Booker prize winner Shehan Karunathilaka has requested people to stop sharing a pirated pdf version of his winning book ‘The Seven Moons of Mali Almeida’. Following his win this week, an unauthorized version of the book had been making the rounds on social media and Whatsapp.

Issuing a statement on his social media, Karunathilaka said the book took seven years to write and that countless hours of research, craft and hard work were poured into it. He, therefore, asked the people not to share pirated versions of the book if they wished to support Sri Lankan art. He asked people to refrain from circulating the illegal pdf version.