Mark Leiren-Young wins the Leacock Medal

Journalist, filmmaker, and Georgia Straight contributor Mark Leiren-Young has won the esteemed Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour. In its 62-year history, the annual nationwide prize for literary wit has honoured such writers as Robertson Davies, Farley Mowat, W.O. Mitchell, Mordecai Richler, and Bill Richardson.

Leiren-Young won the medal, along with $15,000 in cash, for Never Shoot a Stampede Queen: A Rookie Reporter in the Cariboo, his debut memoir about life in Williams Lake. The field of finalists also included Pender Island author William Deverell, for his novel Kill All the Judges.

The award was announced on April 30. It will be presented to Leiren-Young at the annual Leacock dinner, to be held on June 13 in Geneva Park, near Orillia, Ontario.