Politics and Prose
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Shastri Akella — The Sea Elephants - with Jeffrey Dale Lofton
Posted
October 13, 2024
Views
451
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October 13, 2024
451
8
1.77%
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40:03Now PlayingWatch author Shastri Akella 's book talk and reading at Politics and Prose bookstore in Washington, D.C.
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Shagun knows he will never be the kind of son his father demands. After the sudden deaths of his beloved twin sisters, Shagun flees his own guilt, his mother's grief, and his father's violent disapproval by enrolling at an all-boys boarding school. But he doesn't find true belonging until he encounters a traveling theater troupe performing the Hindu myths of his childhood.
Welcomed by the other storytellers, Shagun thrives, easily embodying mortals and gods, men and women, and living on the road, where his father can't catch him. When Shagun meets Marc, a charming photographer, he seems to have found the love he always longed for, too. But not even Marc can save him from his lingering shame, nor his father's ever-present threat to send him to a conversion center. As Shagun's past begins to engulf him once again, he must decide if he is strong enough to face what he fears most, and to boldly claim his own happiness.
Utterly immersive and spellbinding, The Sea Elephants is both dark and beautiful, harrowing and triumphant. An ode to the redemptive joys of art, Shastri Akella's debut novel is a celebration of hard-won love--of others and for ourselves.
Shastri Akella's writing has appeared in Best American Short Stories, Fairy Tale Review, Guernica, LitHub, The Masters Review, Electric Literature, and CRAFT, among others. The Sea Elephants is his debut. He's a professor of creative writing at Michigan State University.
Akella is in conversation with Jeffrey Dale Lofton. Lofton hails from Warm Springs, Georgia, best known as the home of Roosevelt’s Little White House. He calls the nation’s capital home now and has for over three decades. He is a senior advisor at the Library of Congress where he is surrounded by books and people who love books—in short, paradise. Red Clay Suzie is his first novel, a fictionalized memoir written through his personal lens as an outsider—gay and living with a disability in a conservative family and community in the Deep South. It was Longlisted for The Center for Fiction 2023 First Novel Prize and was awarded the Seven Hills Literary Prize for Fiction.
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Founded by Carla Cohen and Barbara Meade in 1984, Politics and Prose Bookstore is Washington, D.C.'s premier independent bookstore and cultural hub, a gathering place for people interested in reading and discussing books. Politics and Prose offers superior service, unusual book choices, and a haven for book lovers in the store and online.
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