Bulawayo publisher, amaBooks, has published two new books — Moving On and Other Zimbabwean Stories and The Goddess of Mtwara. The latter won the 2017 Caine Prize for African Writing anthology.
BY SHARON SIBINDI
Moving On and Other Zimbabwean Stories brings together 20 of Zimbabwe’s finest storytellers, from within the country and from the diaspora. The book will be launched in Bulawayo on September 30 as part of the 2017 Intwasa Arts Festival in Bulawayo.
The launch — at the National Gallery at 4:30pm — will feature a conversation about the book and about Zimbabwean literature, featuring American academic James Arnett, a Fulbright scholar at the National University of Science and Technology, Zimbabwean award-winning poet Tinashe Tafirenyika and several contributors to the book.
The 20 writers include Raisedon Baya, Patricia Brickhill, Gamu Chamisa, Murenga Joseph Chikowero, John Eppel, Adrian Fairbairn, Tendai Huchu, Donna Kirstein, Bongani Kona, Christopher Kudyahakudadirwe, Ignatius Mabasa, Barbara Mhangami-Ruwende, Christopher Mlalazi, Mzana Mthimkhulu, Blessing Musariri, Togara Muzanenhamo, Melissa Tandiwe Myambo, Thabisani Ndlovu, Tariro Ndoro and Bryony Rheam.
amaBooks director Brian Jones said there were a wide range of experiences among writers in Moving On and Other Zimbabwean Stories and a wide range of writing styles and themes — something for everyone to enjoy.
“There are writers whose names will be familiar to readers of Zimbabwean fiction and will include those who have won National Arts Merit Awards or those that have been shortlisted for the Caine Prize for African Writing,” he said.
“Many of the characters in this anthology are themselves moving on: from the chains of the past, from the loss of loved ones, from long-held beliefs.”
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Keep Reading
This is the sixth in the amaBooks Short Writings series, following Short Writings from Bulawayo I, II and III, Long Time Coming and Where to Now?, and the translation of Where to Now? as Siqondephi Manje?
The Goddess of Mtwara contains stories from across Africa; from the writers shortlisted for the 2017 Caine Prize for African Writing — the “African Booker”—and from writers who were invited to the annual Caine Prize workshop.
The Caine Prize anthologies are published by publishers across Africa, United Kingdom and North America. There is one Zimbabwean writer in this year’s anthology, Tendai Huchu, whose work is also in Moving On.
