by Kyle Wells reporter@prpeak.com Grant Lawrence’s blowout bestseller Adventures in Solitude: What Not to Wear to a Nude Potluck and Other Stories from Desolation Sound has been nominated for the largest award in Canadian non-fiction.
The Hilary Weston Writers’ Trust Prize for Non-Fiction, which is awarded to the year’s best in non-fiction, comes with a gift of $60,000, the largest pot for a non-fiction work in Canada. Lawrence is one of five nominees for the award and is the only debut writer on the list.
Ever since Adventures in Solitude came out in October 2010 its sales and the response have been building and building. First came a top spot on the BC Bestsellers List and then soon after second billing on the Canadian National Non-Fiction Bestsellers List. From there it went on to be named in numerous top-10 lists around the country for 2010 books and won the BC Book Prize for best book published in BC.
Lawrence said he finds it somewhat intimidating to have his rough and rugged tale of life on the desolate reaches of the West Coast nominated alongside books on Mordecai Richler and Sir John A. MacDonald. He takes some comfort in the fact that a book on tree planting is also among the nominees, giving his book some dirtbag company.
“It tells stories that are encrusted in salt, dirt, oil, gasoline and all the stuff that we deal with on the coast beyond the end of the road,” said Lawrence about Adventures in Solitude.
Nobody has been more surprised by the reception than Grant, except maybe the publishers who told him that a book about some end of the road nowhere that nobody outside of the area has ever heard of would not find an audience.
“I am really surprised,” said Lawrence. “When I think back to when this book was first being made, I was told repeatedly that the book had no appeal. I believed the critics. I thought well I guess maybe I’ll be lucky if the book gets placed on a BC ferry. That was the height of my ambition, to get the book in the BC Ferries gift shop.”
Lawrence is pleased to note the response he usually hears about the book is the opposite of what the early criticisms prepared him for. He said people are relating to the elements of a book on the process of rejecting the people and places that influence us as children and then coming back to reconnect with them in adulthood. People also simply like reading about the relatable childhood experience of being strapped into the backseat of a car by your parents and being taken off to camp or vacation somewhere.
“All I did was write the stories that honestly interest me,” said Lawrence. “I believe there’s an incredible character that exists in that part of the world that I’ve always loved to talk about and to absorb myself in.”
Lawrence said it took him a while to realize just what an honour it is to be nominated for the prize. First of all, he misunderstood the $60,000 prize as $6,000. Then he found himself attending a swanky gala and press conference in Toronto to celebrate the nominations, which Order of Canada recipient Hilary Weston attended. When the phone calls started coming in from other authors and Lawrence’s CBC peers, including Jian Ghomeshi, to congratulate him on the nomination, Lawrence said it really sunk in.
As for the people back in Desolation Sound, Lawrence said he doubts most of them know about the awards and that even if they did it probably wouldn’t phase them. Lawrence said the isolation of the area keeps it relatively untouched by the rest of the world, but that some local businesses have seen increased visits from tourists who are eager to find the locations and spirit Lawrence writes of in his book, an honour all its own.
The winner for the award will be announced on October 25 in Toronto.
