{"id":17839,"date":"2025-09-12T10:42:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-12T10:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/17839\/"},"modified":"2025-09-12T10:42:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-12T10:42:09","slug":"i-married-a-spy-the-secrecy-broke-my-heart-by-diana-bayko","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/17839\/","title":{"rendered":"I married a spy. The secrecy broke my heart by Diana Bayko"},"content":{"rendered":"

Diana Bayko\u00a0has made the\u00a02025\u00a0CBC Nonfiction Prize longlist<\/a>\u00a0for\u00a0I Married a Spy. The Secrecy Broke My Heart.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The winner of the 2025\u00a0CBC Nonfiction Prize<\/a>\u00a0will receive $6,000 from the\u00a0Canada Council for the Arts<\/a>, a two-week writing residency at\u00a0Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity<\/a>\u00a0and have their work published on\u00a0CBC Books<\/a>. The four remaining finalists will each receive $1,000 from the\u00a0Canada Council for the Arts<\/a>\u00a0and have their work published on\u00a0CBC Books<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The shortlist will be announced on Sept. 18\u00a0and the winner will be revealed on Sept. 25.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If you’re interested in other writing competitions, check out the\u00a0CBC Literary Prizes<\/a>. The 2026\u00a0CBC Short Story Prize<\/a>\u00a0is currently accepting submissions.\u00a0The 2026\u00a0CBC Nonfiction Prize<\/a>\u00a0will open in January and the 2026\u00a0CBC Poetry Prize<\/a>\u00a0will open in April.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

About Diana Bayko<\/p>\n

Diana Bayko is a mixed-race writer who has worked as an intelligence officer, a visual merchandiser and as an\u00a0executive assistant before settling into a writing career. She holds an MFA in creative\u00a0nonfiction from the University of King’s College in Halifax and is writing a book about secrets and relationships called The Half of It: What We Don’t Know About the People We Love. Diana writes about the liminal spaces of our personal, racial\u00a0and professional identities, and her work has been published in The Yummy Mummy Club and Mixed Asian Media. She lives in Calgary with her family.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Entry in five-ish words<\/p>\n

“Hidden identities, deception, longing \u2014 a love story.”<\/p>\n

The source of inspiration<\/p>\n

“I realized I could connect with others by being vulnerable and telling the truth about my experiences. Although most civilians can’t relate to the work that goes on in the intelligence world, everyone can relate to being in a romantic relationship that has issues. The themes I write about \u2014 isolation, disconnection, secrecy, and love \u2014 those are universal.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

What the readers had to say<\/p>\n

“I’m not sure if someone has written about the household routine of a Canadian spy before, but the mixing of humour, secrecy and the mundane brings the readers to the kitchen table for an unexpected series of family discussions.”<\/p>\n

First lines\u00a0<\/p>\n

I met Eric in a French class. That’s the story I’ve always told people, and it’s a version of the truth. We spent eight months in a classroom together in downtown Ottawa practicing verb conjugations and used ourselves as the subject of interest. Seven and a half hours a day, five days a week, for eight months, we learned everything about each other. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Check out the rest of the longlist<\/p>\n

The longlist was selected from more than 1,300 submissions.\u00a0A\u00a0team of 10\u00a0writers and editors from across Canada<\/a>\u00a0compiled the list.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The jury selects the shortlist and the eventual winner from the readers’ longlisted selections. This year’s jury is composed\u00a0of\u00a0Zoe Whittall, Danny Ramadan and Helen Knott<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The complete\u00a0longlist is:\u00a0<\/p>\n

I married a spy. The secrecy broke my heart.<\/a> by\u00a0Diana\u00a0Bayko (Calgary)\u00a0 The Sensibilities of Dogs<\/a> by\u00a0Antoinette\u00a0Bekker (Medicine Hat, Alta.)\u00a0 The Space Between Views<\/a>\u00a0by\u00a0Laurel\u00a0Borisenko (Chemainus, B.C.)\u00a0 Day Shift, Night Shift<\/a>\u00a0by Jo-Anne Dusel (Moose Jaw, Sask.)\u00a0 The Pauper<\/a> by\u00a0Izzy\u00a0Ferguson (Dundas, Ont.)\u00a0 Summer Ash<\/a> by\u00a0Rachel\u00a0Foster (Vancouver)\u00a0 Reflections of a Teen Vessel<\/a>\u00a0by\u00a0Cori\u00a0Francis\u00a0(Barnwell, Alta.)\u00a0 The Boy Who Loved Alice<\/a> by\u00a0Charles\u00a0Hayter (Toronto)\u00a0 A Mother’s Guide to Urban Gardening<\/a> by\u00a0Michelle\u00a0H\u00e9bert (Halifax)\u00a0 I Wash the Purple Water Bottle<\/a> by\u00a0Kelley\u00a0La (Calgary)\u00a0 I got used to You<\/a> by\u00a0Yasmin\u00a0Ladha (Muscat,\u00a0Oman)\u00a0 Death on the Seventh<\/a> by\u00a0Jim Libiran\u00a0(Scarborough, Ont.)\u00a0 Fishing with My Father:\u00a0Reflections on Newfoundland’s Cod Culture<\/a> by\u00a0Boyd\u00a0Lundrigan\u00a0(Spaniard’s Bay, N.L.)\u00a0 Songs for Linda<\/a> by\u00a0Carrie\u00a0Mac (Vancouver)\u00a0 The Invisible Woman<\/a> by\u00a0Laura\u00a0MacGregor\u00a0(Waterloo, Ont.)\u00a0 We are baptized for the dead in Taber\u00a0before going to A&W for burgers and root beer<\/a> by\u00a0Cheryl\u00a0Markosky\u00a0(London, U.K.)\u00a0 Small Miracles<\/a> by\u00a0Anastasia\u00a0McEwen\u00a0(Fergus, Ont.)\u00a0 The First Apartment<\/a> by\u00a0Jennifer\u00a0McGuire (Owen Sound, Ont.)\u00a0 The Home That Crossed Ocean<\/a> by\u00a0Raffi\u00a0Minas (Calgary)\u00a0 Little America<\/a> by\u00a0Nancy\u00a0Newman (Edmonton)\u00a0 The Townie Time Machine<\/a>\u00a0by\u00a0Ian\u00a0Orti (Berlin, Germany)\u00a0 Cancer Stage Exit 4: A Memoir<\/a> by\u00a0Lena\u00a0Palacios (Montreal)\u00a0 The Art of Falling Overboard<\/a> by\u00a0Loghan\u00a0Paylor (Chilliwack, B.C.)\u00a0 The Dances We Do With Our Children<\/a> by\u00a0Trenton\u00a0Pomeroy (Rothesay, N.B.)\u00a0 36 Views of Mount Royal<\/a> by\u00a0Lorne\u00a0Roberts (Montreal) Out of Love<\/a> by\u00a0Barclay\u00a0Rose (North Cowichan, B.C.)\u00a0 In Case\u00a0I Die<\/a>\u00a0by\u00a0Crystal Semaganis\u00a0(Bear Island, Ont.)\u00a0 The Morel Moral: A Public Service Announcement<\/a> by\u00a0Shelley Wood (Kelowna, B.C.)\u00a0 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Diana Bayko\u00a0has made the\u00a02025\u00a0CBC Nonfiction Prize longlist\u00a0for\u00a0I Married a Spy. The Secrecy Broke My Heart.\u00a0 The winner of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[489,156,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-17839","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}