In Catalyst Press news, the winners of this year’s Short Story Day Africa Prize have been announced! We’re thrilled to be releasing Disruption, the newest Short Story Day Africa anthology, to the North American market in September. Disruption features stories from 21 new and emerging authors from across Africa, including the winning short stories of this year’s prize. Pre-orders are available now.
In celebrity book news, beloved British television host Graham Norton has a new memoir, James Patterson and Bill Clinton are back with more tropes, and Jared Kushner and President Joe Biden’s sister both signed book deals (sigh). And most important, Tsitsi Dangarembga became the first Black woman to win the prestigious Peace Prize of the German Book Trade! Go Tsitsi!
A literary heritage project in Australia is trying to save the nation’s books, and five organizations across the United States have started a collective fundraiser in support of Black literary arts. This week commemorates 121 years since the loss of the Hanlin Library (the what, you ask?). And in case you needed another reason to hate Amazon…
In more Catalyst news, we’re running a Goodreads giveaway for The Rising Tide, book 2 in Helen Brain’s Fiery Spiral Trilogy, which will be releasing next month! The giveaway ends in just over a week, so enter now.
Here’s your weekly recommended reading roundup: 25 audiobooks read by celebrities, 30 queer fairytale retellings, 20 young adult LGBTQ+ comics and 7 books about UFOs. Check out these Japanese female-authored books in translation, then call your local indie to get your hands on all 6 books on Ibram X. Kendi’s book list to help your kids understand race. And my favorite book list of the week: Blake Morrison, Chris Power, Megan Nolan, and Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé on the books that shaped their respective generations.
For some though provoking reads: here’s Benjamin Hedin on Alice Munro’s (maybe?) novel, poet Wayne Miller on writing your children, Jennifer Baker on gaslighting in fiction (and two books to add to my wish list), and cartoonist Charles Johnson on being a Black artist. In the tech world, here’s Shya Scanlon on Internet Literature’s form and future and Stephen Marche on AI, NLP, and all of those other important acronyms. LitHub found the world’s most interesting book club, and Carina Pereira explained Pride and Prejudice having never once read it. Lastly, read up on how to get pubbed by Boston Review in this week’s “Interview with a Journal” on LitHub.
Check out these visual works by Sarah Mapps Douglass, an early 19th century African American painter and abolitionist, and finally, head to Twitter for my favorite trends of the week: hiding scientific discoveries from the poets and is Batman a selfish lover?
Lastly, congratulations to illustrator Barly Baruti, author Christophe Cassiau-Haurie, and translator Ivanka Hahnenberger on the release of Madame Livingstone, a historical graphic novel set in the Congo in World War I. We chatted with the authors for a Q&A, which you can read here. And be sure to check out an excerpt of the book (view in full screen for best results!):
