2014 PEN/Hemingway Award
Exciting news! NoViolet Bulawayo is the winner of the 2014 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Fiction for WE NEED NEW NAMES (9780316230810).
The award was founded in 1976 both to honour the memory Ernest Hemingway, and to recognize distinguished first books of fiction. Read more about the award here: http://www.pen-ne.org/hemingway-foundationpen-award.
"A deeply felt and fiercely written debut novel ... The voice Ms. Bulawayo has fashioned for [Darling] is utterly distinctive - by turns unsparing and lyrical, unsentimental and poetic, spiky and meditative." Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
"Bulawayo describes all this in brilliant language, alive and confident, often funny, strong in its ability to make Darling's African life immediate ... She demonstrates a striking ability to capture the uneasiness that accompanies a newcomers arrival in America." Uzodinma Iweala, The New York Times Book Review
"Fans of Junot Díaz, who, as fiction editor of Boston Review, published NoViolet Bulawayo's early work, will love her debut novel, We Need New Names ...Bulawayo's use of contemporary culture (the kids play a game in which they hunt for bin Laden and, later, text like their lives depend on it), as well as her fearless defense of the immigrant experience through honoring the cadence of spoken language, sets this book apart-on the top shelf." Kristy Davis, Oprah.com
Shortlisted for the 2013 Man Booker Prize Winner of the 2013 Etisalat Prize for Literature Finalist for the 2013 Guardian First Book Award One of the New York Times Notable Books of the Year for 2013 One of National Public Radio's Great Reads of 2013