Leah Mol wins the 2018 CBC Short Story Prize

Leah Mol has won the 2018 CBC Short Story Prize for Lipstick Day, a story about teens' sexual behaviour and peerpressure.

As the grand prize winner, Mol will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts anda 10-day writing residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. Her story waspublished on CBC Books, you can read it here.

• How Leah Mol wrote the story that won the CBC Short Story Prize

This year, there were more than 2,200 English-language submissions to the CBC Short Story Prize.

Lipstick Day was selected by the jury comprised of writers Eden Robinson, Kevin Hardcastle and Heather O'Neill.

"In Lipstick Day,a teenage girl navigates the tricky world of awakening sexuality with disarming candour.This searing exploration of her inner world articulates where the social rituals of politeness collide with fumbling first experiences," the jury said. "The painstaking detail, the carefully chosen moments and the menacing undercurrent of difficult power dynamics give this story its haunting power."

• Read Lipstick Dayhere

The other finalists for the 2018 prize were J. Livingston for Scale of Comfort, Terri Monture for Strawberries, Taqralik Partridge for Fifteen Lakota Visitorsand Ayelet Tsabari for Green.The finalists each received $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and had their stories published on CBC Books.

Maryse Andraos is the winner of the French-language grand prize, Prix de la nouvelle Radio-Canada, for her story Sans refuge.

TheCBCLiterary Prizeshave been recognizing Canadian writers since 1979. Past winners include Michael Ondaatje, Carol Shields, Michael Winter and Frances Itani.

• Check out the past CBC Literary Prizes winners

If you are interested in entering the CBC Literary Prizes, the CBC Poetry Prize is now open. The deadline to submit your original, unpublished poetry is May 31, 2018.