Congratulations to Christian Rück for winning the August Prize for non-fiction book of the year
The August Prize in the non-fiction category goes to Christian Rück, professor of psychiatry, for “Ett liv värt att leva. Varför självmord blev människans följeslagare” (A life worth living. Why suicide became man's companion). According to the jury, the book is written with ‘a liberating self-evidence’.
Based on his aunt's suicide and several other patient cases, Christian Rück, a professor at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience, guides the reader through difficult and uncomfortable questions.
In his book, he also manages to ‘get past and through all the taboos surrounding the subject’, the jury emphasised in its motivation.
“I didn't even think I would be nominated, this is a subject that people are so afraid of, even journalists. I hope it will make it a little easier for people to read a book on this difficult subject, that it will be a kind of ‘sign of approval’, a recommendation to read it,” he says.
The other winners are Tony Samuelsson in the fiction category, Linda Bondestam in the children and young adults category, and Marcus Hägglund in the Little August Prize.