May 12, 2021, 12:21pm
Trevor Shikaze has been named the first winner of n+1’s newly established Anthony Veasna So Prize, an annual $5,000 award named in honor of n+1 contributor and brilliant short story writer Anthony Veasna So, who died in 2020. The award is granted to an n+1-published fiction writer who shows a sustained commitment to producing literature that approaches the problems of contemporary life and politics with lucidity, intelligence, and humor.
Trevor Shikaze, who “taught himself to write while working as a sales clerk at a family-run bookstore in Alberta,” has published two stories with n+1: “Beast Leave” and “Parasite Air.” Shikaze’s work has also been seen in The Baffler and Joyland, among other publications. Said Shikaze on Twitter, on winning: “Tenderized from pinching self, so far still dreaming.”
An award ceremony to celebrate Shikaze—and Christina Nichol, winner of the 2021 n+1 Writer’s Fellowship—will be held online on May 26 at 7:30 p.m. ET.
So’s debut story collection, Afterparties, will be published by Ecco in August 2021.