On this episode of TGE’s Current Read, Sam Herbst welcomes award-winning Indian-British author Gurnaik Johal for an in-depth author interview. No stranger to fiction, Gurnaik won the Somerset Maugham Award in 2022 for his short story collection, We Move, among other accolades.

Now venturing into the realm of longform fiction, Gurnaik’s debut novel Saraswati has been listed among Observer’s Best Debut Novels for 2025 and was a finalist for the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize.

Described as “an ambitious panoramic portrait” (The Guardian) and a “roaring deluge of a novel” (Jon McGregor), Saraswati connects the lives of seven distant relatives whose ancestors were all named after different tributaries of Northern India’s holy Saraswati river.

In this conversation, Gurnaik shares the genesis of Saraswati – the seed that sprouted this sprawling story. He also reflects on his passion for folktales in fiction, his place within the Indian diaspora literature tradition, the sociopolitical themes his work explores, and how the dystopian elements in Saraswati became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

As with every Current Read episode, we enjoy a live author reading and chat about Gurnaik’s latest inspirations and creative process.

Join us for this literary podcast discussion, and let us know what you think of the episode.

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This episode of TGE’s Current Read was brought to you in part by Jonathan Ball Publishers.