Category: Translation

Coming Attractions

We’ve had a good year so far. Since January, we’ve released four books making our current catalog six books deep. We’re really proud of the work we’ve been able to do since we’ve launched, and we’re excited about what the future holds.

Let’s talk about the future.

We can’t wait for you to read our next releases. There are kid’s books, thrillers, sci-fi, graphic novels, memoirs, fiction, non-fiction, you name it. We thought we’d share some of the great Catalyst titles coming to bookstores in the next year. Some are available for pre-order right now, if that’s your thing (we hope it’s your thing). And if you’re looking for any of our current titles, they are for sale right here on this very site, if that’s your thing (we hope that’s your thing, too). You can keep up with us as we share more news about these releases by signing up for our newsletter. Continue reading “Coming Attractions”

Q&A with Elsa Silke

This has been a really great Women in Translation Month so far. We’ve been clicking on that #WiTMonth tag and finding some great reads (because when your to-be-read piles looks like the ones at Catalyst HQ, what’s one more?). There are a wealth of amazing voices all over the world waiting for readers. We have a few of our voices to spotlight this month, so be sure to check out our other posts from this, and WiTMonths past, to read about our authors, our translators, and how you can continue to add more world literature by women to your bookshelves.

We’re continuing our celebration by chatting with translator Elsa Silke. Elsa was the translator for Chanette Paul’s continent-hopping thriller Sacrificed. She is an accomplished translator who has translated works by Ingrid Winterbach, Irma Joubert, and in 2006, she was awarded the SATI/Via Afrika Prize for outstanding translation in fiction for her translation of This Life by Karel Schoeman. We talked to Elsa about her background, translating Sacrificed, and how translated works enrich readers. (Check out this three-chapter excerpt (PDF) from the novel!) Continue reading “Q&A with Elsa Silke”

Q&A with Rachel Hildebrandt Reynolds

We’re celebrating Women in Translation Month by turning the spotlight on the authors and translators who make our books so wonderful. Today, we meet Rachel Hildebrandt. Rachel is a German-language translator and one of the founders of the Global Literature in Libraries Initiative, an organization whose aim is to get world literature—particularly translation—to as wide an audience as possible. Rachel has translated several books, both fiction and non-fiction, including Fade to Black by Zoë Beck and Staying Human by Katharina Stegelmann. Her work with Global Literature in Libraries has provided an amazing resource for readers who want to read globally, and add more women’s voices to their shelves. We’re excited to bring Rachel into the #TeamCatalyst fold, as the translator for our upcoming release The Wall by Max Annas.

We chatted with Rachel about her background, her work, how readers can read more broadly, and how she uses translation to “open up windows and openings where they have been boarded up or forgotten.”

Continue reading “Q&A with Rachel Hildebrandt Reynolds”

Women in Translation Month 2018

It’s that time of year again! Welcome to Women in Translation Month everyone! This is a great time to broaden your reading horizons by adding translated works by women authors and translators to your ‘to read’ stacks! We’ll be doing our part this month with giveaways, interviews, sales, and more! Stay tuned….

If you want to get reading now, we’re offering special prices on all of our titles all summer, but we have a few we want to spotlight:

SacrificedFirst up, Sacrificed by Chanette Paul (translated by Elsa Silke) sends readers on a global journey from South Africa to Belgium as Caz Colijn searches for answers about her mysterious past. Sacrificed is on sale now.

And next, if you want to add even more women to your reading list, check out our special Women’s Voices bundle, which features Sacrificed, short story collection Love Interrupted by Reneilwe Malatji, We Kiss Them with Rain by Futhi Ntshingila (Futhi just recently finished an isiZulu translation of her novel!), and a sneak preview of Bom Boy by Yewande Omotoso, which is out in January.

Follow us @catalyst_press on Twitter and @catalystpress on Instagram to keep up with our #WiTMonth fun, and be sure to tag us if you’re reading one of our titles this month! And click here to read all of our WitMonth posts.

Continue reading “Women in Translation Month 2018”

Q&A with Martin Steyn

We’ve been re-posting interviews with Catalyst authors that originally appeared in our newsletter, because everyone—newsletter subscriber or not—should read these. Our authors are that good. But if you wanted to subscribe to our monthly newsletter, we wouldn’t mind. In fact, we’d be pretty happy about it. You’d get interviews like this plus event updates, giveaways, new release info, and more!

These past few months have been exciting for us, and Dark Traces is certainly a big part of that. The US-debut thriller by Martin Steyn has earned him quite a bit of praise. Library Journal called it a “captivating debut thriller,” and in a starred review, Kirkus praised the novel as “a dark, intriguing, and satisfying tale with strong characters.” We chatted with Martin about Dark Traces, his process, and the politics of crime writing.

Dark Traces is out now and available through Indiebound and Amazon. You can also read an excerpt from the novel here.

Continue reading “Q&A with Martin Steyn”

Q&A with Chanette Paul

We’re re-posting some of our author interviews that we’ve featured in our newsletter. Consider these just a little taste of all of the great things we send straight to your inbox every month. Keep up-to-date with all of the Catalyst Press goings-on by subscribing to our newsletter! We’re fun and our authors are amazing. It’s a win-win.

This Q&A is with author Chanette Paul. Her North American and English-language debut thriller Sacrificed was released in October 2017. The New York Journal of Books praised the novel and Chanette calling it “a page-turner that will keep you reading long past the moment the midnight oil burns out,” and hailing Chanette as “among the classiest thriller writers of our day.” We chatted with Chanette back in October right before the release of Sacrificed, a thriller fusing politics, race, and family drama. Read an excerpt here (PDF), and you can order the novel via our website or IndieBound. Continue reading “Q&A with Chanette Paul”

Women in Translation Month, Futhi Ntshingila

We’ve loved seeing all of the awesome women being spotlighted as part of this year’s Women in Translation Month. Such an incredible and diverse group of writers. We’d like to introduce you to our own writers who are working in translation. You can read our first post here. Continue reading “Women in Translation Month, Futhi Ntshingila”

Women in Translation Month, Chanette Paul

In her post introducing this year’s Women in Translation Month, the event’s creator Meytal Radzinski writes about what she hopes comes from this year’s event:

People learning about the publishing imbalance in translation between men and women. People seeking out new and diverse literature by women writers from around the world. And people doing it not out of any sense of obligation or guilt, but because there are so many good books that this just becomes a month that focuses their reading.

It’s not just about this August, or next August, but about celebrating diverse literature every day. Expanding just one month’s reading list can open up a world of possibilities, of viewpoints, of ideas. It’s what we hope our books do for our readers, and, more to the point, what we hope reading does. We step outside of our lives every time we open a book, and whether that new experience brings us joy, or thrills, or sadness, or knowledge, we leave with more understanding. Now, more than ever, we need to look towards diverse voices and perspectives in art and listen to their stories.

As part of Women in Translation Month, we’d like to introduce you to some of our authors who are working in translation. First up, Chanette Paul:

Chanette is a South African author of more than 40 books in her native language Afrikaans. On October 10, we are pleased to release her first English-language novel Sacrificed (translated by Elsa Silke), a translation of Offerlam. Sacrificed follows Caz Colijn from the Congo’s diamond mines to Belgium’s finest art galleries, and from Africa’s civil unrest to its deeply spiritual roots in her search for the truth about her trouble past.

Continue reading “Women in Translation Month, Chanette Paul”