Oonya Kempadoo

Oonya Kempadoo is a writer who was born in Sussex, England in 1966 of Guyanese parents. She was brought up in Guyana and has since lived in Europe and various islands in the Caribbean.

Her first novel, Buxton Spice, was published to great acclaim in 1998, and was nominated for the 2000 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Her second book, Tide Running (Picador, 2001), set in Plymouth, Tobago, is the story of young brothers Cliff and Ossie.

Oonya Kempadoo has studied art in Amsterdam and has lived in Trinidad, St. Lucia, Tobago, and now lives in Grenada.

She was named a Great Talent for the Twenty-First Century by the Orange Prize judges and is a winner of the Casa de las Americas Prize.

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Nelly Rosario

Nelly Rosario (born 1972) is a Dominican American novelist and creative writing instructor in the MFA Program at Texas State University in San Marcos.

Rosario was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in Brooklyn. She received a B.A. in engineering from MIT and an M.F.A. in fiction from Columbia University.

After the debut of her novel Song of the Water Saints, Rosario was described by Julia Alvarez as "a Caribbean Scheherazade."

(from Wikipedia)
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Ken Saro-Wiwa

Kenule "Ken" Beeson Saro Wiwa was a Nigerian writer, television producer, environmental activist, and winner of the Right Livelihood Award and the Goldman Environmental Prize.
Saro-Wiwa was a member of the Ogoni people, an ethnic minority in Nigeria whose homeland, Ogoniland, in the Niger Delta has been targeted for crude oil extraction since the 1950s and which has suffered extreme environmental damage from decades of indiscriminate petroleum waste dumping. Initially as spokesperson, and then as President, of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), Saro-Wiwa led a nonviolent campaign against environmental degradation of the land and waters of Ogoniland by the operations of the multinational petroleum industry, especially
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Edwidge Danticat

Edwidge Danticat is a Haitian American novelist and short story writer. Her first novel, Breath, Eyes, Memory, was published in 1994 and went on to become an Oprah's Book Club selection. Danticat has since written or edited several books and has been the recipient of many awards and honors. Her work has dealt with themes of national identity, mother-daughter relationships, and diasporic politics. In 2023, she was named the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor of the Humanities in the department of African American and African Diaspora Studies at Columbia University.
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William Faulkner

William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer. He is best known for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, a stand-in for Lafayette County where he spent most of his life. A Nobel laureate, Faulkner is one of the most celebrated writers of American literature and often is considered the greatest writer of Southern literature.
Faulkner was born in New Albany, Mississippi, and raised in Oxford, Mississippi. During World War I, he joined the Royal Canadian Air Force, but did not serve in combat. Returning to Oxford, he attended the University of Mississippi for three semesters before dropping out. He moved to New Orleans, where he wrote his first novel Soldiers' Pay (1925). He went back to Oxford
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Esmeralda Santiago

Esmeralda Santiago (born 1948 in San Juan, Puerto Rico). Is a renowned Puerto Rican author In 1961, she came to the United States when she was thirteen years old, the eldest in a family that would eventually include eleven children. Ms. Santiago attended New York City's Performing Arts High School, where she majored in drama and dance. After eight years of part-time study at community colleges, she transferred to Harvard University with a full scholarship. She studied film production and graduated in 1976 magna cum laude. Shortly after graduation, she and her husband, Frank Cantor, founded CANTOMEDIA, a film and media production company, which has won numerous awards for excellence in documentary filmmaking.

Her writing career evolved from h
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Angie Cruz

Angie Cruz was conceived in Dominican Republic and born in 1972 in New York City's Washington Heights. She continued to travel to and from, every summer, until she was sixteen years old. She went to La Guardia High School concentrating on Visual Arts and by default decided to follow a path in Fashion Design at Fashion Institute of Technology. During those four years of college, she worked as a salesperson, manager and then window designer in an upscale Madison Ave. boutique. In 1993, four of her children stories were featured on BET's Story Porch. Soon after, she gave up her fashionista lifestyle to become a full-time college student at SUNY Binghamton where her love affair with literature and history began. She graduated from the NYU, MFA
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Jamaica Kincaid

Jamaica Kincaid is an Antiguan-American novelist, essayist, gardener, and gardening writer. She was born in St. John's, Antigua (part of the twin-island nation of Antigua and Barbuda). She lives in North Bennington, Vermont (in the United States), during the summers, and is Professor of African and African American Studies in Residence at Harvard University during the academic year.
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Nuruddin Farah

Nuruddin Farah (Somali: Nuuradiin Faarax, Arabic: نور الدين فرح‎) is a prominent Somali novelist. Farah has garnered acclaim as one of the greatest contemporary writers in the world, his prose having earned him accolades including the Premio Cavour in Italy, the Kurt Tucholsky Prize in Sweden, the Lettre Ulysses Award in Berlin, and in 1998, the prestigious Neustadt International Prize for Literature. In the same year, the French edition of his novel Gifts won the St Malo Literature Festival's prize. In addition, Farah is a perennial nominee for the Nobel Prize in Literature.
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Leila Aboulela

Leila Aboulela grew up in Khartoum, Sudan where she attended the Khartoum American School and Sister School. She graduated from Khartoum University in 1985 with a degree in Economics and was awarded her Masters degree in statistics from the London School of Economics. She lived for many years in Aberdeen where she wrote most of her works while looking after her family; she currently lives and lectures in Abu Dhabi.

She was awarded the Caine Prize for African Writing in 2000 for her short story The Museum and her novel The Translator was nominated for the Orange Prize in 2002, and was chosen as a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times in 2006.

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Nelly Rosario

Nelly Rosario (born 1972) is a Dominican American novelist and creative writing instructor in the MFA Program at Texas State University in San Marcos.

Rosario was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in Brooklyn. She received a B.A. in engineering from MIT and an M.F.A. in fiction from Columbia University.

After the debut of her novel Song of the Water Saints, Rosario was described by Julia Alvarez as "a Caribbean Scheherazade."

(from Wikipedia)
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Claire Cameron

A new book, March 25, 2025 — HOW TO SURVIVE A BEAR ATTACK: A Memoir

Also, author of The Last Neanderthal, The Bear and The Line Painter.

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José Eduardo Agualusa

«José Eduardo Agualusa [Alves da Cunha] nasceu no Huambo, Angola, em 1960. Estudou Silvicultura e Agronomia em Lisboa, Portugal. Os seus livros estão traduzidos em 25 idiomas.

Escreveu várias peças de teatro: "Geração W", "Aquela Mulher", "Chovem amores na Rua do Matador" e "A Caixa Preta", estas duas últimas juntamente com Mia Couto.

Beneficiou de três bolsas de criação literária: a primeira, concedida pelo Centro Nacional de Cultura em 1997 para escrever « Nação crioula », a segunda em 2000, concedida pela Fundação Oriente, que lhe permitiu visitar Goa durante 3 meses e na sequência da qual escreveu « Um estranho em Goa » e a terceira em 2001, concedida pela instituição alemã Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst. Graças a esta bolsa viveu
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Karen Lord

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Kim Thúy

Kim Thúy arrived in Canada in 1979, at the age of ten. She has worked as a seamstress, interpreter, lawyer and restaurant owner. She currently lives in Montreal where she devotes herself to writing.

Her debut novel Ru won the Governor General's Award for French language fiction at the 2010 Governor General's Awards. An English edition, translated by Sheila Fischman, was published in 2012 and was a shortlisted nominee for the 2012 Scotiabank Giller Prize.

Thúy spent her early childhood in Vietnam before fleeing with her parents as boat people and settling in the Montreal suburb of Longueuil. She has degrees in law, linguistics and translation from the Université de Montréal.
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Jessica J. Lee

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Narine Abgaryan

Наринэ Абгарян
Նարինե Յուրիի Աբգարյան

Narine Yuryevna Abgaryan (Наринэ Абгарян) is a Russian writer of Armenian origin, a blogger. Graduated from Yerevan State Linguistic University V. Ya. Bryusova, since 1993 lives in Moscow. She became known after the publication of the autobiographical book "Manyunya" (2010). With this book, she became a laureate of the Russian National Literary Prize "Manuscript of the Year" in the nomination "Language". Entered the long list of nominees for the 2011 Big Book Award.
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Waubgeshig Rice

Waubgeshig Rice grew up in Wasauksing First Nation on the shores of Georgian Bay, in the southeast of Robinson-Huron Treaty territory. He’s a writer, listener, speaker, language learner, and a martial artist, holding a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. He is the author of the short story collection Midnight Sweatlodge and the novels Legacy, Moon of the Crusted Snow, and Moon of the Turning Leaves. He appreciates loud music and the four seasons. He lives in N’Swakamok - also known as Sudbury, Ontario - with his wife and three sons.
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Katherena Vermette

Katherena Vermette is a Canadian writer, who won the Governor General's Award for English-language poetry in 2013 for her collection North End Love Songs. Vermette is of Metis descent and from Winnipeg, Manitoba. She was a MFA student in creative writing at the University of British Columbia.

Her children's picture book series The Seven Teachings Stories was published by Portage and Main Press in 2015. In addition to her own publications, her work has also been published in the literary anthology Manitowapow: Aboriginal Writings from the Land of Water. She is a member of the Aboriginal Writers Collective of Manitoba, and edited the anthology xxx ndn: love and lust in ndn country in 2011.

Vermette has described her writing as motivated by an a
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Caitlin Galway

Caitlin Galway is a Canadian novelist and short fiction writer. She has received and been shortlisted for numerous prizes, and her work has appeared in journals and anthologies across North America.
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Elizabeth Renzetti

It all began in a small sod hut on the Prairies .... no, it didn't. It began with my failure to do well in math, which led to journalism school, which led to the Globe and Mail, which led to interviewing dozens (hundreds? it felt that way sometimes) of authors, which led to this run-on sentence that would have caused my first journalism professor to cut off my typing digits.
In short, I was one of those kids whose best friends were fictional characters. I walked into poles regularly because I read as I walked, and I was a better reader than a walker.
Then I was a journalist, first in Toronto and then in Los Angeles and London for the Globe and Mail, sometimes known as the Mope and Pail, Canada's national newspaper. All along, I continued to f
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Jinwoo Park

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Omar El Akkad

Omar El Akkad is an author and journalist. He was born in Egypt, grew up in Qatar, moved to Canada as a teenager and now lives in the United States. The start of his journalism career coincided with the start of the war on terror, and over the following decade he reported from Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay and many other locations around the world. His work earned a National Newspaper Award for Investigative Journalism and the Goff Penny Award for young journalists. His fiction and non-fiction writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Le Monde, Guernica, GQ and many other newspapers and magazines. His debut novel, American War, is an international bestseller and has been translated into thirteen languages. It won the Pacific N
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Carleigh Baker

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Canisia Lubrin

Canisia Lubrin is a writer, editor, and teacher. Her books include the acclaimed and awards-nominated Voodoo Hypothesis and The Dyzgraphxst, nominated for ten prizes, ﬁnalist for the Trillium and Governor General’s awards for English poetry, and winner of the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the Griffin Poetry Prize, and the Derek Walcott Prize. Lubrin was also awarded the 2021 Joseph Stauffer Prize in literature by the Canada Council for the Arts. Poetry editor at McClelland & Stewart, she is the Creative Writing MFA Coordinator in the School of English and Theatre Studies at the University of Guelph. In 2021, she was awarded a Windham-Campbell prize for poetry. Lubrin’s debut work of ﬁction is Code Noir: Metamorphoses.
Born in St.
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Suyi Davies Okungbowa

Also known as Suyi Davies

Suyi Davies Okungbowa is an award-winning author of fantasy, science fiction and general speculative work. His latest books include Lost Ark Dreaming and The Nameless Republic epic fantasy trilogy ( Son of the Storm and Warrior of the Wind ). His debut godpunk novel David Mogo, Godhunter won the 2020 Nommo Award for Best Novel. His shorter works have appeared in various periodicals and anthologies and have been nominated for various awards. He also writes for younger audiences as Suyi Davies. He earned his MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona, and is an Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa.
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Jordan Ifueko

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Hollay Ghadery

Hollay Ghadery is a multi-genre writer living in rural Ontario on Anishinaabe land. She has her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Guelph. Her work has appeared in various literary journals and magazines around the world. Fuse, her acclaimed memoir of mixed-race identity and mental illness, was published by Guernica Editions’ MiroLand imprint in 2021. Her debut collection of poetry, Rebellion Box, was released with Radiant Press in spring 2023. The title poem from this collection was the winner of The New Quarterly's 2022 Nick Blatchford Occasional Verse Prize. Hollay's short-fiction collection, Widow Fantasies, is due out with Gordon Hill Press in 2024.
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O.O. Sangoyomi

O.O. Sangoyomi is a Nigerian American author with a penchant for African mythology and history. During a childhood of constantly moving around, she found an anchored home in the fictional worlds of books. She is a recent graduate of Princeton University, where she studied literature. Her debut novel, Masquerade, will be published by Macmillan/Forge in July 2024.

You can find Sangoyomi on Instagram and Twitter @oosangoyomi.
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Patricia Powell

Patricia Powell is Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing at Mills College. She is the author four novels, including Me Dying Trial, A Small Gathering of Bones (Beacon Press, 2003), The Pagoda (Harcourt, 1999), and The Fullness of Everything (Peepal Tree Press, 2009).

Excerpts from her novels as well as her short stories have been widely anthologized, and she has lectured and led creative writing workshops in literary venues both nationally and internationally.

In 1993 Powell was a finalist for Granta’s Best of Young American Novelists Award. Among other prizes, she is the recipient of a PEN New England Discovery Award, The Publishing Triangle’s Ferro-Grumley Award for fiction, and The Lila-Wallace Reader’s Digest Writers’ Awar
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Patricia Powell

Patricia Powell is Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing at Mills College. She is the author four novels, including Me Dying Trial, A Small Gathering of Bones (Beacon Press, 2003), The Pagoda (Harcourt, 1999), and The Fullness of Everything (Peepal Tree Press, 2009).

Excerpts from her novels as well as her short stories have been widely anthologized, and she has lectured and led creative writing workshops in literary venues both nationally and internationally.

In 1993 Powell was a finalist for Granta’s Best of Young American Novelists Award. Among other prizes, she is the recipient of a PEN New England Discovery Award, The Publishing Triangle’s Ferro-Grumley Award for fiction, and The Lila-Wallace Reader’s Digest Writers’ Awar
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