South African author, journalist, and artist Shubnum Khan is releasing a new book. The book is titled Paper Flowers and secured a major six figure deal. It will be published by Viking Books in fall 2023.

Paper Flowers takes place in Durban, South Africa and India. It follows a young woman who moves to a boarding house on South Africa’s eastern shore. She begins to research the background of the estate, “turning up ghosts, a djinn, and a tragic love story.”

Khan earned a Bachelors degree in Media Studies and a Masters in English (cum laude) from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Her writing has appeared in a wide variety of journals and magazines like The New York Times, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, New Contrast. Her first novel, Onion Tears was published in 2011 and was shortlisted for two prizes: the Penguin Prize for African Writing and the University of Johannesburg Debut Fiction Prize.

She is best-known for her recent book, How I Accidentally Became a Global Stock Photo and Other Strange and Wonderful Stories, which was published last year. The collection is “part memoir, part travelogue and part love letter.” The stories, drawn from her personal life experiences, come together to address themes on what it means to be a woman—particularly a single Muslim woman in South Africa, trying to find herself in a modern world.

Congratulations to Shubnum Khan! Stay tuned for more details.