Honorable Dance: A Kenyan author nominated for an American literary prize :: Kenya

Former editor of The Standard, Peter Kimani is one of six authors nominated for the Hurston / Wright Legacy Award, the largest prize for black writers in the United States. States.

The award is in honor of Zora Neale Hurston and Richard Wright, two African American pioneer writers who wrote in the 1940s. Hurston is popularly known for his 1937 novel, Their Eyes Looked God while Wright is remembered for Native Son who was studied in Kenya schools. Both writers died in 1960.

Kimani's fictional novel, Jakaranda Dance, published by Akashic Books, will fight with, among others, Black Moses of Congolese writer Alain Mabanckou. Alain's book is published by The New Press and he is considered one of the best francophone African writers.

Other nominees in the fictional category are Lesley Nneka Arimah, author of Which means when a man falls from the sky (Riverhead Books), Ernest J Gaines, author of The Tragedy of Brady Sims (Vintage Contemporaries), Yewande Omotoso with The Woman Next Door (Picador) and Jesmyn Ward author of Sing, Unburied Sing (Scribner ).

In announcing the nominees, the Zora Neale Foundation Hurston / Richard Wright noted that 140 books published in 2017 had been submitted by self-produced publishers and authors in the following four categories: first novel, fiction, non-fiction and poetry .

The judges – all honored laureates from previous years – worked independently of the foundation to evaluate books of artistic excellence and contribution to the literary canon, the foundation wrote on its website.

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The Hurston / Wright Foundation has been established as a resource center for training and to be a gateway to ensure the unique experience and voice of African Americans in the literature . He recognizes the literary excellence of black writers in the United States and around the world in the categories of novel first novel, fiction, non-fiction and poetry.

Kimani says that it was the first nomination of the Jakaranda Dance for a significant prize, he was also chosen by the New York Times as the one of his 100 remarkable books of 2017

Typically, The New York Times receives 1000 books to be reviewed each week, which equates to more than 50,000 books a year. At the same time, The Jakaranda Dance was inscribed in the Quartz Book of the Year, Amazon Book Deal for January 2018, Book Banquet Notable Book of 2018 and was a special Amazon.com choice for January 2018.

In mid-June 2018, the novel rose to the # 1 category of the African Historical Fiction category on the British subsidiary of Amazon.

The novel is currently available in the United States and the United Kingdom, where it was released in March this year, highly acclaimed by critics. Five radio, television and online stations from the BBC conducted interviews with the author, including In the Studio, a 30-minute weekly arts program aired last month. The BBC describes the program as a chronicle of "the world's most creative people at work".

The book has been featured in several of the most important publications of several countries: Australia, Great Britain, Canada, Kenya, India, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Nigeria, South Africa, Trinidad and Tobago and United States.

"I did many tours around the world last year, participating in the biggest festivals in the world, from New York's PEN World Voices to the Los Angeles Times Festival to Los Angeles Times. the Calabash Lit-fest, a biennial event in Jamaica, "says Kimani.

Kimani, who dropped out of the newsroom for the clbadroom, resumed teaching at Aga Khan University's Graduate School of Media and Communications after a year of absence from Amherst College , where he was a guest writer.

The author describes the appointment as a big step in his writing, explaining that he will give the book a boost and give him more exposure.

He will travel to Washington in mid-October for the Hurston / Wright Legacy Award Gala which will include public readings of all the finalists, before a winner is announced.