Chinelo Okparanta wins a lesbian fiction award for debut novel 'Under the Udala Trees'

Award-winning Nigerian-American author Chinelo Okparanta was awarded a Lambda Literary Award for her debut novel .

Clinching the prize for the second time, Okparanta's Under the Udala Trees was named lesbian fiction of the year for highlighting the problems and challenges faced by homosexuals in Nigeria.

“Throughout tonight’s ceremony we were reminded of the impact that LGBT literature has on people’s lives,” Lambda literary executive director Tony Valenzuela said during the gala ceremony in New York. Books Live reported.

The Lambda Literary Awards, or Lammys, celebrate the best lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender books of the year.

Okparanta was shortlisted for the 2013 Caine Prize for African Writing, and her collection of short stories Happiness, Like Water was shortlisted for the the 2014 Etisalat Prize for Literature. It also won the Lesbian General Fiction Award in the 2014 Lambda Literary Award.

ALSO READ: "Nigeria is a very homophobic country"