International publisher signs Sikkim writer for two book deal

PRAJWAL PARAJULY BECOMES YOUNGEST  INDIAN TO SIGN AN INTERNATIONAL, MULTI-COUNTRY BOOK DEALGANGTOK, 18 Oct: Two books by Prajwal Parajuly have been acquired by Quercus, marking the publishing debut of the 26 year old alumnus of Gangtok’s Tashi Namgyal Academy and making him the youngest writer with the publisher. Quercus, a London-based publishing house, it may be mentioned here, was named the “Publisher of the Year” at the 2011 Bookseller Awards in London.
The two titles are “The Gurkha’s Daughter: Stories”, and “Land Where I Flee”, a novel. The Gurkha’s Daughter: Stories is scheduled to be published in hardback in December 2012. The collection chronicles the lives of Nepali-speaking people around the world. Land Where I Flee will be released in December 2013.
Mr. Parajuly, currently based in New York, informs that the short-story collection is based on the lives of Nepali-speaking people everywhere. “There are two stories based in Gangtok, another in Kalimpong, a third in Darjeeling, one in Nepal, one in Bhutan, one in London, one in New York,” he shares.
As for the novel, it is spread in the same areas, he informs, adding that it deals with various members of a big family in conflict with one another.
The Quercus Editor-in-chief Jon Riley has been quoted in media reports as informing that the publishing house has bought the UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, for a five-figure sum from Susan Yearwood at the Susan Yearwood Literary Agency, which is handling Mr. Parajuly’s portfolio.
When asked by when the books will be available in bookstores in India, Mr. Parajuly said, “The first book will be out in England in late 2012. It hasn’t been declared whether the book will be simultaneously released all over the world. If not, the book should be distributed by Penguin Books in India shortly thereafter.”
Hemali Sodhi, Vice President, Marketing & Corporate Communications, Penguin Books-India, has also come on record as saying, “Prajwal Parajuly is one of the brightest young writing talents to come out of India.”
About the books and Mr. Parajuly’s oeuvre, Mr. Riley says: “The colour and intensity of Prajwal Parajuly’s language, and the world he peoples his work with, make him an astonishingly accomplished young writer and one we are excited to be publishing.”
The Sikkim writer is already being touted as the next big thing in South Asian fiction by various publications of the Indian sub-continent and his first release being held up as the harbinger of the resurgence of the short-story format.
When his first title gets published next December, it will also be the first time that a book on fiction has been written about Nepali-speaking people without the contents restricted to Nepal.
Growing up in Gangtok, Mr. Parajuly completed his school education from TNA here. At 17 he became a columnist for The Himalayan Times, and a year later enrolled at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri. He was involved in the school’s campus media, including editor-in-chief of “Detours”, a travel magazine that won the College Media Advisers' Apple Award in March 2006 and the Pacemaker Award at the 2007 National College Media Convention in Washington, D.C. while he was at the helm of affairs. After graduation, Mr. Parajuly moved to New York City and worked as an advertising executive for The Village Voice.
He left his job in 2009 and began visiting communities across South Asia, Great Britain and the United States influenced by refugees from Bhutan, seeking to tell their stories. While working on his first compilation of short stories, he gained acceptance into Kellogg College’s creative writing Masters programme at Oxford University. And now he has made publishing history... Congrats!