Jane Potter has made the 2023 CBC Nonfiction Prize longlist for Expectation. The shortlist will be announced on Sept. 14 and the winner will be announced on Sept. 21.

If you're interested in the CBC Literary Prizes, the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize is open for submissions.

Jane Potter is a writer, researcher and podcaster with Vancouver Opera. She received her MA in creative and critical writing (with distinction) from the University of Gloucestershire and is a graduate of the Humber School for Writers. She also runs a business with her husband, has several writing projects on the go and two grown children off living their best lives. She has no cats.

"New brother, lifetime of questions."

"Seeing 50-year-old adoption papers that my mother gave me during my brother's health crisis made me curious about his past in a way I had never felt before, which then made me curious about my curiosity."

It's late afternoon, and I've just come home from the hospital, where my brother has been for the past six weeks. I've been trying all day to find a moment to open the folder my mother gave me yesterday, and now, papers, some thin and fragile like a pressed flower, some thick and washed out like a piece of old construction paper, lay strewn across the table in front of me. I should be taking better care, I think, attempting to gather them into orderly piles. I clear a larger space on my desk, adjust the light and slide a long piece of legal-sized paper toward me. The typewriter ink has faded over the years: "Adoption Summary," followed by my brother's Korean name. I lean closer: "abandoned," "infant," "orphanage."

The winner of the 2023 CBC Nonfiction Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and win a two-week writing residency at Artscape Gibraltar Point. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The 2024 CBC Short Story Prize is currently open until Nov. 1, 2023 at 4:59 p.m. ET. The 2024 CBC Nonfiction Prize will open in January 2024 and the 2024 CBC Poetry Prize will open in April 2024.