Jack Whalen, Lisa Moore and Susie Taylor take home the 2024 Winterset Awards

Three authors have won the 2024 BMO Winterset Award for excellence in Newfoundland and Labrador writing. 

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the award. To mark the milestone, two $12,500 prizes were awarded to a work of fiction and a work of non-fiction.

Susie Taylor brought home the fiction prize for her short story collection, Vigil. The one-time non-fiction prize was awarded to co-authors Lisa Moore and Jack Whalen for Invisible Prisons. 

Sara Power and Ashleigh Matthews were recognized as finalists with a $3,000 prize each, for their respective works, Art of Camouflage and Otherwise Grossly Unremarkable.

The winners were honoured at an event at Government House in St. John's Thursday afternoon.

Invisible Prisons

Jack Whalen has been hailed by many as a hero. 

The man estimates he spent over 700 days in solitary confinement in the Whitbourne Boys' Home as a teenager in the 1970s.

During that time, Whalen suffered physical and psychological abuse. He made a replica of the solitary confinement cell and attached it to his truck in 2023, when he started his protest against the province's statute of limitations on child abuse lawsuits.

The law prevented him from suing the province over his treatment at the youth detention centre. 

Newfoundland and Labrador removed that time limit in 2024, and Whalen became closer to closure. 

Co-writing Invisible Prisons amplified that feeling. 

"Before the book came out, I used to have nightmares pretty much twice a week, at least, about running away from the boys home and everything," Whalen told CBC News, award in hand.

"Since it's come out, I've had none. So I must be at peace," he said. 

It was a journey for co-author Lisa Moore, too.

"Jack was so brave and courageous and honest," she said. "It is heartbreaking, but it's also full of redemption, really. It's full of healing and … it was an amazing journey."

Vigil

Susie Taylor, who took home the award for fiction Thursday, says the Winterset award gives her hope.

"I live in rural Harbour Grace," Taylor said. "I spend most of my day doing things like, you know, chopping wood, walking my dogs, and preventing the house from falling down.

"Being able to come out of that life and into things like this, to be able to meet other writers … it's incredible. These awards really do have a huge impact on our reputation and also our lives as a writer."

Her award-winning book, Vigil, is a collection of short stories — stories Taylor said are inspired by the beauty and tragedy that surrounds her in Conception Bay North.

Taylor told CBC she started writing at 40, and getting to this point feels "surreal."

"We can all do amazing things when we don't expect it," she said.

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