Ava Homa
Award-winning transnational author & speaker
Ava Homa is an acclaimed author, speaker, activist, and faculty member at California State University, Monterey Bay. Her debut novel, Daughters of Smoke and Fire (HarperCollins & Abrams, 2020), was featured in Roxane Gay's Book Club, the Unplugged Book Box, and Women for Women International. The novel earned a place among the 'best books' in outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, the Independent (UK), and Globe and Mail (Canada). It received the 2020 Nautilus Silver Book Award for Fiction and was a 2022 William Saroyan International Writing Prize finalist. A groundbreaking work in English by a Kurdish woman, Daughters of Smoke and Fire has been incorporated into university curricula at institutions such as George Mason University, the University of Toronto, and Southern Methodist University.
Ava's collection of short stories, Echoes from the Other Land, was nominated for the 2011 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award. Her essays, written in English, Kurdish, and Persian, have been published in outlets like the BBC, Literary Review of Canada, Open Democracy, and Literary Hub. Her short stories and non-fiction pieces have been anthologized and she has delivered speeches across North America and Europe, including a memorable appearance at the United Nations in Geneva. She holds a master’s degree in creative writing and is a 2023 California Arts Council fellow.
Ava offers authenticity/sensitivity reads and developmental editing services
Writers-In-Exile Scholarship
PEN Lecturer-in-Residence
George Brown College, Toronto, 2012 - 2013
Second Vice Chair
National Council of The Writers’ Union of Canada
2015 - 2018
Writer-in-Residence
Joy Kogawa Historic House, Vancouver, BC, 2013
R.D. Lawrence, Minden Hill, Ontario, 2012
Advisory Board
Freedom to Read Award
Jury for 2016