I just finished judging the annual Katha International Fiction Contest and was impressed by the range and quality of new South Asian writing emerging in the world today.  My co-judge Ronica Bhattacharya is a novelist herself too, and we were a good pair, drawn to different aspects in each of the stories but agreeing on the overall quality of this year’s prize-winners.  Winning stories were published in India Currents magazine and Khabar magazine. Click here for more on the contest.

It is always moving to me to receive thoughts on my book from a reader in a foreign country, especially one in which I am not officially published.  Here is one forwarded to me from Dublin, Ireland:  ”I have read it and loved it… I couldn’t put it down. The combination of the, well, I don’t know, ‘gothic’? and 60s India combined with such sympathetic, humorous characterizations was wonderfully done, I thought. I even felt sorry for the drunkard son and his horrible wife in the end. And the denouement I didn’t guess for a moment.”

Phantom Press has just released the Russian edition of Haunting Bombay with a stunning blue cover featuring a golden sunbird and an intricately red door with a hint of a ghostly presence behind it.  I am grateful to the entire Phantom Press team, including my editor and translator for such a beautiful translation.

I was recently invited to be one of six mentors for the 13th annual PEN USA’s Emerging Voices Program, a distinguished fellowship program to support writers from culturally diverse communities in LA during the early stages of their writing career.  I am mentoring African-American writer Natashia Deon, who is working on her first novel, The Spinning Wheel, set on the eve of the Civil War about three outcast women.

Haunting Bombay is officially a BESTSELLER! San Francisco Chronicle listed it as #4 in this week’s bestseller list.

This past weekend, I flew to Washington D.C. to accept a First Words Literary Prize for South Asian Writers, awarded to my yet unpublished novel, HAUNTING BOMBAY.  Award-winning author Vikram Chandra announced the prizes for novel and short-story as part of the 2003 South Asian Literary & Theater Arts Festival.  The weekend-long festival also included talks given by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Kamila Shamsie, Taslima Nasreen, Mira Nair, & Lee Siegel.  We were treated to a reception at the elegant Bombay Club, known to be a favorite restaurant of President Clinton when he was at the White House.  After my reading, I was greeted in the lobby by filmmaker Mira Nair who told me that she thought my novel film-worthy!  It was so wonderful to be surrounded by such a supportive group of artists.  I am deeply honored by this prize and thank the distinguished panel of judges and the organizers of the annual festival.