Zimbabwean writer Novuyo Rosa Tshuma has won the 2019 Edward Stanford Travel Writing Award in the fiction category. She won it with her debut novel, House of Stone. The book was awarded for its sense of place.
Describing her win, the judges said her novel is “impressive, evocative and highly unusual.” Adding that “the playful, often painful narrative takes a series of unexpected turns, keeping the reader engrossed in often shocking African politics and history.”
House of Stone has been longlisted for the International Dylan Thomas Prize organized by the Swansea University. It was also awarded the Bellagio Literary Arts Residency Award.
Novuyo has received several honours and fellowships including: Rydson Award, 2016 writer-in-residence at the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, the 2009 Yvonne Vera Award, the 2014 Herman Charles Bosman Prize for her collection of short stories, Shadows. She is also a fiction editor at The Bare Life Review. The Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards was established in 1853 and has existed over these years “celebrate this most exciting of genres and seek to celebrate the best travel writing, and travel writers, in the world.”
