prizes | praise

Translation Awards & Grants

For translating Budi Darma’s People from Bloomington

• 2023 PEN Translation Prize
• 2023 NSW Premier’s Translation Prize

For translating Norman Erikson Pasaribu’s Happy Stories, Mostly

• 2023 NBCC Barrios Book in Translation Prize – shortlist
• 2023 National Translation Award (in prose) – longlist
• 2023 Cercador Prize – finalist
• 2022 Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses (UK)
• 2022 International Booker Prize – longlist

For translating Norman Erikson Pasaribu’s Sergius Seeks Bacchus

• 2021 NSW Premier’s Translation Prize – shortlist
• 2018 PEN Translates grant
• 2017 PEN Presents prize (East and Southeast Asia)

Writing Awards & Grants

2022 Copyright Agency Create Grant – for her novel-in-progress: But Won’t I Miss Me?

2019 Ned Kelly Award longlist – for the novel Under Your Wings (US and UK title: The Majesties)

The Majesties

“This is a bold and dramatic portrayal of characters on the cusp of an impossible choice between complicit self-preservation and total annihilation.” 
—Publishers Weekly

“Tiffany Tsao’s Under Your Wings is a sharply realised page-turner with a brilliant twist, written with an effortless command of pace and suspense.”
—The Sydney Morning Herald 

“I think the fact that I am so unsettled by the read as a whole makes The Majesties a resounding success. It’s shocking how enjoyable and delicious this dark, disturbing novel was, and that unease will sit with me for a long time to come.”
— NPR

“There is an unflinching realism at the heart of this novel that is brutally pessimistic. This is not a criticism. The Majesties suggest that the cost of survival for those in the minority is collective protection at all costs. This is the bind that the characters find themselves in: resisting the darker aspects of self-preservation is self-annihilation. Yet, while compliance seems to ensure continuity, the price is a split subject. The question of how long these inner conflicts can be contained before they spill out is central to the novel.”
—Arts Equator

“The Majesties is an urgent literary thriller that also affectingly, seamlessly acts as a social treatise exposing the moral and legal abuses of the ultra-elite. Raised in Singapore and Indonesia, Tsao evokes a convincing sense of place. Vivid geographic and cultural details notwithstanding, Tsao’s (The Oddfits) first non-fantasy novel proves to be an engrossing, eloquent story of fatal familial dysfunction.”
—Shelf Awareness

“One of the most gripping, original and enlightening novels of the day.”
—SA Weekend

The Oddfits

Listed in Superhero Novels: The Best of 2017

The More Known World

Mentioned on Syfy Wire: December SFF Books to Keep An Eye Out For