Teodoro Alcuitas
Editor, Philippine Canadian Nes
Also a successful marketing and communications professional
Vancouver-based writer and marketing professional Larah Luna has won the prestigious CBC Short Story Prize for her story, A Season of Crows. Selected from nearly 3,000 entries, Luna wins $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, and publication on CBC Books.
“Even then, it already felt surreal. Winning is something I’m still struggling to fully process,” said the Philippine born and Winnipeg raised Luna in a LinkedIn post after hearing that she was shortlisted.
“This story began quietly. It came from returning to fiction writing after some time away and learning to trust that voice again. Like many writers, I carried stories for years before finally letting them take shape on the page.
A Season of Crows explores fear, belonging, migration, and community through the eyes of a child narrator in a town unsettled by the sudden arrival of thousands of crows. In many ways, it’s a story about how people respond to what they don’t fully understand.”
Luna will discuss her winning short story on Bookends with Mattea Roach. The interview will air at a later date on CBC Radio and CBC Listen.
“I wrote A Season of Crows out of a sense that grief doesn’t disappear,” said Luna. “It shifts and settles into the world around us. Seeing crows gather felt, to me, as if they knew something before we did. The story grew from my memories of the prairies, and from the feeling that landscapes hold onto what we’ve lost. I’m deeply honoured that it resonated with the jury.”
The 2026 CBC Short Story Prize jurors Maria Reva, Terry Fallis and Tracey Lindberg said this about Luna’s story:
“The jury found A Season of Crows to be a loving portrait of the complex relationships, community and equality of spirit in a town where crows and humans cohabitate. The genuine love of neighbours, human and more than human, respect for social orders, and reciprocal understandings of home and love, are gently and skillfully woven together in this story. The author’s writing resonates deeply, allowing readers the space for both joy and grief. With the complexity of neighbouring societies laid bare, A Season of Crows reminds us all of the richness and necessity of community relationships.”
Luna’s win follows another writer for British Columbia, Louie Leyson who won the 2023 CBC Nonfiction Prize for Glossary for an Aswang, an essay examining Filipino folklore through the lens of overseas workers.
Luna was already a successful marketing and communications professional in Winnipeg before moving to Vancouver in 2019 to join for the Vancouver Art Gallery as Director of Marketing and Communications until 2022,when she moved to Vancouver Fraser Health as Regional Director, Communication Projects, Anti-Racism and Cultural Safety.
She has worked for various B.C. institutions in Marketing, among them Pacific Blue Cross and Vancouver Island Trail.
Her marketing and communications skills has been recognized with awards such as the Aboriginal Tourism Marketing Award (Travel Manitoba) in 2015, Airport Promotions Honourable Mention, 2017, Best Sales and Marketing Strategy Award (Canadian Circulation Management Association), 2009, and Best Development of Newspaper Sponsorship Programs, 2006 & 2009.
Luna has held prominent leadership positions in Winnipeg’s marketing and communications sector among them as Director of Marketing and Communications for several years for
Royal Winnipeg Ballet (RWB). During her tenure, she oversaw major initiatives, including the RWB’s annual Nutcrackerand the award-winning Going Home Star production.
She worked for the Winnipeg Richardson International Airport as a communications professional. Her work there earned an Honourable Mention for Airport Promotionsfrom Airports Council International – North America in 2017.