I didn’t win the Alberta Reader’s Choice Award. Helen Waldstein Wilkes’ Holocaust memoir Letters from the Lost has been picked as the book everyone in Alberta should read. I want to thank all those who voted. Especially those who voted, and voted again. It was a valiant – or obsessive compulsive – effort.
Cinco de Mayo always had the long odds. Not just because I’m American and not writing about a cause, but because more people read non-fiction than fiction. I have no idea why. Good fiction frequently represents the truth much more clearly.
It was exciting to be nominated. I loved hearing all sorts of nice things about the novel. The people who enjoyed the book despite not usually liking this kind of fiction, or even fiction at all, made me smile. I never expected to win, though I always held hope. The fiction between the two was not pleasant. It wasn’t ‘nice’ being nominated. It was rewarding and challenging, but never nice, like volunteers at a bloodbank or cupcakes.
Not that I wouldn’t do it all again. Nope, I would. Only better next time.
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