About Nandini
About life, times, and writing
Dear Friends,
During an active academic career and while single-parenting, I set to writing fiction — mainly short stories and novels — dedicatedly about five years ago. My first novel Love's Garden, forthcoming in October 2020, is a work of historical fiction and draws on major interconnected events of the two World Wars, the British Raj, the city of Calcutta (Kolkata), Indian Independence, the Partition of India, and the lives of Indian women caught up in that perfect storm of history. I'm currently working on a second novel about minorities and Hindutva politics in Narendra Modi's India, and love, racism, xenophobic mentalities and other mysteries in Donald Trump's America, titled Homeland Blues.
I have published short stories in Storyscape Journal, Raising Mothers, Ozone Park Journal, Bangalore Review, Bacon Review, Meat for Tea: The Valley Review, and OyeDrum. I've held residencies and fellowships at the Bread Loaf Writers' Workshop, the Sarah Lawrence Summer Writers' Workshop, the Southampton Summer Writers' Conference, The Voices of Our Nation Arts Writing Workshop, the Cambridge Writers' Workshop in Paris, and the Vermont Studio Center. I am also accepted at the Centrum Artist Residency, the Craigardan Writer's Residency, and the Ragdale Artist Residency (forthcoming). Also, in January 2021 I will begin attending the Warren Wilson College MFA program with a Holden Opportunity Grant from the Friends of Writers.
My awards include first runner-up for the Los Angeles Review Flash Fiction contest (2017-2018), a finalist for the Fourth River Folio Contest for Prose Prize (2018), long-listed for the Disquiet International Literary Prize (2019 and 2020), and a finalist for the Reynolds-Price International Women's Literary Award (2019).
Please stay in touch through my contact form!
Love,
Nandini