Name for Submissions – The Worldwide Amy MacRae Award for Memoir

By Alison Carrying

In Might 2019, a small group of girls met at a writing retreat within the south of France. Amongst them was a glowing younger lady named Amy.

Amy spoke usually of her daughter, then 4 years previous, the years of heartbreaking infertility Amy and her husband had endured earlier than a fantastic adoption, and the way a lot she liked being a mom. “The perfect factor I’ve ever been referred to as is Mama.”

Amy additionally talked about her work as a kindergarten trainer, which she adored, and of the terminal ovarian most cancers prognosis she had been given a yr earlier. “I would solely have two extra summers,” she stated softly throughout our introductions. “There are such a lot of issues I need to write.”

The private essays Amy workshopped through the retreat had been spectacular, however she was involved that nobody would have an interest. “Why would anybody need to learn my unhappy tales?” she requested us. “Received’t it simply be miserable?”

Each lady on the retreat roared; a fierce, wonderful refrain of help. All through the week, we continued to howl our enthusiasm for Amy’s writing, its vitality and significance.

On the final evening of the retreat, Amy handed out glow sticks and invited us all to bop to her favorite tunes at the hours of darkness. It was riotously enjoyable, and I’ll always remember watching Amy twirl across the château lounge, her arms swirling color into the darkness.

Over the following months, Amy labored exhausting revising and sharpening one of many items she had written in France. “Do you actually suppose it might be revealed,” she requested me at one level, “or are you simply being good?”

I assured her I used to be being trustworthy, that her writing was sturdy and pure, easy and majestic, however I’m unsure she ever believed me. The perfect writers usually don’t.

On June 1, 2020, on the age of 35, Amy died of ovarian most cancers.

A couple of weeks later, the CBC Literary Awards contacted the writers whose tales had been chosen as finalists for his or her prestigious annual contest. These awards are a number of the best within the nation, with hundreds of tales submitted yearly. Amy MacRae was one in all 5 writers shortlisted for the CBC Nonfiction Prize. You might learn her story right here.

Within the months after Amy’s demise, she grew to become a near-constant presence for me, one which jogged my memory how lucky I used to be to have a physique wholesome sufficient to scale a rock face, skip over tree roots, or simply shut my eyes and take heed to the wind peel a layer of water from the floor of the lake. She taught me to see each gray hair as a privilege, each interplay as a chance for kindness, and each morning an providing, even within the midst of a lockdown.

A couple of months after she died, I used to be snowshoeing via the forest, once I had an thought. Or moderately, Amy handed me an thought. Or moderately, she pressed a thought into the form of a snowflake, blew it off a excessive department and let it spiral down and land on my nostril, at which level I smiled and regarded up, blinked a couple of occasions, and felt like I had an thought. (Choose your most well-liked understanding of inspiration.)

The concept was to create a literary contest in Amy’s honour and donate all proceeds to her dwelling legacy fund for ovarian most cancers analysis.

And so, the Worldwide Amy MacRae Award for Memoir was born. This annual contest, now in its sixth yr, celebrates excellence in brief memoir (max. 2000 phrases). An excerpt from an extended work can be welcome as long as it really works as a stand-alone piece.

We outline memoir writing (or private essay) as a piece of inventive nonfiction that illustrates a private expertise utilizing literary methods and narrative units similar to dialogue, character, setting and scene. Reasonably than merely recounting previous occasions, profitable memoir tends to supply a better perspective on that previous, use private expertise as an illustration of common themes and/or endeavour to derive that means, understanding or knowledge from the story it sketches.

There was one level about which I felt very strongly once I created this award: the only real important criterion have to be literary excellence. Simply because a narrative is “fascinating” or “uncommon” or “well timed” or “ticks a variety of containers” doesn’t imply it’s a prize-winning story. It might sound shocking, however the subject material of story is nearly irrelevant.

A story of a wildly thrilling or horrendous life occasion that’s written with no actual level past “take heed to what occurred to me!” received’t maintain a candle to a quiet, refined story that has been fastidiously and intentionally crafted, that has a pulsing centre of gravity, readability of objective, originality, spark, artistry, a robust voice, a novel angle or model, or one thing that makes it shimmer or stick with us, a high quality that lifts it into the realm of artwork.

Our submission portal shall be open from April 15 to July 1, 2026. Winners shall be introduced in October 2026.

Study extra in regards to the contest right here.  

___

*** This essay initially appeared in April 2025; we expect it’s price one other learn, with joyful summer time needs to everybody from The Brevity Weblog staff.

___

Alison Carrying is founder and administrator of the Worldwide Amy MacRae Award for Memoir.

Tagged: Name for Submissions, crafting memoir, memoir, motherhood, nonfiction submissions, submissions