2024 Washington State Book Award Winner – Sonora Jha

Winner of the 2024 Washington State Book Award for Fiction, “The Laughter” is an explosive, tense, and illuminating work of fiction… a fascinating portrait of privilege, radicalization, class, and modern academia that forces us to confront the assumptions we make, as both readers and as citizens.

Sonora Jha is also the author of the memoir “How to Raise a Feminist Son” and the novel “Foreign.” After a career as a journalist covering crime, politics, and culture in India and Singapore, she moved to the United States to earn a PhD in media and public affairs. Sonora’s op-eds, essays, and public appearances have been featured in the New York Times, on the BBC, in anthologies, and elsewhere. She is a professor of journalism and lives in Seattle.

Jha will be in conversation with librarian and Washington State Book Award judge Jennie Diaz. 

The Washington State Book Awards are a project of the Washington Center for the Book (an affiliate of The Library of Congress Center for the Book administered by Washington State Library).

This event is presented by the Washington Center for the Book and the Hugo House. The event is free and will be presented in person at the Hugo House and online via Zoom. Registration is required for the online event. The event will be recorded and accessible on Washington State Library’s YouTube channel.

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_kiNwQ5feSsWCS6Xxn5G3dQ#/registration

MORE ABOUT THE BOOK:

"Sonora Jha expertly inhabits the perspective of a man so terrified of the old world slipping away, he can’t see the ground shifting beneath his feet. A deliciously sharp, mercilessly perceptive exploration of power, ‘The Laughter’ explores how ‘otherness’ is both fetishized and demonized, and what it means to love something—a person, a country—that does not love you back."—Celeste Ng

“Astutely provoking, deeply disturbing and unexpectedly delightful. . . . Jha is an extraordinary storyteller, aiming her shrewd erudition directly at elitism, sexism and racism.”—Shelf Awareness

The House bar will be open to serve alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages.