Fermentation by June Pyo Park
CBC Books | Posted: April 11, 2024 1:30 PM | Last Updated: April 11
The Montreal writer is on the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize longlist
June Pyo Park has made the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize longlist for Fermentation.
The winner of the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and attend a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. The four remaining finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.
The shortlist will be announced on April 18 and the winner will be announced on April 25.
If you're interested in the CBC Literary Prizes, the 2024 CBC Poetry Prize is open for submissions until June 1. The 2025 CBC Short Story Prize will open in September and the 2025 CBC Nonfiction Prize will open in January.
About June Pyo Park
June Park is a writer, editor and arts consultant. She was born in Gwangju, Korea, has lived across Canada from Vancouver to Toronto, and is currently based in Tiohtiá:ke/Montreal. She studied literature at the University of Calgary (BA) and the University of Toronto (MA). Like most book lovers, she has been writing stories and poetry from an early age. She is currently finishing a historical novel for which she was awarded the 2022 Max Margles Fiction Prize from the Quebec Writers' Federation. Park was a reader for the 2023 CBC Short Story Prize.
Entry in five-ish words
"A daughter's retrospective on love."
The story's source of inspiration
"My failed attempts at reproducing any of the Korean food my mother made for us on a daily basis when my siblings and I were kids."
First lines
Squatting, reaching into the back corner of the bottom shelf, behind an almost empty jar of pickles, beside a box of baking soda, she finds a single large glass mason jar of kimchi. Sujin is cleaning out the fridge, which is a last act in a spectacle of procrastination. On her desk wait taxes slips, invoices, bills piled in profusion.
Check out the rest of the longlist
The longlist was selected from more than 1,900 submissions. A team of 12 writers and editors from across Canada compiled the list.
The jury selects the shortlist and the eventual winner from the readers' longlisted selections. This year's jury is comprised of Suzette Mayr, Kevin Chong and Ashley Audrain.
The complete longlist is:
- The White Stetson Hat by Dennis Allen (Edmonton)
- Leave A Funny Message at the Beep by Vincent Anioke (Waterloo, Ont.)
- How Far Should You Go? by Anne Baldo (Windsor, Ont.)
- Kind Lady Lives Here by Jennifer Booth (Cambridge, Ont.)
- A Very Full Life by Rebecca Cuneo Keenan (Toronto)
- Four-Boot Fred by Izzy Ferguson (Dundas, Ont.)
- The Sea Comes Pouring In by Phil Glennie (London, Ont.)
- We Asked Too Much From God by Marian Godfrey (Victoria)
- Old Bones by Kate Gunn (Vancouver)
- dark by Mirabelle Chiderah Harris-Eze (Calgary)
- Lamentations by Miriam Ho Nga Wai (Toronto)
- Tremor of the Tongue by Nnamdi Ibeanusi (Kitchener, Ont.)
- How to Make a Friend by Zilla Jones (Winnipeg)
- Shopping by Delailah M. K. Grondin (Windsor, Ont.)
- Tiny Gifts by Vivian (Xiao Wen) Li (Toronto)
- Best by Annick MacAskill (Halifax)
- Transcendence by Britt MacKenzie-Dale (Kelowna, B.C.)
- Outpour by Lauren McNeil (Revelstoke, B.C.)
- The Ball Game by Adam McPhee (Fort McMurray, Alta.)
- Fish Sauce by Alexandra Musten (Ottawa)
- Tamago by Lindsay Naito (North Vancouver, B.C.)
- the worst has already happened by KM Naud (Vancouver)
- A Good Visit by Susan Paddon (Margaree, N.S.)
- Fermentation by June Pyo Park (Montreal)
- The Green Guest House by Mina Sharif (Toronto)
- How to Give Your Grief to the Moon by Traci Skuce (Courtenay, B.C.)
- Disprin by Kailash Srinivasan (North Vancouver, B.C.)
- The Baby by Kailash Srinivasan (North Vancouver, B.C.)
- Smack Dab by D.D.R.Staines (Cambridge, Ont.)