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Pauline Dakin wins Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction

Author Pauline Dakin has been named winner of the 2018 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction for her memoir Run, Hide, Repeat: A Memoir of a Fugitive Childhood.

"This is a true story unlike any other you’ve read that will keep you guessing from beginning to end," said Bruce Gillespie, an award juror and professor in Laurier’s Digital Media and Journalism program. "More than just a mystery, Dakin’s memoir is also a moving reflection on the complexity of family relationships."

When Dakin was 23, her mother made a startling confession: their family had been hiding from the Mafia since she was a child as part of a witness protection program. Run, Hide, Repeat tells the story of her childhood while offering a moving reflection on the demands and limits of our closest relationships.

Pauline Dakin
Pauline Dakin

In addition to Run, Hide, Repeat, the shortlist for the 2018 Edna Staebler Award included Life on the Ground Floor: Letters From the Edge of Emergency Medicine by James Maskalyk and A History of Canada in Ten Maps: Epic Stories of Charting a New Land by Adam Shoalts.

Dakin's win was celebrated during public events at Laurier's Waterloo and Brantford campuses in early November.

The $10,000 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction recognizes Canadian writers for a first or second work of creative non-fiction that includes a Canadian locale or significance. Established and endowed by writer and journalist Edna Staebler in 1991, the Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction is administered by Laurier, the only university in Canada to bestow a nationally recognized literary award.

Run, Hide, Repeat

In related literary news, novelist and memoirist Alison Pick was chosen as Laurier’s Edna Staebler Visiting Author for the fall 2018 term.

Pick is an award-winning writer whose accomplishments in three genres – fiction, memoir and poetry – have been internationally recognized and published in multiple languages. Among her works are the novel Far to Go, which was long-listed for the 2011 Man Booker Prize.

During her time on Laurier’s Waterloo and Brantford campuses from Oct. 22 to Nov. 2, Pick visited classes, conducted workshops, offered literary readings and mentored writers in the Laurier community.

Alison Pick
Alison Pick