Hot from the Press
Catch up on two great Catalyst author events:
Caroline Kurtz did a virtual reading with Annie Bloom’s Bookshop from her new book, Today is Tomorrow, a follow up to her award-winning memoir A Road Called Down on Both Sides: Growing up in Ethiopia and America. Today is Tomorrow, which reflects on the years Caroline and her husband spent working with war refugees in South Sudan and Kenya, is on sale April 19. Happy pub week, Caroline!
And on Friday, Johns Hopkins’ Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences hosted a great conversation with Windham-Campbell Prize winner Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu. We’re proud to be the North American publisher for Siphiwe’s The Theory of Flight and The History of Man, both available now!
And finally, the fourth book in Niki Daly’s beloved Lolo series, Fly High, Lolo, just received a starred review from School Library Journal! SLJ called the book “a beautiful addition to the series, and a worthy addition to library shelves.” Fly High, Lolo, a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection, is available for pre-order now.
This week in literary news
Brandon Taylor’s Filthy Animals won the Story Prize and the National Book Foundation announced its 5 under 35 list. Brooklyn Public Library launched the Books UnBanned initiative, which gives kids and teens free access to banned books via ebook across the USA. Bitch Media is shutting down after almost three decades of uplifting women and feminist voices, and beloved British spy novelist Jack Higgins passed away at age 92.
In thought-provoking reads, Laure Van Rensburg contemplated what Gillian Flynn’s anti-heroines mean for feminism and Erika Hardison discussed the origins and future of Afrofuturism. Find out the five biggest takeaways from last week’s London Book Fair, and how Ukraine is resisting the Russian influence through profanity.
#ReadingAfrica Roundup
In this section, we’ll be sharing publishing news, book recs, and more all focused on African and African diaspora authors. Don’t forget to mark your calendars for our sixth annual #ReadingAfrica week, this year Dec 4-10!
Some exciting awards news from #ReadingAfrica this week! First up, Holland House and Karavan Press announced the shortlist for its inaugural Island Prize for African debut literature, which included A Darkness with her Name on It by Doreen Anyango from Uganda, Single Minded by Marina Auer and Glass Tower by Sarah Isaacs from South Africa, Sand Roses by Hamza Koudri from Algeria, and Delightful Cage by Joyce Nwankwo from Nigeria.
South African author Caitlin Venniker was awarded the Mogford Prize for her short story “The Hunt”, and ICYMI, here’s a roundup of all of the winners of South Africa’s National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences awards. We see some familiar Catalyst authors on that list–congratulations Futhi Ntshingila for They Got to You Too, and Barbara Boswell and Yewande Omotoso who were both featured in Surfacing: On Being Black and Feminist in South Africa!
In Kenya, an artist is making art more accessible for the blind by adding braille descriptors to his paintings, and in South Africa, the government is making moves towards including its many mother tongues in the national curriculum.
From the Backlist
In honor of Futhi Ntshingila’s HSS Awards win for her novel They Got to You Too, this week we’re spotlighting her wonderful novel (and North American debut!) We Kiss Them With Rain, which was selected as a USBBY 2019 Outstanding International Book and named a 2019 Skipping Stones Award honoree for Multicultural and International Books.
By Futhi Ntshingila
ISBN 978-1-946395-04-7
Paperback $14.95
The terrible thing that steals 14-year-old Mvelo’s song leads to startling revelations and unexpected opportunities.
Life wasn’t always this hard for 14-year-old Mvelo. There were good times living with her mother and her mother’s boyfriend. Now her mother is dying of AIDS and what happened to Mvelo is the elephant in the room, despite its growing presence in their small shack. In this Shakespeare-style comedy, the things that seem to be are only a façade and the things that are revealed hand Mvelo a golden opportunity to change her fate. We Kiss Them With Rain explores both humor and tragedy in this modern-day fairy tale set in a squatter camp outside of Durban, South Africa.
You can read an excerpt here, or check out the discussion guide, perfect for educators, parents, or teen book clubs. There’s a lot of great praise for We Kiss Them With Rain, so we’ll just include a few here. Here’s what people had to say:
“Taking place mostly in Durban, South Africa, the tale doesn’t shy away from the reality of AIDS, poverty, or rampant sexual abuse, but instead of making those subjects its sole focus, Ntshingila folds them in with the other realities of life: love, joy, and hope. Ntshingila’s lyrically wrought North American debut is a slim yet satisfying novel sure to trigger a wide range of emotions.” Kirkus (Starred review)
“Those who appreciate realistic fiction will enjoy this novel in which young female characters learn to love themselves, no matter the circumstances” School Library Journal
“Full of heart and hope despite the emotionally challenging subject matter […] A haunting, all-too-true story with plenty of compelling depth.” Booklist
“It is a story about joy and hope and courage, and what it means to lift up others and be lifted oneself, and how one young girl found her voice in a world seemingly determined to take it away.” Shelf Awareness (starred review)
“Ntshingila takes what could be mere tearjerking manipulation and turns Mvelo’s path into something at once dramatic and prosaic. In other words, a 14-year-old pregnant by rape, orphaned by AIDS, and uncertain of her future sounds and feels like a full human instead of a line in a news story. Highly recommend.” — Bethanne Patrick, Lit Hub
