Esi Edugyan

The two-time winner of the Scotiabank Giller Prize on her appreciation for peaceful Parksville, B.C.

IIf I am seeking to hit the pause button on life or the daily grind, Parksville, B.C., is my escape. My husband and his brother used to go camping near there when they were young, so there’s a nice nostalgia around it. We took my daughter there when she was two, and we’ve returned every August since to reconnect with my brother-in-law’s family. Parksville is a small city where everything is built toward the water, with wide, expansive beaches that stretch for miles. The sand is soft, bright and scoured, and there’s that fresh smell of sea air that fills your nose. There are thousands of small, gelatinous blobs glistening on the surface of the beach. It’s all very magical. Everything feels like it has been rendered much slower and calmer there.

When I stand along the shoreline, I have a sense that there is no horizon, that I can just walk out toward the water and keep walking. It feels unspoiled, untrammelled, clean and remote. You can hear birds singing and children laughing. Peacefulness just washes over me.

One of my books, Washington Black, is about a man’s discovery of the natural world and falling in love with marine life. Writing it, I became interested in classifying different plants and animals, and learning which species are native to certain areas. I think Parksville embodies that passion.

When I am there, I feel grounded and we tend to have deeper, intimate and more philosophical conversations. There’s definitely something special about being in Parksville that allows us to connect on another level.