The City of Vancouver Book Award is a Canadian literary award, that has been presented annually by the city of Vancouver, British Columbia to one or more works of literature judged as the year's best fiction, non-fiction, poetry or drama work about the city.
As with the City of Toronto Book Award, the award may go to one or more books.
The award has a monetary value of $3,000. The prize is funded by interest earned from the city's publishing reserve, which was established in 1977 as a permanent legacy for writers and publishers. The fund received royalties generated from Vancouver's First Century: A Photo History of Vancouver, edited by city staff. The third edition of the book, renamed Vancouver: A City Album, for many years generated royalty payments for the fund.
1989 | Saltwater City: An Illustrated History of the Chinese in Vancouver | Winner | ||
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1990 | Disappearing Moon Cafe | Winner | ||
Being Brown: A Very Public Life | Finalist | |||
Buddy's: Meditations on Desire | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
1991 | Vanishing Vancouver | Winner | ||
Leonard Frank: An Enterprising Life | Finalist | |||
Robin Ward's Vancouver | Finalist | |||
1992 | Trees of Vancouver: A Guide to the Common and Unusual Trees of the City | Winner | ||
No Forwarding Address | Finalist | |||
Hidden Cities | Finalist | |||
Flesh Wound | Finalist | |||
and Graeme Wynn | Vancouver and Its Regions | Finalist | ||
1993 | Vancouver: A Visual History | Winner | ||
Finalist | ||||
and John Atkin | Heritage Walks Around Vancouver | Finalist | ||
1994 | Winner | |||
and Karl Spreitz | Vancouver: Visions of a City | Finalist | ||
Robin Ward's Heritage West Coast | Finalist | |||
Line Screw | Finalist | |||
1995 | Earle Birney: A Life | Winner | ||
and Cynthia Nugent | Mister Got to Go | Finalist | ||
and Robert Davidson | Eagle Transforming: The Art of Robert Davidson | Finalist | ||
1996 | Winner | |||
Monday Night Man | Finalist | |||
Making Vancouver: Class, Status & Social Boundaries 1863-1913 | Finalist | |||
1997 | Winner | |||
Vancouver at the Dawn: A Turn-of-the-Century Portrait | Finalist | |||
and Bob Scullion | Postcards from the Past: Edwardian Images of Greater Vancouver and the Fraser Valley | Finalist | ||
1998 | Winner | |||
and Ian Macdonald | Finalist | |||
And a Body to Remember With | Finalist | |||
1999 | Keys to Kingdoms | Winner | ||
and the editors of Vancouver Magazine | Vancouver: Secrets of the City | Finalist | ||
White Lung | Finalist | |||
2000 | and Donald Luxton | Lions Gate | Winner | |
and Collin Varner | Gardens of Vancouver | Finalist | ||
Paper Shadows: A Chinatown Childhood | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
2001 | Simple Recipes | Winner | ||
City of Glass: Douglas Coupland's Vancouver | Finalist | |||
Stanley Park | Finalist | |||
(ed.) | Susan Point: Coast Salish Artist | Finalist | ||
2002 | Winner | |||
Burrard Inlet: A History | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
Making a Stone of the Heart | Finalist | |||
2003 | , Ken Dietrich-Campbell, Patricia Canning and Elaine Allan | Heroines | Winner | |
(ed.) | Stan Douglas: Every Building on 100 Block West Hastings | Winner | ||
and Bob Turner | Vancouver, City on the Edge: Living with a Dynamic Geological Landscape | Finalist | ||
Intimate Distances | Finalist | |||
2004 | L.D.: Mayor Louis Taylor and the Rise of Vancouver | Winner | ||
Finalist | ||||
Finalist | ||||
Sitting Practice | Honourable mention | |||
Honourable mention | ||||
Missing Sarah: A Vancouver Woman Remembers Her Vanished Sister | Honourable mention | |||
2005 | Dream City: Vancouver and the Global Imagination | Winner | ||
All That Matters | Finalist | |||
and Dara Culhane (eds.) | In Plain Sight: Reflections on Life in Downtown Eastside Vancouver | Finalist | ||
Various | Finalist | |||
2006 | Stanley Park's Secret: The Forgotten Families of Whoi Whoi, Kanaka Ranch, and Brockton Point | Winner | ||
Waterfront: The Illustrated Maritime History of Greater Vancouver | Winner | |||
Historical Atlas of Vancouver and the Lower Fraser Valley | Finalist | |||
, Ian M. Thom, and Adele Weder | B.C. Binning | Finalist | ||
2007 | Vancouver Remembered | Winner | ||
and Michael Turner | Fred Herzog: Vancouver Photographs | Finalist | ||
Can You Hear the Nightbird Call? | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
2008 | and Gillian Jerome | Hope in Shadows: Stories and Photographs of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside | Winner | |
Falsework | Finalist | |||
At Home With History: The Untold Secrets of Greater Vancouver's Heritage Homes | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
2009 | Winner | |||
In the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts | Finalist | |||
Nightmarker | Finalist | |||
2010 | and Scott Steedman | Visions of British Columbia | Winner | |
Finalist | ||||
Common Ground in a Liquid City | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
2011 | Winner | |||
Whoever Gives Us Bread: The Story of Italians in British Columbia | Finalist | [2] | ||
After Canaan: Essays on Race, Writing, and Region | Finalist | |||
Vancouver Kids | Finalist | |||
2012 | YVR | Winner | ||
and Elee Kraljii Gardiner (eds.) | V6A: Writing from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside | Finalist | [3] | |
At the World's Edge: Curt Lang's Vancouver | Finalist | |||
Undesirables: White Canada and the Komagata Maru | Finalist | |||
Finalist | ||||
2013 | How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler's Memoir | Winner | [4] | |
Finalist | ||||
Ink on Paper | Finalist | |||
and Robin Ward | Exploring Vancouver: The Architectural Guide | Finalist | ||
Inventing Stanley Park: An Environmental History | Finalist | |||
2014 | Arthur Erickson: An Architect's Life | Winner | ||
What Makes Olga Run? | Finalist | [5] | ||
How Does a Single Blade of Grass Thank the Sun? | Finalist | |||
Anatomy of a Girl Gang: A Novel | Finalist | |||
Artificial Cherry | Finalist | |||
2015 | Winner | [6] [7] | ||
Live at the Commodore: The Story of Vancouver's Historic Commodore Ballroom | Finalist | |||
Hastings-Sunrise: Poems | Finalist | |||
and Cynthia Nugent | Mister Got To Go, Where Are You? | Finalist | ||
2016 | , Karen Duffek, and Tania Willard | Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun: Unceded Territories | Winner | [8] |
and Renée Sarojini Saklikar (eds.) | Finalist | [9] | ||
That Lonely Section of Hell: The Botched Investigation of a Serial Killer Who Almost Got Away | Finalist | |||
2017 | Bad Endings | Winner | [10] | |
, Ian M. Thom, Susan Point, Kathryn Bunn-Marcuse, Thomas Cannell, Myrtle McKay, and William McLennan | Susan Point: Spindle Whorl | Finalist | ||
Pandas on the Eastside | Finalist | |||
Invisible Dead | Finalist | |||
2018 | Dear Current Occupant | Winner | [11] | |
Fighting for Space: How a Group of Drug Users Transformed One City's Struggle with Addiction | Finalist | |||
Sitting Shiva on Minto Avenue, by Toots | Finalist | |||
Sustenance: Writers from BC and Beyond on the Subject of Food | Finalist | |||
2019 | and Susan Point | People among the People: The public art of Susan Point | Winner | |
Finalist | ||||
Murder by Milkshake: An Astonishing True Story of Adultery, Arsenic, and a Charismatic Killer | Finalist | |||
No Fixed Address | Finalist | |||
Port of Being | Finalist | |||
2020 | Chinatown Through a Wide Lens: The Hidden Photographs of Yucho Chow | Winner | [12] | |
on/me | Finalist | [13] | ||
Vancouver for Beginners | Finalist | |||
2021 | Five Little Indians | Winner | ||
Finalist | ||||
and Anna Bron | Salma the Syrian Chef | Finalist | ||
Ho Sun Hing Printers | Honourable mention | |||
2022 | , Bill McLennan, and Jordan Wilson | Where the Power Is: Indigenous Perspectives on Northwest Coast Art | Winner | |
Erase and Rewind | Finalist | [14] | ||
No Shelter | Finalist | |||
Chiru Sakura: Falling Cherry Blossoms | Finalist | |||
Debbie Cheung & Christopher Lee, Occupying Chinatown | Finalist |