Diana Evans

Diana Evans is a novelist who was born and lives in London. She has written two full-length novels. Her first novel, 26a, won the Orange Award for New Writers,^[1] the Betty Trask Award^[2] and the deciBel Writer of the Year award.^[3] Also a journalist, Evans has written for publications including Marie Claire, The Independent, The Observer, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, the Financial Times and Harper’s Bazaar.^[4]

Biography

Evans is the daughter of a Nigerian mother and an English father. She was born and grew up in Neasden, north-west London, with her parents and five sisters, one of whom was her twin. She also spent part of her childhood in Lagos, Nigeria.^[4]

She completed a Media Studies degree at the University of Sussex.^[4] While in Brighton she was a dancer^[5] in the African dance troupe Mashango.^[4]

She completed an MA in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia.^[4] At the age of 25 she became a journalist. She contributed human-interest features and art criticism to different magazines, journals and newspapers in the UK; published interviews to celebrities; worked as an editor for Pride Magazine and the literary journal Calabash.

Evans' twin sister committed suicide^[5] in 1998.

Her first novel, 26a, was published in 2005 to wide critical acclaim. It portrays the experiences of British-Nigerian twins growing up in Neasden. Literary critic Maya Jaggi, writing in The Guardian, said of 26a: "The writing is both mature and freshly perceptive, creating not only a warmly funny novel of a Neasden childhood [. . .] but a haunting account of the loss of innocence and mental disintegration."^[6] Carol Birch, writing in The Independent, said of 26a that "Evans writes with tremendous verve and dash. Her ear for dialogue is superb, and she has wit and sharp perception" and though she has her criticisms, concludes that Evans "has produced a consistently readable book filled with likeable characters: a study of loss that has great heart and humour."^[7]

Evans' second novel, The Wonder (2009), explores the world of dancing.^[1][5] Maggie Gee, writing in The Independent, called it "a serious work of art, with sentences like ribbons of silk winding around a skeleton of haunting imagery.. . . The Wonder's most central achievement is to explore what art means in human life. [. . .] This second novel, both powerful and delicate, lacking in linear plot but rich in the poetry of human observation, proves that Evans has what she calls 'the watch-me, the grace note' that marks a true artist."^[8]

As well as writing, Evans reviews books for the national press,^[9] and teaches courses and workshops on journalism and creative writing at venues that have included the Arvon Foundation and Royal Holloway College.^[4] She is a patron of the SI Leeds Literary Prize for unpublished fiction by Black and Asian women in the UK.^[10]

Books

• 26a, London: Chatto & Windus, 2005, ISBN 978-0-7011-7888-8 
• The Wonder, London: Chatto & Windus, 2009, ISBN 978-0-7011-7797-3 

Books with others

• Newland, Courttia; George, Kadija (2000), IC3: The Penguin Book of New Black Writing in Britain, London: Hamish Hamilton, ISBN 978-0-241-14074-1 . Evans contributes short story "Journey Home".
• McCarthy, Karen (2003), Kin: new fiction by black and Asian women, London: Serpent's Tail, ISBN 978-1-85242-852-5 . Evans contributes short story "The Beginning".
• Too Much Too Young: The Book Slam Annual Vol. II, London: Book Slam Productions, 2012, ISBN 978-1-908615-58-9 . Evans contributes short story "Another Saturday Night (Sam Cooke, 1963)".

Awards

• 2005: winner, Orange Award for New Writers, for 26a.^[1]
• 2005: Betty Trask Award, Society of Authors, for 26a.^[2]
• 2005: longlist, Guardian First Book Award, for 26a.^[11]
• 2005: shortlist, First Novel category, Whitbread Book Awards, for 26a.^[12]
• 2006: shortlist, Commonwealth Writers' Prize, Best First Book category, for 26a.^[13]
• 2006: winner, deciBel Writer of the Year award, British Book Awards, for 26a.^[3]

References

External links

• Official website