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2019 Banff Mountain Book Competition Long List announced

By Jess Green Posted on September 03, 2019

BANFF, AB, September 3, 2019 – Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival is pleased to announce the long list of category finalists for Banff Mountain Book Competition.

Chosen from the best in mountain literature (non-fiction), mountain fiction and poetry, mountain environment and natural history, adventure travel, mountain image, guidebooks, mountaineering articles, and climbing literature. The prescreening committee read 132 book submissions from authors in nine countries, which were narrowed down to a long list of 29 category finalists (across 8 categories). A shortlist of award winners contending for the Grand Prize will be announced in mid October.

"Once again we were overwhelmed at the quality of entries this year in our competition. Mountain literature is alive and well and I’m pleased to say that our long list of finalists represents many new and emerging voices in the genre.” 

– Joanna Croston, Festival Director, Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival

Category finalists are listed alphabetically by title in each award category:

Mountain Literature (non-fiction) – The Jon Whyte Award
$2000 – Sponsored by the Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies

Hangdog Days
Jeff Smoot, Mountaineers Books (USA, 2019)

Inner Ranges
Geoff Powter, Rocky Mountain Books (Canada, 2018)

No Easy Way
Mick Fowler, Vertebrate Publishing (UK, 2018)

Paul Preuss: Lord of the Abyss
David Smart, Rocky Mountain Books (Canada, 2019)

Rising
Sharon Wood, Douglas & McIntyre (Canada, 2019)

Waymaking
Helen Mort, Claire Carter, Heather Dawe, Camilla Barnard, Vertebrate Publishing (UK, 2018)

Mountain Fiction & Poetry
$2000 – Sponsored by the Town of Banff

Magnetic North: Sea Voyage to Svalbard
Jenna Butler, University of Alberta Press (Canada, 2018)

Rock as Gloss
Mark Goodwin, Longbarrow Press (UK, 2019)

The Equilibrium Line
David Wilson, The Poetry Business (UK, 2019)

Mountain Environment and Natural History
$2000 – Sponsored by Rocky Mountain Soap Company

Caribou Rainforest
David Moskowitz, Mountaineers Books (USA, 2018)

Down from the Mountain
Bryce Andrews, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (USA, 2019)

Kings of the Yukon
David Weymouth, Penguin Random House – Knopf Canada (Canada, 2018)

Adventure Travel
$2000 – Sponsored by Fjällräven

Horizon
Barry Lopez, Random House Canada (Canada, 2019)

Lines on a Map
Frank Wolf, Rocky Mountain Books (Canada, 2018)

Rough Magic
Lara Prior-Palmer, Catapult (USA, 2019)

The Animal One Thousand Miles Long
Leath Tonino, Trinity University Press (USA, 2018)

The Sun is a Compass
Caroline Van Hemert, Little, Brown Spark (USA, 2019)

Mountain Image
$2000 – Sponsored by Lake O’Hara Lodge

Alpenglow: The Finest Climbs on the 4000m Peaks of the Alps
Ben Tibbetts (UK, 2019)

Scenic Playground: The Story Behind New Zealand’s Mountain Tourism
Peter Alsop, Te Papa Press (NZ, 2018)

The Grand Canyon: Beyond River and Rim
Pete McBride, Rizzoli International Publications (USA, 2018)

The Rough-Stuff Fellowship Archive: Adventure with the World’s Oldest Off-Road Cycling Club
Mark Hudson, Isola Press (UK, 2019)

Guidebooks
$2000 – Sponsored by the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides

Aoraki – Tai Poutini
Robert Frost, New Zealand Alpine Club (NZ, 2018)

Lake District Bouldering
Greg Chapman, Vertebrate Publishing (UK, 2019)

Safer Ski Touring in Norway
Espen Nordahl and Erlend Sande, Fri Flyt (Norway, 2018)

Training for the Uphill Athlete
Steve House, Scott Johnston and Kilian Jornet, Patagonia Books (USA, 2019)

Mountaineering Article
$2000 – Sponsored by the University of Alberta and the Alpine Club of Canada

Finding Protection in Bears Ears
Josh Ewing, The Climbing Zine (USA, July 2019)

Magic Line
Lonnie Kauk, Alpinist Magazine (USA, May 2019)

The Last Days of Marc-André Leclerc
Matt Skenazy, Outside Magazine (USA, June 2018)

Thirteen Feet Under
Jayme Moye, Alpinist Magazine (USA, June 2019)

Climbing Literature
$2000 – Sponsored by Rocky Mountain Books

All titles that are longlisted in the categories above that have a theme of climbing are eligible for this award.

Grand Prize – the Phyllis and Don Munday Award
$4000 – Sponsored by the Alpine Club of Canada

The shortlist of category award winners eligible for the Grand Prize will be announced in mid-October.

The Grand Prize will be announced Thursday, October 31, 2019 at Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival where category awards will also be presented to winning authors.

Authors in attendance for this year’s Festival include Craig Childs (Atlas of a Lost World), Frank Wolf (Lines on a Map), Mark Twight (Refuge), Jeff Smoot (Hangdog Days), Kate Rawles (The Life Cycle), Sharon Wood (Rising), Corey Rich (Stories Behind the Images), Mark Synnott (The Impossible Climb), Caroline Van Hemert (The Sun is a Compass), as well as Book Competition finalists Jenna Butler (Magnetic North: Sea Voyage to Svalbard), Geoff Powter (Inner Ranges), and David Smart (Paul Preuss: Lord of the Abyss).

For more information on the 2019 Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival and to view the schedule, please visit www.banffmountainfestival.ca.

If you’d like to provide media coverage of the 2019 Festival, please submit a media accreditation application form (submissions open until October 1).

For more information please contact:          

Jess Green
Media and Communications
Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival
107 Tunnel Mountain Drive
Banff, Alberta
T1L 1H5 

jess_green@banffcentre.ca        

About Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival: Created 44 years ago, Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival has become the premier event of its kind in the world. The nine-day Festival at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in Banff, Canada, showcases the world’s best films, books and photographs on mountain subjects – climbing, culture, environment and natural history, exploration and adventure, wildlife, and sport – and attracts the biggest names in mountaineering, adventure filmmaking, and explorers as presenters and speakers. An international jury will also award over $40,000 in prizes for films and books submitted to this year’s Festival competitions. banffmountainfestival.ca 

Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival Partners: The 2019 Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival Presenting Partners are: Rab and Banff and Lake Louise Tourism. The Festival is also sponsored by Deuter, Clif Bar & Company, Mountain House, Oboz Footwear, Yeti, BUFF®, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, Kathmandu, Smartwool, NOLS, World Expeditions, Kicking Horse Coffee, Lake Louise Ski Resort and Summer Gondola, and MEC.

About Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity: Founded in 1933, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity is a learning organization built upon an extraordinary legacy of excellence in artistic and creative development. What started as a single course in drama has grown to become the global organization leading in arts, culture, and creativity across dozens of disciplines. From our home on Treaty 7 territory in the stunning Canadian Rocky Mountains, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity aims to inspire everyone who attends our campus – artists, leaders, and thinkers – to unleash their creative potential and realize their unique contribution to society through cross-disciplinary learning opportunities, world-class performances, and public outreach. banffcentre.ca