The Home of British Asian Writing
by Kia Abdullah It started with a disastrous radio slot. I was invited onto a programme along with authors Nikesh Shukla, A A Dhand and Mariam Khan to look at why British Asian authors are underrepresented in publishing. Sadly, we were asked to go over the same old ground: ‘Does diversity lower standards?’ ‘Do writers …
The cover A Summary The Cure For a Crime is about the twins, Ali and Tulip, whose Mum has got a strange new boyfriend, Brian Sturgeon the Brain Surgeon. Suddenly Mum falls ill, a fever maybe? No, it is a strange new virus and Brian Sturgeon is No.1 on the twins’ suspect list. Oh no, …
The Salam Award for Imaginative Fiction, a short story award which promotes science fiction and related genres is now open for entries. Now in its fourth year the prize aims to encourage and inspire writers from Pakistan to unleash their creative potential. The scope of the prize is broad and encompasses everything from science fiction …
Crime writer Abir Mukherjee has been shortlisted for a major literary prize. Mukherjee’s third book, Smoke and Ashes is one of six titles in contention for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. Now in it’s 16th year the most coveted prize in crime fiction, presented by Harrogate International Festivals, represents crime writing …
by Farah Damji I helped to set up The View Magazine, a publication by and for women in the criminal justice system, with three other women with conviction because nothing like it exists. The current prison publications are aimed at men and women are only mentioned as an afterthought. The View Magazine is a voice …
Debut novelist Emma Smith-Barton and Costa winner Jasbinder Bilan have been shortlisted for the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize. Emma’s novel The Million Pieces of Neena Gill has been placed in the Older Readers category, while Asha and the Spirit Bird by Jasbinder Bilan is listed in the Younger Readers category. Now in its sixteenth year, …
by Leela Soma Set in South India, in the tiny cantonment of Nandagiri The Tainted by Cauvery Madhavan traces the lives of the Anglo-Indian community. They belong nowhere, not to the ruling Raj, or the local community, tainted by their mixed blood. The love story between Private Michael Flaherty of the Royal Irish Kildare Rangers …
by Jude Higgins Flash fiction is a form of short short fiction that, in recent years, has been growing in popularity worldwide. To qualify as a ‘flash’, stories must be 1000 words or less and many writers write to a 500 or 300 word limit. The skill in writing these tiny tales is to successfully …
Brace yourselves, 2020 sees Asian authors returning to what they know and love: literary fiction. I don’t remember a time quite like it. Reminiscent of my mother’s Eid dinners, 2020 promises us abundance, from poetry collections to short stories, crime to children’s fiction. The year has already gifted us with some literary gems but there’s …
With falling author earnings it is common for writers to supplement their income with teaching or part time work. But the portfolio career or ‘slashie’ – juggling two or three entirely different careers at the same time – is a new way of working and it’s on the rise. Crime writer Vaseem Khan tells us …