I’m sure Vincent Lam was the most astonished person in the room when his book was announced as the Giller winner last night at a gala in Toronto. As I’m sure you’ve noticed, I have yet to review two of the finalists, Carol Windley’s Home Schooling, and the book with the biggest pre-award-announcement buzz, Rawi Hage’s novel about Lebanon during the years of civil war, De Niro’s Game. However, of the books I have read I would have picked The Immaculate Conception over Lam’s Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures, but I did enjoy that one too. What I think I liked most about Dr. Lam’s win was the backstory. We’ve all heard over the past few weeks how Hage’s book was plucked from the almost certain death it faced in Anansi Press’s slush pile, and we’ve heard how Lam’s book was the only one of the finalists to have been published by a major house. Until now though, I hadn’t heard that Lam’s path to having his book published was even more an instance of spectacular good fortune than Hage’s.

It started with a chance meeting between a doctor on a cruise ship and literary icon Margaret Atwood. He told her he was an aspiring writer. She asked him if he wanted her to be nice or be honest. He said “honest” and she agreed to read the half-written manuscript of his first book. She e-mailed him back a few months later saying “Congratulations. You can write.” She helped him get a book deal and last night Vincent Lam won Canada’s most prestigious book award.