Niko wins the Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction
Jury comments, "Written in clear, direct, and startlingly lovely prose. . . beautifully imagined and told with honesty and grace, Niko is a gripping and deeply compassionate novel."

Niko reviewed in Montreal's Rover Arts
"Niko is tragic, spirited, resilient and very affecting, " writes Martyn Bryant.

Interview in Winnipeg's Uptown Weekly
"After years of drafts, Dimitri Nssrallah's second novel, Niko, is ready to grip readers, " writes Quentin Mills-Fenn.

Niko: The MRB Spotlight

The Spring 2011 issue of the Montreal Review of Books contains an insightful look at Niko and its long gestation from idea to published novel. In it, Eric Boodman writes, "The pleasure of reading Niko comes from more than just its fast pace. In this novel, Nasrallah has created complete worlds that you carry around in your head after you put the book down, worlds to which you want to return. What makes these settings so enticing is the way they are built up around the characters. ...we are in the hands of a master storyteller."

Award-winning writer Dimitri Nasrallah is the author of two novels, Niko (Esplanade Editions, 2011) and Blackbodying (DC Books, 2005). A prolific and well-known music critic in Canada, he currently he edits the electronic music section for national music magazine Exclaim! . READ MORE

Niko (2011)

Six-year-old Niko Karam has never known a life outside civil war. He rarely leaves his parents’ small apartment, and from its small balcony he listens to the world outside tumble down one building at a time. But after a car bomb kills his pregnant mother, Niko is thrust into a much wider and confusing world. Swiftly paced, poignantly moving, and beautifully imagined, Niko is a powerful epic story of what it takes to survive during and after war.

Niko: The MRB Spotlight

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