Veeraporn Nitiprapha started writing stories when she was a teenager. Born, raised and still residing in Bangkok, she used to work as an editor for a fashion magazine and as a copywriter for advertising agencies. These days, she is mother to a young man, owner of four moody cats and a devoted cook and gardener. A fulltime writer, she also runs a writing workshop. The title of her latest novel, published in Thai, roughly translates as The Twilight Years and the Memory of a Black Cat. It won the S.E.A. Write Award in October 2018, making her the first female writer to win the award twice.

The Blind Earthworm in the Labyrinth

Mon, Mar 25, 18:00

On the day Chareeya is born, her mother discovers her father having an affair with a traditional Thai dancer. From that moment on, Chareeya’s life is fated to carry the weight of her parents’ disappointments. She and her sister grow up in a lush riverside town near the Thai capital, Bangkok, subsumed in a lyrical web of romance novels, classical music and make-believe. When the laconic orphan, Pran, enters their world, he unwittingly lures the sisters further into a labyrinth of their own making as they each try to escape their intertwined fates.

The original Thai language edition of The Blind Earthworm in the Labyrinth won the prestigious South East Asian Writers (S.E.A. Write) Award for fiction in 2015 and was a best-seller in Thailand. It is translated into English by Thai film critic and recipient of France’s Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, Kong Rithdee.

Attuned to the addictive rhythms of a Thai soap opera and written with the consuming intensity of a fever dream, this novel opens an insightful and truly compelling window onto the Thai heart.