An Evening with Vajra Chandrasekera, Hosted by Huxley & Hiro

Huxley & Hiro is thrilled to host acclaimed author Vajra Chandrasekera for a conversation about his latest novel, Rakesfall. Moderated by Kenneth L. Hansen, it promises to be an evening of insight and inspiration!

Please note this is an online event hosted on Zoom!

Zoom Link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88107486217?pwd=LWLezUnBemz23ki6aMrnqLBQJEFAQq.1

Meeting ID: 881 0748 6217

Passcode: 923594

Book Description:

Some stories take more than one lifetime to tell. There are wrongs that echo through the ages, friendships that outpace the claws of death, loves that leave their mark on civilization, and promises that nothing can break. This is one such story.

Annelid and Leveret met as children in the middle of the Sri Lankan civil war. They found each other in a torn-up nation, peering through propaganda to grasp a deeper truth. And in a demon-haunted wood, another act of violence linked them and propelled their souls on a journey throughout the ages. No world can hold them, no life can bind them, and they'll never leave each other behind.

Tracing two souls through endless lifetimes, Rakesfall is a virtuosic exploration of what stories can be. As Annelid and Leveret reincarnate ever deeper into the future, they will chase the edge of human possibility in a dark science fiction epic unlike anything you've read before.

About the Author:

Vajra Chandrasekera is from Colombo, Sri Lanka. His novels The Saint of Bright Doors and Rakesfall have between them won Nebula, Ignyte, Locus, Crawford, and Otherwise awards, been selected as New York Times Notable Books of 2023 and 2024, and been nominated for the Le Guin Prize for Fiction and the Hugo, among others. He is one of the 2025-2026 Fellows of the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. His short stories, poems, and articles have appeared in many publications including Clarkesworld, West Branch, and The Los Angeles Times. He has worked as a fiction editor for Strange Horizons, The Deadlands, and Afterlives: The Year’s Best Death Stories, and as a contest judge for the Dream Foundry and the Salam Award. He is online at vajra.me and probably on whatever social media still exists at the time you’re reading this.

About the Moderator:

Kenneth Hansen is an instructor of social sciences at Delaware Technical Community College. He is an avid reader of everything from comic books to "War and Peace." Originally from the Deep South, he is now a proud Delawarean who shares his love of books on Bluesky at @kennethluke.

Looking to pick up Vajra's book? Stop by our Wilmington, Delaware store, or support us online by ordering through Bookshop.org or Libro.fm. Just be sure to select Huxley & Hiro as your bookstore!