Picture a Sri Lankan-born, Toronto-raised storyteller who swapped classrooms and stages for a pen that packs a punch—meet Priya Guns! This rising star in contemporary literature burst onto the scene with her debut novel, Your Driver Is Waiting, a fierce, funny, and unapologetic dive into the gig economy, queer love, and social justice. With a knack for crafting raw, relatable characters, Guns is redefining what it means to tell stories that matter.
From her roots in Scarborough to her global adventures, Guns’s journey is as vibrant as her prose. Her unique blend of acting, teaching, and academic hustle fuels her writing ruling her a literary force to be reckoned with.
The Making of Priya Guns
Born in Sri Lanka and raised in Toronto, Priya Guns grew up with a passion for stories that sparked her love for literature. She honed her craft with a Creative Writing degree from Kingston University, but her path wasn’t just academic. Before writing full-time, Guns taught geography, organized arts education in places like Sri Lanka, Palestine, and Turkey, and trained as an actor. These experiences—coupled with her PhD studies—infuse her work with a worldly, empathetic lens, capturing the struggles of the marginalized with humor and heart.
Priya Guns’s Unforgettable Stories
Guns’s debut novel, Your Driver Is Waiting (2023), is a gender-flipped reimagining of Taxi Driver, following Damani, a queer Tamil ride-share driver navigating love, loss, and late-stage capitalism. With sharp social commentary and sultry romance, it tackles socioeconomic disparities and racial tensions, earning praise from Vogue and the Los Angeles Times. Her short stories, published in gal-dem, Spring Magazine, and anonymously in The Guardian, showcase her ability to blend wit with poignant themes. Her latest, ‘G-Spots in Geology,’ appeared in Somesuch Stories (2023), cementing her versatility.
Guns’s style is raw, propulsive, and unapologetic, blending satire, activism, and vivid sensuality. Her characters—like the buff, bisexual Damani—are flawed, fierce, and unforgettable, resonating long after the page. Drawing from global protests, like Beirut’s 2019 uprising, she crafts narratives that feel both universal and deeply personal.
Why Priya Guns Matters
Priya Guns is more than a writer; she’s a voice for the voiceless, amplifying the struggles of gig workers, queer communities, and people of color. Her work challenges readers to confront privilege and act in solidarity, as she told the Los Angeles Times: “I see readers so compelled by Damani’s story that they begin to act.” By marrying social consciousness with humor and heart, Guns is carving a bold legacy in contemporary literature.
- Born: Sri Lanka, raised in Toronto
- Key Work: Your Driver Is Waiting (2023)
- Notable Publications: gal-dem, Spring Magazine, The Guardian
- Education: Creative Writing, Kingston University; PhD student
Snag Your Driver Is Waiting and dive into Priya Guns’s electrifying world of wit, rage, and redemption!