The Paris-based Palestinian journalist Yasmin Zaher wins the 2025 Dylan Thomas for her debut publication, ‘The Coin.’

This year's jury comprises Daniel Williams of Swansea University; authors Jan Carson and Mary Jean Chan; and literary critic Max Liu.

The Paris-based Palestinian journalist has won the 2025 Dylan Thomas Prize for her debut novel, ‘The Coin’.

The Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize has been awarded to Yasmin Zaher for her debut novel,

The Coin (Riverhead Books). The winner was announced tonight, 17 October, at Swansea University.

Zaher is a Palestinian journalist born in Jerusalem in 1991. She holds a BS in biomedical engineering from Yale and an MFA in creative writing from the New School, and is based in Paris.

In a comment of rationale for the jury, its annual chair, Namita Gokhale, said, “Whittling our exceptional longlist of 12 down to six brilliant books, and then again to just one, was not an easy exercise.

“Yet the judging panel was unanimous in their decision to name debut novelist Yasmin Zaher as the winner of the 2025 Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize.

“Zaher brings complexity and intensity to the page through her elegantly concise writing: The Coin is a borderless novel, tackling trauma and grief with bold and poetic moments of quirkiness and humour. It fizzes with electric energy. Yasmin Zaher is an extraordinary winner to mark twenty years of this vital prize.”

The 2025 Dylan Thomas Prize Shortlist

Including Zaher, the shortlisted authors were:

This year’s jury comprises Daniel Williams of Swansea University; authors Jan Carson and Mary Jean Chan; and literary critic Max Liu.

More from Publishing Perspectives on the Swansea University International Dylan Thomas Prize is here. And more on world literary and publishing awards is here.