Gurnaik Johal

Gurnaik Singh Johal (born 1998) is a British writer of Indian origin. Originally from Northolt, London, he studied at the University of Manchester.^[1]

Johal's debut collection of short stories, We Move, was published in 2022. Among other honours, it won the Somerset Maugham Award. His sophomore novel, Saraswati, is due out in 2025.^[2][3][4]

We Move (2022)

We Move was published April 2022, by Serpent's Tail, and contains 17 stories:

1. Arrival
2. The Red River
3. Leave to Remain
4. Chatpata: Kaam
5. Strange Attractor
6. Flight Path
7. SYM
8. The Turn
9. Chatpata: Ahankar
10. Afterimage
11. The Piano
12. Haven Green
13. Be More Roy
14. Chatpata: Moh
15. Freehold
16. The Twelfth of Never
17. We Move

The collection was generally well received by critics,^[5][6][7][8] with both The Guardian and Hindustan Times named it one of the best books of 2022.^[9][10] It won the 2023 Somerset Maugham Award^[11] and the Tata Literature Live! First Book Award.^{[citation needed]} Prior to the collection's publication, "Arrival" won the 2022 Galley Beggar Press Short Story Award,^[12] and "The Piano" had been shortlisted for the 2018 Guardian and Fourth Estate BAME Short Story Prize.^[13]

In 2025 Saraswati was shortlisted for Waterstones debut fiction prize.^[14]