On August 9th book lovers in Gaborone will be treated to the second Gaborone Book Festival (GBF) Trust quarterly book night. This book night will be headlined by celebrated authors, Zukiswa Wanner who is based in Kenya and Niq Mhlongo based in South Africa.
The two authors are currently on a tour across the continent to promote their 2018 book releases ÔÇô Hardly Working, which is a travel memoir by Zukiswa, and Soweto Under the Apricot Tree by Niq, a collection of short stories.
On the same day, August 9, the GBF Trust will announce the list of authors who will be featured during the main festival from 21-22 September.
Whilst in Gaborone from the 9th until 11th August, Zukiswa and Niq will also conduct a free workshop for a limited number of writers on the 11th and be hosted by book clubs on the 10th and 11 August.
Co-founder of Gaborone Book Festival Trust, Kenanao Phele has said three out of four of their platforms are free and accessible to all readers. “To keep this status quo, we are still appealing to individuals, families, companies and different entities for sponsorships, support and partnerships to stage the quarterly book night and the upcoming and inaugural book festival in September, a platform which doesn’t exist at the moment in our city.” The Gaborone Book Festival (GBF) Trust’s main mission is to foster a love for reading among Batswana and residents of Botswana. GBF achieves its objectives through four platforms; the school outreach programme, monthly book reviews, book night. The upcoming and inaugural book festival will be September 21-22 2018.
AUTHORS BIOs
Zukiswa Wanner is the author of the novels The Madams(2006), Behind Every Successful Man(2008), Commonwealth-shortlisted for Best Book Africa region Men of the South(2010) and winner of the South African Literary Award London Cape Town Joburg (2014).
She has also written two works of nonfiction, Maid in SA: 30 Ways to Leave Your Madam (2013) and a literary travel memoir, Hardly Working (2018) as well as two children’s books, Jama Loves Bananas (2011) and Refilwe (2014).
Wanner is a creator and curator of Artistic Encounters in Nairobi, a program that brings two artists of different art forms on one stage at the same time. Artistic Encounters is now in its second year running at the Goethe Institute. Wanner has also recently founded an East and Southern African publishing house, Paivapo. Her accolades include being a 2018 Johannesburg Institute of Advanced Studies (JIAS) fellow, being African Juror for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize in 2017, Danish International Visiting Artist (DIVA) in 2016, and Etisalat Prize for Fiction Juror in 2015. She is a Brand SA PYP Ambassador. Niq Mhlongo was born in 1973 in Soweto. His first novel, Dog Eat Dog, was published by Kwela in 2004 and was translated into Spanish under the title Perro Come Perro in 2006. This Spanish edition was awarded the Mar des Lettras prize. Besides writing novels and short stories, Niq has written a screenplay for an animated children’s TV series and scripts for a comic magazine called Mshana, the first issue of which appeared in February 2007. Way Back Home, his third novel, was published in 2013 and his first short story collection, Affluenza, was released in 2016. His second collection, Soweto Under the Apricot Tree, was published in early 2018.
