Now in its fifth year, the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing supports the voices of immigrant writers whose works straddle cultural divides, embrace the multicultural makeup of our society, and interrogate questions of identity in a global society. At a time when borders are physically closed due to a global pandemic, draconian immigration laws are being passed, and xenophobic and racist rhetoric pervades the media, we are more determined than ever to amplify and celebrate the stories and experiences of immigrant authors. This prize awards $10,000 and publication with Restless Books to a writer who has produced a work that addresses the effects of global migration on identity. The prize-winning books alternate between fiction and nonfiction every year; the 2020 prize will be for fiction.
This year’s judges, Dinaw Mengestu, Achy Obejas, and Ilan Stavans, have carefully selected five finalists from one of our largest pool of submissions to date. We are grateful for the deliberation of our three judges and extend a heartfelt thanks to all of the applicants who shared their work with us this year.
We are delighted to share the 2020 short list for the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing:
Three Trips by Sindya Bhanoo
This moving and profound collection of short stories about the lives of South Indian immigrants and their families offers a complex look at the effects of immigration, not only on those who leave, but also those who stay. From a young woman in Georgia on the brink of starting college to a lonely mother in India adjusting to life in a retirement home, Bhanoo deftly explores the nuances of family bonds, identity, and cultural assimilation in these stories.
The Life and Times of the Little Manuscript & Anonymous by Meron Hadero
These continent-crossing stories are full of nuanced, fully realized characters. A ten-year-old refugee in Iowa by way of Berlin befriends an older German man. A street sweeper pins his hopes on a smooth-talking NGO employee. With understated power, these stories explore the many kinds of borders we cross to find belonging.
Together We Aspire by Justin Haynes
Set in a Trinidadian fishing village, this novel is memorably narrated by a chorus of local men. When a scarlet ibis appears on the roof of a house one day, the bad luck it portends falls on the village in spades. Fishermen are held for ransom offshore, and then begin turning up in pieces. A young girl fleeing Venezuela arrives, rescued from a brothel. And then a foreign reporter starts poking around. Inventive and vividly told, this story crackles with violence.
Until the Deer Return by Alisa Koyrakh
A frank exploration of identity and family dynamics, Until the Deer Return lays bare the desires of a mother and daughter to reconcile their Russian culture and Jewish heritage in their search to define themselves. Zhenya and her daughter Natasha leave Russia, moving first to Italy and then to the United States. As Zhenya distances herself from her past, Natasha delves deeper into her family’s origins as she seeks to understand her mother and their history.
The Thousand-Year Dream by Natali Petricic
The Thousand-Year Dream is a heartfelt, nonlinear family saga told through connected short stories. A Croatian family from the Dalmatian Islands experiences the fall of communism, emigrates to Washington state, and confronts the duality of hope as they share collective joys and heartbreaks. These stories paint a full picture of the motivations, sacrifices, and realities of one family’s choice to start a new life.
Congratulations to all the 2020 finalists! Stay tuned to see who the winner of 2020’s Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing will be!
ABOUT THE FINALISTS
© Brian Birzer
Sindya Bhanoo’s fiction has appeared in Glimmer Train, Granta, The Masters Review and elsewhere. She was the 2020 grand prize winner of the DISQUIET Literary Prize and her work has received support from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference.
She has worked as a reporter for The New York Times, where she was the longtime Observatory columnist, and The Washington Post, where she is still a frequent contributor. She is a graduate of UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism and the Michener Center for Writers, where she was a finalist for the Keene Prize for Literature in 2018 and 2019. She is currently a Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan.
Meron Hadero is an Ethiopian-American born in Addis Ababa who came to the U.S. in her childhood via Germany. Her short stories have been shortlisted for the 2019 Caine Prize for African Writing and appear in Best American Short Stories, Ploughshares, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, Zyzzyva, New England Review, The Iowa Review, Addis Ababa Noir, and others. She’s also published in The New York Times Book Review and The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives. Meron has been a Steinbeck Fellow at San Jose State University and a fellow at Yaddo, Ragdale, and MacDowell. An alum of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation where she worked as a research analyst for the President of Global Development, she holds an MFA from the University of Michigan, a JD from Yale Law School, and a BA from Princeton in history with a certificate in American Studies.
Originally from Trinidad and Tobago, Justin Haynes migrated to Brooklyn, NY as a teenager. Since then he has lived in various places in the U.S., and he currently resides and works in Central Virginia. He has been awarded residencies and fellowships for his fiction by the Fine Arts Works Center in Provincetown, the Wisconsin Institute of Creative Writing where he was a Carl Djerassi fellow, Art OMI, the Vermont Studio Center, and Tin House Summer Workshop. His writing has been published in various print and online outlets including Caribbean Quarterly, The Caribbean Writer, SX Salon|Small Axe Project, and Pree.
© Colin Dekeersgieter
Alisa Koyrakh received her BA in Comparative Literature from Barnard College and her MFA in Fiction from NYU. With support from NYU’s Global Research Initiative, Alisa spent four months researching her novel in Eastern Europe. The daughter of Soviet Jewish immigrants, Alisa writes to explore the precarious nature of morality and our need to feel at ease in a world that is never truly our own. Her work has most recently appeared in New England Review. She lives in Carrboro, North Carolina with her husband.
© Dennis Escobedo
Natali Petricic is a first-generation Croatian-American whose parents emigrated from the Dalmatia region of Croatia. Her short stories have appeared in CALYX, Santa Monica Review, The Fem, Rosebud and Joyland. Her novella, Leaf Boats, is included in the Running Wild Novella Anthology, Volume 3. She is a former PEN USA Emerging Voices Fellow and PEN USA Mark program participant. Natali is currently working on a novel.