The Gaze That Hovers shorlisted for the 2021 Nan Shepherd Prize

There I am in 2015, around the time I first started dreaming of writing a book about birds. Six years later, my book-in-progress, The Gaze That Hovers, has been shortlisted for the 2021 Nan Shepherd Prize for underrepresented voices in nature writing. It’s literally a dream coming true.

The Gaze That Hovers explores my own and others’ relationships with birds in nature and culture alike. It seeks to cultivate an environmental sensibility that integrates aesthetics with social justice and ecology.

It is such encouraging validation to have been acknowledged by the Nan Shepherd Prize team at Canongate, and an honour to be in the company of the other strong and interesting writers on the list. The prize is also a wonderful means of promoting emerging authors from diverse backgrounds, thereby broadening the scope of the nature writing genre. I truly hope all the short- and longlisted titles find their way to publication!