Hi everyone! Thanks so much for joining us this week for our fifth annual #ReadingAfrica Week, our annual celebration of African literature. In lieu of a literary news blog this week, we decided to give you a #ReadingAfrica recap, to share all of the fun activities we hosted this week in one place.
From virtual events to social media challenges to playlists, we wait all year for #ReadingAfrica, because it’s the best opportunity to interact with YOU, our Catalyst family. While our books celebrate African authors and African stories all year round, #ReadingAfrica is such a great way to bring everyone together and make some noise—and this year the noise was the loudest it has ever been!
So if you missed out on the fun, don’t worry: #ReadingAfrica week 2021 may be over, but thanks to our friends over at LitNet, LitHub, and CrimeReads, you can check out the full recordings and transcripts of the events you missed by clicking the links below.
First up, on Monday, we kicked off #ReadingAfrica Week with a panel discussion on the African graphic novel and comics industry, featuring some big creators, agents, and publishers in the comics world: Bill Masuku, Ivanka Hahnenberger, Richard Conyngham, and Salim Busuru, moderated by KaDi Yao Tay, founder and editor of Squid Magazine.
On Tuesday, LitHub released our roundtable on African history and literature, curated by Catalyst founder and publisher Jessica Powers and featuring a number of African historians and authors including Kwasi Konadu, Trevor Getz, Lizzy Attree, Wendy Urban-Mead, Holly Y. McGee, and Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu.
On Wednesday, we hosted a children’s literature panel with a great lineup of creatives and curators, including Ekiuwa Aire, Hannes Barnard, Caroline Kurtz, and Ruth Ahmedzai Kemp, moderated by Bunmi Emenanjo, founder of Atlas Book Club. The event was sponsored by the World Kit Lit blog.
Also on Wednesday, CrimeReads shared a #ReadingAfrica roundtable on African crime writing, hosted by Catalyst author Joanne Hichens and featuring crime writers Femi Kayode, Ameera Patel, Chanette Paul, Kwei Quartey, Bryony Rheam, and Michael Stanley.
Finally, yesterday we wrapped up the week with a women writers’ panel, including some of our favorite African women authors, including Gabeba Baderoon, Cheluchi Onyemelukwe, Sifton Anipare, and Yewande Omotoso. The video for that panel will be available soon.
Getting good news for our authors during #ReadingAfrica Week is really something special—and this year, we got lots of it! This week, Niki Daly’s YOU’RE A STAR, LOLO was named a Best of the Best of 2021 by the Chicago Public Library in the Best Fiction for Younger Readers category, and Brittle Paper named DISRUPTION: NEW SHORT FICTION FROM AFRICA as one of the fifty most Notable African Books of 2021. Huge congrats to both Niki Daly and the entire creative team behind Disruption! Both books are 30% OFF this month only on our online shop.
And last up, a special shout-out to this year’s awardees of the Kids’ Book Choice Awards and the 2021 Children’s Africana Book Awards. Our very own SHAKA RISING was named a Children’s Africana Book Award Honor Book for Older Readers back in 2019. Congratulations to all of this year’s winners!
