It's no secret that Malaysia has its fair share of talented writers - regardless of international awards and accolades.

But it's always a proud moment when they do get the credit they deserve and everything that comes with it.

Just yesterday (19 August), Zen Cho, a lawyer/fantasy writer based in England, made our country proud again when she won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette for her story 'If At First You Don’t Succeed, Try, Try Again'.

Meet the author.
She received the award at the 77th World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon) in Dublin, Ireland, on 18 August.

Cho's book revolves around a hapless imugi (a type of Korean dragon) who is determined to attain the form of a full-fledged dragon and gain entry to the gates of heaven. But sadly for the imugy, for a long time, things don't go well. Then, it meets a girl.

We don't know what happens after that, but it does sound like a pretty interesting story.

And we absolutely adore the cover art too:

It's the story of an imugi that aspires to become a dragon
Hugo Award is considered one of the most prestigious literary awards in the science world.

Members and attendees of the World Science Fiction Convention vote on the best sci-fi work published the year before and you have to be pretty good to impress the bunch.

The other contenders for the award category were 'The Last Banquet of Temporal Confections' by Tina Connolly, 'The Thing About Ghost Stories' by Naomi Kritzer, 'Nine Last Days on Planet Earth' by Daryl Gregory, 'The Only Harmless Great Thing' by Brooke Bolander, and 'When We Were Starless' by Simone Heller.

You can find Zen Cho's winning story on Barnes & Noble blog and even guess what: you can even download and read it for free.

You can also check out more of her work here.

Congratulations, Zen Cho! Malaysia is extremely proud of you.