Tag: Ethiopia

Caroline Kurtz Wins Presbyterian Writers Guild’s Best First Book Award

Huge congratulations to Caroline Kurtz! Her memoir A Road Called Down on Both Sides: Growing up in Ethiopia and America was recently awarded the Best First Book Award by the Presbyterian Writers Guild! The award honors the best debut by a Presbyterian author written during 2018-2019. Caroline’s thoughtful memoir of her life as the child of missionaries explores faith, family, and what it means to find home when you’ve grown up between cultures and continents. We couldn’t be prouder.

Caroline isn’t the only Kurtz sister in the winner’s circle right now. This year, the Writers Guild has also awarded Jane Kurtz the 2020 Distinguished Writer Award in honor of her career as a writer and literary advocate. Jane has published over 35 children’s books, and with Caroline, founded Ready Set Go Books, a publishing company that produces books for young readers in English and three Ethiopian languages.

As the award ceremony, like many other events, has been postponed, the Kurtz sisters have recorded their acceptance speech, which you can see below. Congratulations to both Caroline and Jane!

Continue reading “Caroline Kurtz Wins Presbyterian Writers Guild’s Best First Book Award”

This Week in Literary News, Week of March 1

Our weekly round-up of literary news here at Catalyst and beyond, is brought to you by our intern Naomi Valenzuela. Naomi is from Phoenix, Arizona and El Paso, Texas, and is majoring in Creative Writing and minoring in English & American Literature at the University of Texas, El Paso, with plans of working in the publishing business after graduation.

In publishing news, ViacomCBS has put Simon & Schuster up for sale. The multinational media conglomerate says that the company no longer fits into their business plans. Read more on The New York Times.

On Brittle Paper, there’s a gathered series of humorous tweets showing readers how different writers have a different interpretation of Nigeria in their fiction.

Also on Brittle Paper, an article on The Life and Struggles of Our Mother Walatta Petros. Originally written in 1672, it has been translated into English and details the life of Walatta Petros, an important figure within Ethiopia’s Tawahedo Church tradition.

The Washington Post has an article on how the coronavirus has led to an increasing amount of “survival guides” for the virus on Amazon and underlines how unreliable information may be spread through self-publishing.

Continuing on the topic of the coronavirus, it persists to harm the literary industry as The Guardian reports on the cancellation of the London book fair due to fears and involuntary financial strains on publishers.

The Guardian also has an opinion piece discussing World Book Day and the tradition of dressing up to celebrate the day.

Electric Lit has a neat selection of adult novels accompanied by illustrations. From thrillers to biographies, there is something for everyone in these books with graphic elements.

Last but certainly not least, Bridget Krone author of Small Mercies, one of our latest releases, has an interview for Intralingo’s Spotlight series. Take a look at it over on Intralingo’s podcast or their YouTube channel.

Q&A with Caroline Kurtz

An excerpted version of this Q&A appeared in our newsletter. Each month, we include things like information about events, giveaways, sales, and fun extras like author Q&As. If you’d like be the first to know about what’s going on at Catalyst HQ, be sure to subscribe!

We’re getting ready for another big release at Catalyst, A Road Called Down on Both Sides: Growing up in Ethiopia and America by Caroline Kurtz (out July 15). It’s big for a few reasons: not only is this our first non-fiction release, but because Caroline is US-based, we’re able to help her plan a few events in support of the book. What this means for you book-lovers out there, is that you may get a chance to see Caroline in person as she talks about her memoir detailing her life growing up in rural Ethiopia in the 1950s. She’ll be holding a book launch at Annie Bloom’s in Portland on July 15.

As the daughter of Presbyterian Church missionaries, Caroline and her family packed up their lives in Oregon, and headed to Maji, Ethiopia. It was during her time there that she discovered what it was like to live between cultures. She came of age in a country that felt as much like home as her native country, and yet, she was outside of it. When she returned to the US, she again felt like an outsider. In this thoughtful memoir, Caroline explores what it’s like to search for home when that means so many (often conflicting) things, how her parents’ faith wasn’t necessarily her own, and how she found home by building it from all of the pieces of her traveller’s life. Now back in Oregon, Caroline is the co-founder of Ready Set Go Books along with her sister Jane, which publishes books for young Ethiopian readers, and she runs a non-profit that brings solar power and economic development options to women in Maji.

We chatted with Caroline about her book, her childhood, and why she switched from writing about dragons to writing about her life. You can also keep up with Caroline’s development work at her website, and be sure to check out her pictures of her life in Maji and beyond. Continue reading “Q&A with Caroline Kurtz”

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”