Dublin literary award for Akhil Sharma

NEW YORK, NY — Indian American author Akhil Sharma became the proud recipient of the prestigious International Dublin Literary Award on June 9, for his semi-autobiographical novel “Family Life.”

The win comes with a cash prize of 100,000 euros, the world’s largest prize for a single novel published in English.

Sharma, who also won the 40,000 pound Folio Prize last year for “Family Life,” which traces the journey of a family that emigrates from Delhi to New York, where one brother is left severely brain-damaged after a tragedy strikes.

Sharma was named the winner from an initial list of 160 nominations by a panel of judges, including novelists Ian Sansom, Juan Pablo Villalobos and Carlo Gébler.

“I don’t believe that a prize means it’s the best book. All a prize means is that it is the book which has won a prize, that it’s the one judges agreed on. But it’s a great honor – it’s a prize I’ve known about for decades, and I admire the books that have won,” he said.

After spending almost 13 years writing the book, which he described as “a nightmare – like chewing stones, chewing gravel,” Sharma now plans to use some of that prize money to set up a scholarship in his brother’s name in India, to help young women go to school.

“Family Life” was nominated by the India International Centre Library, New Delhi, and by the Jacksonville Public Library in the US.

The report added that Sharma was now working on a collection of short stories, and hopes to complete it by the end of the year.