We’re pleased to release two new books this May and June— You’re a Star, Lolo by Niki Daly and Madame LIvingstone by Christophe Cassiau-Haurie, Barly Baruti, and Ivanka Hahnenberger. Both books are available through your favorite bookseller, and right here on our site
YOU”RE A STAR LOLO
In May, we released You’re a Star, Lolo, the third book in author/illustrator Niki Daly’s Lolo series for beginning readers. The book was praised in a starred review from Kirkus, “[D]rawn tenderly and told in a way that honors the characters and their culture. Another winning addition—Lolo is indeed a star!”
You’re a Star, Lolo joins Here Comes Lolo and Hooray for Lolo in the Lolo series of books that introduce young readers to the adventurous and fun-loving Lolo who lives in South Africa with her mother and grandmother. Make sure to also check out all of the educational resources for the series including teaching guides, activity pages, a read-along with the author, and more!
Order:
MADAME LIVINGSTONE
This week saw this release of Madame Livingstone, a graphic novel set in World War 1 Congo. Written by Christophe Cassiau-Haurie, illustrated by Barly Baruti, and translated by Ivanka Hahnenberger this story of adventure and friendship finds Belgian pilot Gaston Mercier teamed with a local guide, an enigmatic man nicknamed Madame Livingstone. Together, the pair set out on a nearly impossible mission: finding and sinking a critical German warship, the Graf Von Götzen. Little by little as the war between Belgian and German colonial powers rages on, Mercier learns more about the land around him, and discovers the irrevocable and tragic effects of colonialism on the local people.
In Catalyst Press news, Niki Daly’s You’re a Star, Lolo released this week in the USA! This is our third release from Daly, the beloved South African children’s book author and illustrator—and we know you’ll love it as much as we do! Read more about the series and while you’re at it, get a copy of the first two books, Here Comes Lolo and Hooray for Lolo!
In the book world, Publishers Weekly is gearing up for its U.S. Book Show in 10 days, to replace the recently retired BookExpo (R.I.P.). Speakers this year include Oprah Winfrey, Keanu Reeves, Senator Elizabeth Warren, authors Anthony Doerr and Ijeoma Oluo, and more.
Another week, another selection of some of the week’s news! (News here being defined as book and book-related. I’m not sure I have the strength to recap the news at-large).
Yewande Omotoso | photo by Victor Dlamini
Over at The New Internationalist, there’s a lovely short essay by Yewande Omotoso on why she’s filled her house with plants. Yewande is a regular contributor there, so be sure to check out more of her work— they are all just as lovely. You can also pick up her fantastic novel, Bom Boy, of which we are proud to be the US publisher.
There are two great pieces at LitHub. The first, from Rebecca Solnit asks readers to seriously consider what it being asked of them with post-election calls to bridge divides: “[T]he truth is not some compromise halfway between the truth and the lie, the fact and the delusion, the scientists and the propagandists. And the ethical is not halfway between white supremacists and human rights activists, rapists and feminists, synagogue massacrists and Jews, xenophobes and immigrants, delusional transphobes and trans people. Who the hell wants unity with Nazis until and unless they stop being Nazis?” The second is a reprint of Walter Moseley’s speech from the National Book Awards where he was honored with The Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters: “There’s a great weight hanging over the reception of an award when the underlying subject is, the first Black man to receive… We the people who are darker than blue, we have been here, on this continent, in this storm for 400 years. […] Is this a dying gasp or a first breath? Is today different from any other day over the past 400 years? I prefer to believe that we are on the threshold of a new day, that this evening is but one of ten thousand steps being taken to recognize the potential of this nation.” And congratulations to all of the NBA winners! You can see a list of honorees here.
For the next few weeks, we’ll be spotlighting our upcoming releases for the new year. You’ll learn a bit about our 2021 releases, their authors, and information about pre-ordering.
Niki Daly
We’ve been so proud to be the North American publisher for author/illustrator Niki Daly’s Lolo series of books for new solo readers. Niki is an award-winning and much beloved author of numerous books for children, and we’re excited to bring the exuberant, fun-loving, and curious Lolo to even more readers.
The world of publishing went digital this year, as publishing events around the world were cancelled one by one. We all hope next year we will get to return to in-person events. Fall regional trade shows for booksellers were largely digital as well, as Publishers Weekly reports, with California booksellers especially grateful: “Beset by unprecedented fires and seven months of pandemic disruption, the virtual setup allowed California booksellers to participate without having to attempt near-impossible travel.” The online format is not without its perks however. Authors from around the world are able to participate in online events without the expense of travel and without the added stress of getting a visa to travel to the U.S. (not always granted.) For Catalyst, this may give us the opportunity to showcase our authors from the continent of Africa. Publishing will eventually return to its preferred in-person events but perhaps we’ll always retain an allowance, even an appreciation for, digital appearances by authors otherwise unable to appear in person.
Publishers Weeklyalso reportson an important collaboration between Freebird Books in NYC and Books Through Bars, which puts books in the hands of prisoners. The Covid-related lockdown in prisons around the country has made prisoners more “desperate” for books and demand has grown this past year. Graphic novels are especially popular, according to one of the volunteers: “We receive letters that tell us that the comics and graphic novels remind [inmates] of home and childhood. They also serve as an entry point to read other books and serve as part of the educational mission of Books Through Bars.” Hear hear for graphic novels all around! Continue reading “This Week in Literary News: Week of October 18”
In Catalyst news, Africa Access Review reviewed two Catalyst titles last week: Here Comes Lolo by Niki Daly, and Small Mercies by Bridget Krone. Give them a read! We also love seeing our Catalyst authors producing new work. On New Frame, Unmaking Grace author Barbara Boswell chats about being a black woman novelist, the joy of writing, and her new book, And Wrote My Story Anyway: Black South African Women’s Novels as Feminism. If you haven’t read Unmaking Grace yet, you can buy it here!
Some of literature’s leading ladies rocked the headlines this week! This year’s JCB Prize longlist was majority female (and remarkably diverse), with women taking six of ten titles. Huge congratulations to Zambian author and ReadSA nonprofit founder Zukiswa Wanner for being one of three people awarded the Goethe Medal this week, for her commitment to international cultural exchange. Meet the woman behind that Normal People adaptation we’re all obsessed with, and the amazing Baltimore teacher who publishes student novels written by her Black high school freshman students. In the UK, Margaret Atwood, Zadie Smith, and more joined in on the Extinction Rebellion protests this week, speaking out against the right-wing think-tanks pushing climate change denial.
In the U.S., the race to acquire Big 5 house Simon & Schuster is ramping up, with Bertelsmann reportedly joining the fight. Bertelsmann is the owner of Penguin Random House, already the largest publishing house in the world created by a merger of Penguin and Random House back in 2013. HarperCollins is also interested in the acquisition.
I’m always impressed, and somewhat suspicious, when someone tells me they finished the entirety of Karl Ove Knausgaard‘s The Struggle (I certainly have not). Here’s an oddly convincing piece from Jade Wootton at Electric Literature comparing the novelist to everyone’s favorite love-to-hate social media mogul Kim Kardashian.
In celebrity news, Dev Patel stars in a new David Copperfield film, Channing Tatum spent lockdown writing a children’s book (and posted the most Channing Tatum announcement ever about it), and Trump books won’t stop selling – so publishers won’t stop pushing them. The world lost actor Chadwick Boseman last week to a several-year fight with colon cancer. After his celebrated role as T’Challa, King of Wakanda in Marvel’s Black Panther, Boseman became a hero in his own right, teaching Black children to celebrate their blackness and calling for more Black heroes in mainstream film and literature, a mission we couldn’t agree with more.
South African rugby captain Siya Kolisi is making headlines again, but this time in the book world: his wife Rachel spoke out on Instagram against a reprint of an unauthorized biography on Siya, released by South African publisher Jonathan Ball last year. Now, Jonathan Ball is saying it has no intentions of taking the reprint off the shelves.
Young Blood by Sifiso Mzobe
It’s National Book Week next week here in South Africa, and there are a number of exciting virtual events – follow their Facebook page to stay tuned! This year’s virtual ComicCon Africa is also coming up, and illustrator Jenny Frison is making waves with her Wonder Woman official event posters. Catalyst founder Jessica and I attended last year’s South African Book Fair here in Johannesburg (where I was lucky enough to meet one of our brilliant new authors, Sifiso Mzobe, whose award-winning novel Young Blood will be making its North American debut with us next April!). Check out what the fair is doing this year to take advantage of the virtual space, including collaborations with book fairs in Kenya and Nigeria. And while you’re reading up on the pan-African book world, check out this piece on Africa’s thriving literary magazine industry.
And finally, coming in first for the weirdest news to grace my feed this week: have you heard of this inn in Tokyo that will simulate editorial deadlines for you so you can finally finish that novel you’ve been putting off?
These last two months saw the release of four new books! Congratulations to all of these fantastic authors. All of these are out now, and available through your favorite bookseller and right here on our website.
In these two delightful books for beginning readers, we meet Lolo an adventurous, fun-loving, curious girl who lives in South Africa with her mother and grandmother. Both of these books have earned Niki some well-deserved praise from Booklist, Kirkus, and Publishers Weekly, and both were named Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selections. Learn more about the books, including teaching guides, activity sheets, and a read-along with Niki here.
We’re proud to be the North American publisher for this debut novel from an exciting new voice— Ameera Patel. In this thriller/family drama, social, class, race, and religious lines blur and merge as a middle-class family in the suburbs of Johannesburg search for their missing daughter. The novel has earned Ameera a starred review from Publishers Weekly, and praise from Shelf Awareness, Ms. Magazine, Mystery Scene, Foreword Reviews, and more. CrimeReads listed it as one of its ten novels you should read in June, and even though June is fading away, we think it should be one you pick up this month, next month, or anytime. Learn more about Ameera, and order your copy here.
The final chapter in Peter’s Dark Web Trilogy, Bitter Pill continues the exploration of the dark side of our digital world. A shadowy businessman blurs the boundaries between the real and the virtual to satisfy his clientele’s need for heightened thrills. No price is too high to pay to deliver every fantasy—no matter how twisted. Peter’s gritty page-turner has earned praise from Publishers Weekly and the New York Journal of Books. All summer long, we’re offering all three e-books of the trilogy for a special price. Learn more about Bitter Pill, the Dark Web Trilogy, and how you can save on all three e-books here.
