Vancouver's Carmen Aguirre won CBC's Canada Reads competition on Thursday for her memoir Something Fierce: Memoirs of a Revolutionary Daughter.

Aguirre came to Canada from Chile as a child after the 1973 coup d'état, but five years later, her family moved back. As she writes in her memoir, when Aguirre was 18, she joined the resistance movement and moved to Argentina. The book tells of her experiences in the 1980s living in Bolivia, Peru, Argentina and Chile.

During Canada Reads, each book is defended by a celebrity, the panel debates and then books are voted out.

"Our panelists gave audiences four days of passionate debates on five tremendously diverse non-fiction books," said Jian Ghomeshi, host of Canada Reads 2012 and CBC's Q.

"In the end, it was the compelling story of a child who came to Canada as a refugee, then was faced with leaving this new life to return to fight injustice in her homeland, that ultimately captivated our panelists."

Something Fierce was also on the long lists for the Charles Taylor Prize for Non-Fiction and the British Columbia National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction.

Aguirre's memoir was championed by Canadian hip-hop musician Shad (Shadrach Kabango) in the first version of Canada Reads that pitted non-fiction books against each other.

"Something Fierce has a number of passionate advocates here at D&M, so we were thrilled to see it win Canada Reads," said Trena White, associate publisher of Douglas & McIntyre. "Carmen has written a riveting story about dedication to family and to a cause, and the debate around it only proved how essential it is for Canadians to hear different perspectives on resistance and oppression."

The other books in the contest were Ken Dryden's The Game, defended by actor Alan Thicke; On a Cold Road by Dave Bidini, defended by supermodel Stacey McKenzie; The Tiger by Vancouver's John Vaillant, defended by lawyer Anne-France Goldwater; and Prisoner of Tehran by Marina Nemat, defended by Dragon's Den's Arlene Dickinson.

tsherlock@vancouversun.com

Sun Books Editor