Tag: Yewande Omotoso | CatalystPress

The Spark: The “Wow, September is a big month” Edition

Hot from the Press

September is both #NationalTranslationMonth and #WorldKidLitMonth, and to celebrate both at once, here’s an amazing reading of his YA novel Halley’s Comet by author and translator Hannes Barnard, as part of Translators Aloud’s month long celebration.

Caroline Kurtz, author of the memoirs A Road Called Down on Both Sides and recently released Today is Tomorrow, is giving a reading at Wordfest in Longview, Washington this coming Tuesday at 6pm PST, and Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu, Windham Campbell Prize winning author of The Theory of Flight and The History of Man, got a nice mention in Lizzy Attree’s LA Times review of Glory, NoViolet Bulawayo’s Booker Prize shortlisted novel.

And finally, ICYMI, check out the announcement for Panel & Page, our newly launched graphic novel series which kicks off with the 2023 releases of Pearl of the Sea and KARIBA. Pre-orders available now

Continue reading “The Spark: The “Wow, September is a big month” Edition”

The Spark: The “Way to Go, Sifiso!” Edition

Hot from the Press

Late last week, we received the amazing news that Young Blood, Sifiso Mzobe’s crime novel set in Durban’s Umlazi township, was shortlisted for the 2022 Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award! The winner will be announced on October 27^th, but we’re so thrilled to see Sifiso on this incredible list of finalists. Read more about the book at the end of this post!

Huge congrats to Bridget Krone, the award-winning author of Small Mercies, for the launch of her newest middle grade novel, The Cedarville Shop and the Wheelbarrow Swap! To celebrate her South African pub date last week (don’t worry, USA readers! The book is available in North America and worldwide in just a few weeks), Top Class Books in Hilton, South Africa hosted a marvelous launch with almost 100 attendees. Bridget will spend the next few weeks touring schools in Pietermaritzburg and Johannesburg, as well as attending book signings and readings.

Also this week, Today is Tomorrow author Caroline Kurtz was honored alongside her sister Jane and the Reverend Bill Chadwick during a virtual event hosted by the Presbyterian Writers Guild. Caroline’s first memoir, The Road Called Down on Both Sides: Growing Up in Ethiopia and America was awarded the Presbyterian Writers Guild’s Best First Book Award. You can read more about the event, and Caroline’s response to the award, here

And finally, The History of Man author Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu and Bom Boy author Yewande Omotoso will both be taking part as panelists at the 2022 Open Book Festival in Cape Town, September 2-4!

Continue reading “The Spark: The “Way to Go, Sifiso!” Edition”

The Spark

Hot from the Press

Halley’s Comet by Hannes Barnard got a great mention in this article about representative YA literature, On My Papa’s Shoulders is a staff pick at the LA County Library, and in case you missed the big news from last week: Idza Luhumyo’s short story “Five Years Next Sunday”, featured in Disruption: New Short Fiction from Africa, was awarded the 2022 Caine Prize alongside a record setting shortlist!

Awards News

The Miles Franklin Award pulled John Hughes’ The Dogs from its 2022 longlist after Hughes admitted to plagiarizing Svetlana Alexievich’s The Unwomanly Face of War. But people are now drawing similarities to other works of classic literature, including The Great Gatsby, Anna Karenina, and All is Quiet on the Western Front.

Announced this week: the winners of the 2022 Lambda Literary Awards, which celebrate LGBTQ+ literature; Ruth Ozeki’s The Book of Form and Emptiness takes home the Women’s Prize for Fiction; and The Orphanage by Serhiy Zhadan and translated from Ukrainian by Reilly Costigan-Humes and Isaac Stackhouse Wheeler wins the 2022 EBRD Literature Prize.

Costa announced unexpectedly that the 2021 Costa Book Awards were its last, and the Society of Authors announced a new prize, the ACDI Literary Prize, which will celebrate positive representation of disability in literature.

Introducing The Spark

Welcome to The Spark, our weekly roundup of news from Catalyst and beyond. This is our first edition with our brand new fancy name. Think of The Spark as a quick burst of news, a little shorter than our monthly(ish) newsletter, but just as fun. A fun-sized version of the Catalyst news you know and love. If you’re not subscribed to the full-sized version, be sure to subscribe here!

Hot from the Press

Two great mentions for Catalyst Press authors this week! Nigerian author Wole Talabi named his top ten favorite stories of 2021, and two (!!) stories from Disruption: New Short Fiction from Africa were listed (“Shelter” by Mbozi Haimbe, and “Five Years Next Sunday” by Idza Luhumyo). We are proud to be the North American publisher for Disruption, available in stores and online. And Consortium Library Express featured a sneak peak of Niki Daly’s newest Lolo book, Fly High, Lolo. Fly High, Lolo is available for pre-order now. For more info on the Lolo early reader series, check out the “From the Backlist” section below.

This Week in Literary News

We’ve changed our weekly literary news roundup just a bit for the new year. From now on, you’ll find tips on #ReadingAfrica all year round, great titles to check out from our backlist, and of course, other bookish news from across the internet. Think of this as a mini newsletter (for the regular-sized serving of our newsletter, subscribe here). Happy reading!

Public libraries are doing great, but literary magazines–not so much. Apple Books launched its new book club, and We Need Diverse Books started a grant for educators teaching diverse stories. The Rathbones Folio Prize and the Waterstone Children’s Book Prize announced their shortlists, and the National Book Foundation announced its inaugural titles for its new Science and Literature program. Ashley Bryan, beloved author of children’s books on Black lives including Beautiful Blackbird, died at age 98.

This Week in Literary News: Week of October 3

First up, a few updates on your favorite Catalyst authors! Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu, author of award-winning novel The Theory of Flight and her upcoming follow-up, The History of Man, recently spoke at the Harare Book Club, and you can catch up on the event here. And mark your calendars for Saturday November 6^th at 2pm EST, when Siphiwe will be in conversation with author Courttia Newland in a discussion of Afro-futurism, in partnership with Brooklyn’s Word Bookstore.

Futhi Ntshingila, author of We Kiss Them With Rain is celebrating the launch of her new book, They Got to You Too, in South Africa on Tuesday October 12^th at 18:30 SA time, 12:30pm EST, and you can tune in live. Congratulations, Futhi! Continue reading “This Week in Literary News: Week of October 3”

This Week in Literary News: Week of May 30

We love seeing Catalyst Press authors in the news! This week, Young Blood author Sifiso Mzobe spoke with author Jacob Ross about crime writing in South Africa and the Caribbean, at Rofhiwa Books in Durham, NC. Check out the replay here. And this upcoming Wednesday, Rofhiwa Books hosts another Catalyst Press author, Barbara Boswell of Unmaking Grace, in conversation with Professor Shanna Benjamin about the intellectual legacies of Black women in South Africa and the US. Register for the event here, which will take place at 10:00am EST on this Wednesday July 9^th. Barbara is also featured in a new essay collection about Black feminist writers of South Africa. She’s joined by a host of other amazing writers including Catalyst author Yewande Omotoso (Bom Boy). The collection got some great press this week.

It’s my favorite week of the year: which is 1. Hay Festival Week (which runs through this Sunday) and 2. The kickoff week of Pride Month! View the digital Hay Fest program to register for this weekend’s panels and catch up on all the ones you’ve already missed! Spoiler alert: it’s the best lineup yet. And to celebrate Pride, here’s a booklist from Harper’s Bazaar, queer romances from Book Riot, and a quiz to help you pick your first (and second, and third) LGBTQ+ read. Or check out the winners of the 33rd Annual Lambda Literary Awards, which celebrates LGBTQ+ books and authors, announced this week. Happy reading—and happy Pride! Continue reading “This Week in Literary News: Week of May 30”

This Week in Literary News: Week of April 4

This month is full of chances to see Catalyst authors in action. First up, catch Catalyst publisher/founder Jessica Powers and her brother and Broken Circle (Akashic Books) co-author Matthew as part of Cochise College’s Community Creative Writing Celebration on April 16. The reading will be followed by a Q&A, then an open mic. Learn more here. And on April 21, you can catch Sifiso Mzobe, author of the award-winning novel Young Blood, as he steps on the virtual stage for Stony Brook University’s Creative Writing and Literature Writers Speak Wednesday series. The event will be streamed live on the university’s YouTube channel. More information here. Sifiso’s novel is out on April 13.

In other news, following the controversy around American Dirt, Michael Ugarte of Africa is a Country, raises questions about another book, Palmeras en la Nieve, whose “critical reception among historians of Spanish colonization efforts in Africa has been less than positive.”

“Animals have inspired writers since the beginning of the written word” The New York Times presents “Writer’s Best Friend,” a look at some notable writers furry friends, including Jackie Collins’ poodle, George Orwell’s goat, Muriel, and Toni Morrison’s cat. Continue reading “This Week in Literary News: Week of April 4”

This Week in Literary News, Week of November 15

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.

Continue reading “This Week in Literary News, Week of November 15”

This Week in Literary News, Week of November 1

At the time of writing, it’s day four of the U.S. election and if you’re anything like me, you’re on the hunt for some decidedly not political content to help ease the bone-crushing anxiety. So, here’s some literary escapism for you! (Haters out there sayin’ that books won’t save the world, but Kristen Radtke is here to prove them wrong.) Sit back, switch off CNN, and tune into this week’s best virtual book events.

Speaking of virtual, here what the directors of five global book festivals have to say about pivoting in the age of Zoom. More news from the publishing world: Michelle Obama’s Becoming editor Molly Stern is starting up a new publishing firm called Zando. Bookshop, the rising-star online retail platform for indie booksellers, launched this week in the UK, and Jonny Diamond is pissed that they didn’t spell it Bookshoppe. Dr. Camilla Pang is the first author of color – and youngest author ever – to win the Royal Society science book prize, for her “manual for humans” combining her research on human genetics with her personal experience as an individual on the autism spectrum. The 2020 World Fantasy Award winners were also announced this week.

On the Guardian, Tana French talks about the books that formed her style, and Caleb Femi discusses joy, poverty, and his debut poetry collection. Continue reading “This Week in Literary News, Week of November 1”