April 16th 2015
Nikesh Shukla
Nikesh writes, novels, short stories and film. His debut novel, Coconut
Unlimited was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award 2010. He cowrote a non-fiction essay about the riots with Kieran Yates called
Generation Vexed: What the Riots Don’t Tell Us About Our Nation’s Youth.
In 2013, he released a novella about food, called The Time Machine.
His new novel, Meatspace, is out now and according to The
Guardian, ‘Like Douglas Coupland’s Generation X, this novel captures a
cultural moment.’
In 2014, he wrote an award-winning short film with Sarmad Masud
called Two Dosas, starring Himesh Patel. His Channel 4 Comedy Lab
Kabadasses aired on E4 and Channel 4 in 2011 and starred Shazad Latif,
Jack Doolan and Josie Long. The film won the Film London ‘London Calling
Plus’ Award for best film.
Next event: June 25th with literary agent Kate Johnson.
Kate Johnson
Tonight’s Special Guest
Next Novel Nights
Kate Johnson is a literary agent at Wolf Literary Services, based in Bristol and
New York. Prior to joining Wolf Literary Services, Kate was an agent and vice
president at Georges Borchardt, Inc., for more than eight years. She previously
edited and reported at StoryQuarterly, Bookslut.com, New York magazine and
elsewhere, and graduated from Northwestern University’s Medill School of
Journalism.
Kate is on the hunt for literary fiction, particularly character-driven stories,
psychological investigations, modern-day fables, international tales, magical
realism, and historical fiction. She likes moral ambiguity and vivid settings, from
the Midwest to Moldova, and would love to read a good Southern gothic or
Glasgow noir. Nonfiction-wise, she’ll read just about anything about food,
feminism, parenting, art, travel and the environment, and she loves working with
journalists.
Novel Nights Submissions: Submit the first pages of your novel for readings on June 25th. This time we're
looking for literary fiction or narrative nonfiction ((not children’s/young adult or sci-fi/fantasy). We're
particularly encouraging unagented authors.
Tonight’s Team
Grace Palmer
Paul Kirby
Grace Palmer organises Novel Nights and is a member of Bristol Novelists. By
day she's a press officer. Grace has completed her first novel and is sending this
out to agents at the moment. The Wish Bone is set in Bristol and explores how a
family copes with two bombshells: childhood cancer and an affair.
An occasional contributor to Novel Nights, Paul is also a member of Bristol
Novelists. He is currently working on his novel The Craft of Life.
April 16th 2015
Tonight’s Writers
Hari Ramakrishnan
Hari Ramakrishnan will be reading a short story, Electoral Dysfunction.
Hari has predominantly written for theatre, including two original West
End productions. He is starting to move into writing more short stories and
films, whilst trying to attend as many auditions as possible while acting, in
between co-presenting The Saturday Edition on BCfm Radio. Hari
Ramakrishnan also wrote this short introduction. He blogs
www.hariramakrishnan.com and on twitter he is @HotChocHari
L.E. Turner
Maithreyi
Nandakumar
L.E. Turner will read a short story, 'Tweeter and the Monkey'.
Lindsey Turner, writing as L.E. Turner, lives in Bristol which is also the
setting of her novel 'About the Nature of the Creature' in which she has
turned the city into a haven for a variety of supernatural creatures.
She started writing stories in small notebooks at the age of 6, with her “vivid
imagination” commented on by many teachers, and struggles to go a day
without writing – whether an ongoing project, short story or blog post.
She describes herself as a nerd, feminist, performer, blogger and
slightly surreal writer of urban fantasy, gothic horror and science fiction.
Find her on twitter @robot_tiger
Maithreyi Nandakumar will read from her completed novel ‘Stirring the Pot’,
set in Bristol and Chennai which is awaiting fame and fortune Maithreyi is a
Bristol based writer. Her short-stories have been published in anthologies
(Bristol Tales, first prize), broadcast on radio (BBC World Service), online
(Over the Red Line) and her story Innocent and the Book Lender made the
last 16 for BBC Opening Lines in 2014. She blogs
at www.vaguelyprofound.wordpress.com.
AA Abbott
AA Abbott, also known as Helen, is reading a short story, Personal Services
Helen has published two thrillers about big business and is working on a
third. She belongs to the Bristol Fiction Writers' Group, which meets
monthly in the central library.
The group plans to publish a second anthology of local crime fiction
soon. Website: http://aaabbott.co.uk Find her on Facebook and twitter at
AAAbbottStories