Yepoka Yeebo was announced as the UK’s Jhalak Prize winner in London, UK on Thursday, May 30, 2024.
The Jhalak Prize for Book of the Year by a Writer of Colour is an annual literary prize awarded to British or British-resident BAME (Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic) writers created by writers Sunny Singh and Nikesh Shukla in 2016. Some previous winners have been Jacob Ross, Reni Eddo-Lodge, Guy Gunaratne, Johny Pitts, Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi, Patrice Lawrence, and Travis Alabanza. In 2020, they expanded to celebrate writing for Children & Young Adults.
The jury for 2024 are actress, director, and writer Anni Domingo, novelist Stella Oni, poet Denise Saul, author and screenwriter Danielle Jawando, author J. P. Rose, and award-winning children’s author Rashmi Sirdeshpande. The longlists in the two prizes were announced on March 14 before the shortlist was made public on April 18.
The winner in the fiction category Anansi’s Gold: The Man Who Swindled The World, Yepoka Yeebo (Bloomsbury) was announced at a ceremony in London last night.
“I was literally too stunned to speak. It is an honour, and an absolute joy to have won the 2024 Jhalak Prize. I am grateful to @profsunnysingh and to the entire team @jhalakprize. Thank you so much to the remarkable judges @annidom4, @stellaonithewriter and dsaul_writer. I am honoured that you saw something in Anansi’s Gold. I was thrilled be shortlisted with the incredible @lluidas, @noreen_masud, @amiraowrites, @jallenpaisant and @ejbpoetry and am in constant awe of their talent,” said Yeebo on Instagram. “It was a blessing to receive the absolutely stunning and heartrending statuette of Refaat’s Angel made by artist @samer_abdelnour.”
The Children and Young Adult category went to Hiba Noor Khan for Safiyyahs War, AndersenPress.
