 2016 winners". Maclean's, November 3, 2016.
9. "Hilary Weston Prize shortlist announced". The Globe and Mail, September 20, 2017.
10. "David Chariandy, Billie Livingston, and Diane Schoemperlen among the winners at the 2017 Writers’ Trust awards". Quill & Quire, November 14, 2017.
11. Deborah Dundas, "Andre Alexis, Jenny Heijun Wills are big winners at Writers’ Trust Awards". Toronto Star, November 5, 2019.
12. Craig Takeuchi, "Gil Adamson, Jessica J. Lee win Writers’ Trust literary prizes". Now, November 19, 2020.
13. Jane van Koeverden, "Katherena Vermette, Tomson Highway and Cherie Dimaline among winners at 2021 Writers' Trust Awards". CBC Books, November 3, 2021.
14. Vicky Qiao, "Jordan Abel & Ian Williams among five finalists for $60K Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction". CBC Books, September 15, 2021.
15. Deborah Dundas, "Writers’ Trust 2022 book award winners collect $270,000 in prizes". Toronto Star, November 2, 2022.
16. "Joshua Whitehead among finalists for $60K Writers’ Trust non-fiction prize". Toronto Star, September 21, 2022.

External links