Raising the profile of South Asian writers since 2007
Writing is a habit. Or at least that’s what it can become (and, unlike other habits, it can actually be good for you). For me the writing habit began aged six, when I picked up a pencil and made up the sentence ‘I saw a blackbird in my garden’- a seemingly innocuous statement except for …
I have a confession. Sometimes I can become a little too obsessed with my fellow writers. In my enthusiasm to give Asian writers a platform to showcase their work and my commitment to find the best emerging talents, I can become (a bit of) an online stalker. Bilal Tanweer is one of the victims of …
In late November when my husband, Anudit, and I were attending a relative’s memorial service, I kept thinking about how little we know people. Our understanding of fellow human beings is often based on what we have in common or the relationship we share with them. My husband’s great aunt, in whose honour the memorial …
Cyrus Mistry was awarded The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature for his second novel, Chronicle of a Corpse Bearer this weekend (Jan 18, 2014). Mistry was awarded the $50,000 prize (just over £30,000) at a ceremony held at this year’s ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival. Chronicle of a Corpse Bearer tells the story of doomed …
Sathnam Sanghera, author of Marriage Material has been shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award. The author, featured here by The Asian Writer last month, took to Twitter to thank his supporters. many thanks for kind words about @costabookawards nomination for Marriage Material. More info about the book here: http://t.co/EWJMukQiSZ — Sathnam Sanghera (@Sathnam) …
Six titles have made the shortlist of the fourth DSC Prize for South Asian Literature 2014. (November 20, 2013) It is the first year that Indian publishers have dominated the prize, with four of the six titles published by the publishing giant Penguin Random House. The DSC Prize for South Asian Literature is for US …
“Write a vampire novel with an Asian angle?” That was the advice a first time novelist was given recently, by his new agent. You heard it here first: A vampire novel with an Asian angle. “So what do you think I should do?” he said, in all seriousness. I could sense he was uneasy about …
Advances are tricky things for publishers. At Dahlia Publishing I don’t offer an advance simply because it’s a small press and there’s really no money in the bank for me to be able to invest in an author’s career by giving money up front. But conglomerate publishers have always (no matter how small, or diminishing …
Pulitzer Prize winning author, Jhumpa Lahiri has been longlisted for the 2013 Man Booker Prize for Fiction. (Tuesday 23 July 2013.) Lahiri’s second novel, The Lowland (scheduled to be published by Bloomsbury in September) follows the story of two brothers. Born just fifteen months apart, Subhash and Udayan Mitra are inseparable, often mistaken for the …
Lists are a contentious issue. If you haven’t yet woken up to the news about the Granta’s 2013 Best Young British Novelists then here’s a link to the Guardian piece. A while ago now on Twitter, Roopa Farooki and Nikesh Shukla were talking about the Granta list, Roopa Farooki suggested a Best Young Asian Novelists …