Great news for Mubanga Kalimamukwento; she has been recently announced as the winner of this year’s prestigious Drue Heinz Literature Prize, one of the US’s leading awards for a collection of short stories. Mubanga’s winning collection, Obligations to the Wounded, will be published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in October this year.
Judge, Angie Cruz, says: “These thematically linked stories deliver an intricate study of Zambian women living in both Zambia and abroad who are weighing their options of who to love, where to live, where to work. The author, with a poet’s restraint, has written stories that deftly negotiate the challenges and tribulations women face when they feel the pressure and duty to yield to the will of family, community, customs, country, and spiritual beliefs. Obligations to the Wounded is a graceful, touching and generous collection.”
Following her win, Mubanga said: “An absolute dream come true to have been named this year’s winner of the Drue Heinz Literature Prize, especially by a judge whose work I hold deep respect and admiration for. This is a prize I have been reading and entering for years, so a win is a kind of ‘Finally’ and ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you’ moment for me.”
Big congratulations to Mubanga. We can’t wait to see Obligations to the Wounded published. The scheduled publication date is October 8th 2024.
Mubanga Kalimamukwento was shortlisted for the 2019 Bristol Short Story Prize with her story, The Devil’s Ivy. It is published in our volume 12 anthology by Tangent Books: https://www.tangentbooks.co.uk/shop/bristol-short-story-prize-anthology-volume-12