Local author nominated for book award

Esko area author Elaine Osborne’s book, “If I Felt Alone,” was recently nominated for a Northeastern Minnesota Book Award in the nonfiction category.

Osborne’s book tells the story of the massive sewage spills near her home and the effects on her health and her life, as she fought to get officials at the Western Lake Superior Sanitary District to acknowledge and rectify the damage done.

Tens of millions of gallons of raw sewage — wastewater that included industrial waste from the paper mill in Cloquet along with fecal matter — spilled into the Maki Swamp near Osborne’s home on Maki Road five times in five years in the 1980s. At the same time, she began getting sick. First it was repeated bouts of what the Esko woman thought was the flu that she couldn’t shake. Later on she experienced dizziness, blackouts, cognitive decline, and eventually vomiting and diarrhea almost daily.

Osborne said she wrote her book to help others who might be suffering from environmental illness, and to exorcise the ghosts of what turned into a 30-year struggle to convince people that her story, her illness and her struggles were real.

This year’s NEMBA contest honors books published in 2020 and 2021. Find out more at https://lakesuperiorwriters.org/2022-nominee-list.

Osborne’s book may be purchased online at Amazon.com or in person via check or cash at the Pine Knot News office.