You published your first novel in your early thirties while being at the time a lawyer for a large company in France. When did your passion for literature arise? Have you always been writing? Have you always known that you wanted “to be a writer”?

The funny thing is that I always knew that I wanted to become a writer. It was maybe because of the fact that my father kept bringing books at home. He was supposed to read these books once he would retire; although I never saw him open a single one. All these books were stored in my parent’s room, so one day I decided to have a look on it. The first book I took was a collection of poems by Paul Verlaine. I began to read it and loved it.

To this you have to add the fact that I was the only child of the family. It is a very sad situation to be the only child: you do not have brothers and sisters with whom to share your concerns and your friends tease you because you are alone. This situation pushed me to start writing. I both wanted to conceal my sadness and to change my reality. I started creating another reality in which I was a kind of god: I created characters and involved them in stories. Then I turned to poetry when I was in middle school. After that I kept on writing and writing, first poetry then novels and eventually essays.

Your book “Tomorrow I’ll Be Twenty” recalls how it was to be a child in a large African city in the Seventies. Why was it important to write that story?

It was very important because I figured out that we had no stories told through the voice of a kid in Congolese literature. In “Tomorrow I’ll Be Twenty”, I wanted to explain the way we were living under this Congolese regime called “Soviet Socialism”. We were a red country! Everything was about Marx and Engels, about materialism and the philosophy coming from the USSR.

At the same time, I was completely fascinated by Camara Laye’s tale: “L’Enfant Noir” (“The Black Child”, ed.). This was a huge book about how to describe Africa through the way of life of a simple family. This is why I chose to give a voice to this kid called Michel, my central character, and let him explain his way of living during these years.

Through Michel’s lenses, you evoke the hypocrisy of the adult’s world. Your character “Tonton René” embodies a Marxist revolution that benefits only a handful of happy few. Do politics necessarily interfere with the experience of being a child in Africa?

Without hesitation, yes. When I was a child, my father would open the radio everyday and I would hear names such as Ayatollah Khomeini’s and Henry Kissinger’s, news from Vietnam and a lot diverse situations coming from the whole world. Even today I am still surprised at all the news I heard of. People tend to think that surely, African children are not aware of politics but they are wrong. Everyday my father took great care to explain me what was happening here and there.

I think that we were maybe more aware of world news than children from the Western world. Politics was everywhere. To a larger extent, it raises an important question for the African novel: is it possible to talk about our lives without describing the political situation?

Humour and sarcasm are the hallmark of your prose and you often use them to underline African problems. Then last year you published “Le Sanglot de l’Homme Noir” (“The Sobbing of the Black Man” yet to be translated), a daring essay that reflects on the danger for black people to define themselves as victims of history only. Was this theme too difficult to carry through fiction? Or did you want to express a new message?

Actually I have two faces in my writing. When I want to spread a clear message with my own voice, I will rather use the essay than the novel and its fictional characters. “Le Sanglot de l’Homme Noir” should be read as an explanation of what is the black identity today in France. We have a lot of discussion in France about who is black and who is not, about if and how one should keep his African identity when living in Europe and also about why the country is trying to kick out all its immigrants – when it was more than happy to call its African citizens from the colonies to help protect its empire during WWI and WWII.

But when I want to play with my own country, when I want to express our way of thinking, I will rather use the fiction. The essay probably helps me to say things more sharply. I sometimes say to people: “you know there was this theme I developed in my fiction and you did not understand it. Now I am going to explain it to you with quotations, with examples, with ample illustrations of the situation so that you cannot pretend any more to ignore that I was talking about such a theme in my work.”

You worked for years in France and you are now teaching in the USA. Yet, most of your fictional work is set in Africa. Is it easy to write from afar? Can distance be an asset in the writing process?

I think that being far from Africa can be considered as a gift. Would I have stayed in Africa, I am not sure that I would have written what I have written so far. To write, you have to be in a situation where you are looking for something you do not have, searching for a country that you cannot find. In this process, you have to deal with your dreams: you kind of draw an imaginary country.

This brings us to the question of African writers living outside of Africa and trying to write about it. In such a situation, you can write in an “exotic” or in a “nostalgic” way, moaning that you are far from your country and looking at ways to get back there. For me, I made the choice to describe the Africa I knew when I was a kid – that is from zero to twenty years old. But I also made the choice to talk about France, because you find in France a lot of Congolese and African people who have been living there for a while and who are precisely dealing with this issue of the creation of another, new country.

So far, I think that this position of mine to be a kind of bird, travelling from here to there, trying to experience all the seasons, see all the countries is very important. I need to define myself in connection with what other people are doing. I need to know the Chinese culture, the American or the European one: in all these cultures I am going to pick something useful for the definition of my own self.

On your influences: you are sometimes compared to the French Renaissance writer Rabelais for the larger-than-life characters you create; or to 20^th century Céline for your iconoclastic style. Where are your literary influences to be found? Which writer(s) inspire you, and why?

I read a lot! I like writers from Colombia like Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I also like writers from Italy: I remember reading every day this writer called Dino Buzatti. I love “The Old Man and the Sea” by Ernest Hemingway… My inspiration is very eclectic. Literature was for me the only way to get out of Congo-Brazzaville. That country is so small that you have to read to travel, otherwise you are going to stay trapped within the country. I am very lucky because I could meet at that time these influential writers I just mentioned. My reading included African writers of course, such as Mongo Beti from Cameroon or Ahmadou Kourouma from Ivory Coast. I used to read everything.

What I mainly liked were authors with something exceptional, almost magical in their use of language. I think about Céline for example: Céline is one of the writer I preferred to read. Besides Céline, there also was Albert Camus and Günter Grass, from Germany. When I wrote Broken Glass, I put a lot of books I liked in the novel. I can say that I put my ideal library in it. If you read the novel, you will see that almost every sentence is build with titles of books I read.

Are African authors obliged to write in English of French to be published? On a personal level, how do you feel about writing in French?

I feel comfortable writing in French. I always say that my problem is not the French language, my problem is to know how I am going to express what I am thinking and what I am feeling. I do not have a problem with the French language, the French language has a problem with me… Literary commentators in France have to deal with what I am writing. Although it is written in French, they often prefer to call it “Francophone literature”, a term implying that this literature comes from far away.

For many in France, “Francophone literature” means something like a “small literature” above which you would find French literature. I endeavour to explain to French writers that they do not have the monopoly of the French language; that sometimes French language is even more protected by people like us, who are coming from smaller countries, who were colonized by French and who are now trying to enrich the language they brought us.

Africa Book Club is about books coming from and talking about Africa. As for you, do you think there is such a thing as “African literature”? How could one define it? What would be its common traits?

One could say that there is an African literature if one could agree on the elements that would define this African literature. The danger is that, by trying to impose an “African” label on a certain type of literature, one will seek to recognize only a few defining elements – things as random as the bush, wild animals or ants for example…

Photo Credit: Caroline Blache

I remember this Kenyan writer, Binyavanga Wainaina, who wrote a great short story called “How to write about Africa” in which he derisively explained that you had to use the word “war”, or “starvation”, or “tribe” an so on when writing about Africa. I do not want that to define African literature of course. African literature is not an exotic literature; it is the literature coming from the black continent. That is to me its first definition. But at the same time we know that Africa acts as a kind of “mother”. African-American literature for example comes from African literature. Take Maya Angelou who talks about such things as slavery and the situation during the segregation: it is all about blackness!

But one should not consider African literature as a black thing only. Take the South African author André Brink: he is white but he is African. The same for Nadine Gordimer or J.M. Coetzee, not to speak of Egyptian writers as Naguib Mahfouz. That is the whole problem of the definition of African literature: if you take it as a closed thing, you will be forced to consider Africa as one territory with one language and one culture. As far as I know, Africa is different from North to South and East to West. Within Africa, you can meet a Congolese writer who will have different dreams than his Senegalese colleague. It is definitely something to think of… For me, I would rather opt for the term “African literatures”, meaning that it is multiple, it is diverse and it reflects on many culture in Africa.

And finally, you often endeavour to change perceptions about Africa. You recently organized an important literary festival in Brazzaville carrying a strong message of “African optimism”. Who is that message directed to?

First of all to Africans. Organizing this festival, we wanted to let them know that the world was there, at their doorstep. I am talking about young African people who might be thinking that things are falling apart: we wanted to bring them culture. I am not only a writer; if I am doing this, it is also to promote culture. I want to bring artists in Africa in order to support young people. I want these youngsters to meet renowned writers, I want those who are writing to carry on writing. And I think young people in Congo are expecting a new message from me. They want to know what is happening outside of their country, when the writers I bring are very curious about what is happening there in Africa.

Photo Credits: Caroline Blache

Beah’s memoir is a remarkable account.The writing is so vivid that sometimes one can’t help but wonder how a person can experience such horrors and still come out sane. But Beah shows it is possible.” — Dianah Ninsiima

How to Enter the Competition

Enter our May 2013 giveaway competition for a chance to win your copy of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier (By Ishmael Beah). Simply follow the instructions below. If you are not a registered Africa Book Club subscriber, you will need to join first. Then, simply go ahead and answer the question below to enter.

1. Which author wrote the book, Tropical Fish: Stories out of Entebbe?
2. What prize did the book/author win in 2006?

Please email your answers to: memberservices@africabookclub.com with the subject: May 2013 Book Giveaway

Tip: Answers to the questions can be found by browsing the Africa Book Club site.

Remember the Rules:

• This competition is open to all registered subscribers/members of the Africa Book Club anywhere in the world. Non-members can subscribe here to enter the competition.
• This giveaway competition expires Friday, May 31, 2013 at midnight (EST).
• The winner will be drawn on (or shortly after) June 1, 2013 from all correct entries received before the closing date.
• The winner will be asked to provide a valid shipping address or an email address in case he or she prefers to receive the ebook edition.
• Africa Book Club will make a good-faith effort to ship books to anywhere in the world at standard international postal rates. Delivery times vary and may take up to five weeks for certain international destinations.
• Only one entry will be accepted per person registered as a subscriber/member of the Africa Book Club.
• The winner will be notified by email using the address through which he or she entered the competition.
• Only the winning entrant will be contacted by Africa Book Club. Our decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into.
• The winner’s name may be published on the Book Club site after the closing of the competition.

How We Select Our Winners

All entries are assigned a unique number, ranging from 1 to the highest number. Winners are then randomly selected using the sequence generator tool. For more about this tool, visit www.random.org.

Coming of age

Few people remember the ferocious conflict that opposed European settlers to the Xhosa nation in a territory today known as the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Successive “Cape Frontiers Wars” were waged during the major part of the 19^th century to expand the eastern boundary of the colony in a context of ever-changing alliances between the settlers, the different Xhosa tribes and the British army. This guerilla-type conflict over the possession of the land – an issue that is still haunting South Africa today – bred atrocities from each side, in particular through the recruitment of common-law criminals in the British ranks.

“The Kid”, the novel’s main character, is a young member of a group of such “irregulars”: thugs who mostly enrolled to avoid prison. Little is said about the kid’s past. About his future, a gloomy promise comes from the mouth of a disordered missionary in one of the catchy scenes the novel is sparked with. “The wrath of God lies sleeping and it’s not their land or ours” the man predicts from the dark corner of a dusty shack bar. “The wrath of God was hid a thousand years before men were and it waited for you to wake it. Hell is not half full yet. Not half.” In a typical construction of the narrative, the book then relates the kid’s harsh coming of age in this hell on earth that is war.

Stylistic masterpiece

Style is central to Whyle’s literary endeavour. Succession of sober, low-key, almost too simple sentences contrast with the sudden outburst of longer constructions, giving to violence and suffering a nearly physical presence. “Herrid hauled Waine up against a gun carriage and bound his wrists to a spoke. He pulled up Waine’s jacket to expose hairy flesh. He unbuckled his belt and withdrew it from its holdings. He wound the buckle end twice around his right hand. He placed his feet for purchase and swung the leather up into the sky and dragged it down again” the author writes about one of the irregulars’ punishment. “There was a sound like a gunshot and a weal of red grew across Waine’s ribs and he roared. He jerked back against the thong at his neck and bounced forward again and his forehead split against the metal rim of the wheel. Blood dripped onto a dusty spoke.”

Scalpel-sharp in his descriptions of brutality, Whyle’s writing can also show moments of pure beauty – and often so in the most unexpected circumstances. “The world was pale and dim and ice fell like stones from the sky. It bounced off the ground and off the men’s heads and they cowered in their blankets and dodged about and shouted” he narrates of a particularly grim awakening, splendidly carrying on: “they appeared like apparitions, like ancient lunatics, snowy of brow and gibbering and cursing as the hail pelted them in the fog.” This impalpable injection of poetry in the most cruel circumstances is sometimes reminiscent of Cormac Mc Carthy, a clear inspiration for Whyle who discloses its indebtedness to the American author at the end of the book.

No time is lost in explanation about the conflict, its general context or its consequences in the novel. Action is at its purest; a chronology of raw facts unfolds without perceptible logic. Doubts are the privilege of educated officers. “It seems to me that sometimes we are more like revengeful pursuers hunting down poor fugitive slaves than men going forth to meet with men and fight out disputed rights in fair play” observes a captain in his diary. For the others, as the kid, war is just a twist of fate, another demonstration of the absurdity of their destiny. The irregulars barely question their lot; the kid maybe less than any other – which perhaps explains why he is still wandering the same pastures years later. “He looks like one indigenous to that landscape. He can kill or not kill. He is a pilgrim and an exile and a returnee.”

When I knew I wanted to be a writer…

My desire to become a writer started in 2007 during my national service year. In 2010, I spoke at an orientation program for first year students in  the geology department at ESUTECH. It was obvious these  students needed resources and reference materials that were not available. So I decided to write a book. Unfortunately, the book is still yet to be published. My first book,  Being the Best You Can Be, came out two years later.

What I do in my spare time… 

I read books or write. I care more about leaving a lasting legacy and helping people succeed, This reflects in my relationship with people and my writing style.

My most recent book…

Beyond Dark Moments is my latest book, and it was launched on October 28, 2012. I wrote the book to inspire others. It talks about why you should never to give up on life and teaches you that every challenge you encounter actually prepares you for a glorious future ahead with clear examples. The book is relevant more so for today’s generation, where a lot of people have lost their bearings and are struggling to find their reason for existence in life. This book serves as a ready compass providing a navigational path. It can be obtained from any major bookshop in Nigeria, or can be sent to you. Readers outside Nigeria can order the book my emailing me at: princewillokpulor@yahoo.com

My favorite authors…

John C. Maxwell, Dr Myles Munroe, Rev. Don Odunze, Bishop Oyedepo, Sam Adeyemi  and  Pastor E.A. Adeboye. My favorite book by a Nigerian Author is titled Godly Courtship and Engagement by Rev. Don Odunze.

When I Knew I Wanted to Write…

I became aware that I might want to be a writer during an extended stint of working in psychiatry in the dark Northern Scottish winter, when putting words down on paper seemed to be the only way of escaping the endless cold and crazy locals.

About My Book…

My book, Island Explorer: Surfing, Sailing and Exploring beyond Sumatra and the Mentawai Islands is an account of a journey through the remote tropical parts of Sumatra in search of surf, adventure and pristine islands. After climbing volcanoes and enduring crooked touts, maniacal bus drivers and marriage proposals from complete strangers, he boards a wooden sailing ship straight out of a pirate book. Just when the dream of finding perfect waves is about to come true, the ship’s captain becomes unhinged in the tropical heat and threatens to scupper the whole trip.

Island Explorer was published in September 2012 and is available as an e-book and paperback.

Where Can Readers Find the Book?

The book can be purchased from Amazon, Smashwords, Kobo, iTunes and directly from from Dan at trippybooks@gmail.com. Check it out at www.islandexplorerbook.com or look for Dan Scheffler on Facebook.

Besides Writing…

I am a medical doctor in general practice, but I try not to let work interfere too much with my surfing, which is what I love best. These days I spend more time at home with my wife and son, but I still manage to travel to tropical places every now and then. I am currently working on a second book.

Favorite African Writers

My favourite African writers include Damon Galgut, Ben Okri, Antjie Krog, Henrietta Rose-Innes and J.M. Coetzee in small doses. (And Hagen Engler for writing Ten Reasons Why Cape Town Can F- off.)

My Current Favorite Book by An African Writer

Caterpillar Seas by Robert Fridjhon.

Get 20% off the cover price when you pre-order your copy of Americanah, the latest book by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and  (Premium Club members get 40% off). And if your order totals $50 or more, we’ll throw in free shipping to anywhere in the world to thank you for your awesomeness. Please note that orders will be delivered after May 14, 2013, when the book is officially released. This deal expires May 31, 2013, while stocks last.

Click here to order.

Americanah (by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie)

As teenagers in a Lagos secondary school, Ifemelu and Obinze fall in love. Their Nigeria is under military dictatorship, and people are leaving the country if they can. Ifemelu–beautiful, self-assured–departs for America to study. She suffers defeats and triumphs, finds and loses relationships and friendships, all the while feeling the weight of something she never thought of back home: race. Obinze–the quiet, thoughtful son of a professor–had hoped to join her, but post-9/11 America will not let him in, and he plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.

Years later, Obinze is a wealthy man in a newly democratic Nigeria, while Ifemelu has achieved success as a writer of an eye-opening blog about race in America. But when Ifemelu returns to Nigeria, and she and Obinze reignite their shared passion–for their homeland and for each other–they will face the toughest decisions of their lives.

Pre-order your copy of Americanah, the latest book by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and get 20% off the cover price.

Read What Others Say About the Book

“An incredibly readable and rich tapestry of Nigerian and American life, and the ways a handful of vivid characters–so vivid they feel like family–try to live in both worlds simultaneously. As she did so masterfully with “Half of a Yellow Sun, ” Adichie paints on a grand canvas, boldly and confidently, equally adept at conveying the complicated political backdrop of Lagos as she is in bringing us into the day-to-day lives of her many new Americans–a single mom, a student, a hairdresser. This is a very funny, very warm and moving intergenerational epic that confirms Adichie’s virtuosity, boundless empathy and searing social acuity.” –Dave Eggers, author of “A Hologram for the King”

———————–

“Adichie’s great gift is that she has always brought us into the territory of the previously unexplored. She writes about that which others have kept silent. “Americanah” is no exception. This is not just a story that unfolds across three different continents, it is also a keenly observed examination of race, identity and belonging in the global landscapes of Africans and Americans. If Joyce had silence, exile and cunning for his defense, Adichie has flair, loss and longing. And Adichie is brave enough to allow the story to unfold with a distinct straightforward simplicity that never loses its edgy intellect.” –Colum McCann, author of “Let the Great World Spin”

Beukes  is married to Frances and has a daughter. A member of the secret independence movement in South Africa, he  is in charge of the distribution of political leaflets. The story describes how he tries to evade the policemen as he distributes his materials from house to house.  Like others, he must contend with the severe oppression in search of freedom in an unjust society.

In Beuke’s activities and the overall story, we see the Movement’s concerted yet almost futile attempt at a non-white liberation community. La Guma paints the horrible end result of rallies that gets out of hand. `A black preacher gave water to a man who moaned in shock, sitting in a puddle of his own blood, a toddler stood wonderingly over a heap of clothes. The child lay on her face and there seemed hardly a mark on her except when she turned over and they saw the exit hole the heavy slug had made in the chest’.

Elias on the other hand, also a very prominent member of the movement is caught and detained by the police. Savagely beaten and punished, he hangs on to his resolve not to talk or ever breathe a word about the movement. `Elias screamed, he had anticipated violence, but not this. Talk, talk talk his mind told him while his body jerked and jigged like a broken puppet….’ The scene reveals the deep loyalty of such few people who fought to make the liberation a reality.

Yet, the book seems to offer no immediate hope or promise of independence or comfort. It shows things realistically as they were before the independence; harsh, rugged and brutal.

Alex la Guma, the author of In the fog of the Season’s End, was a member of South Africa’s Communist party and he helped to organise the South Africa representatives that drew up the Freedom Charter in the 1950s. For this, he was consequently arrested and was among the 156 accused with treason in the famous Treason Trials. He fled South Africa in the 1967, moving first to Britain and eventually to Cuba, where he represented the African National Congress..

Trois femmes puissantes is an intricately crafted, complex and thought provoking book. It doesn’t initially feel like a novel as it comprises three ‘novellas’, three fictional accounts that each explores one individual’s life at a crucial moment in time. Yet, reflecting on the content, the writing and the structure it falls clearly into the category of novel: the stories are linked in subtle ways through imagery, peripheral character and atmosphere.

NDiaye’s novel comes alive not only through its beautiful language, but also through her probing of the many contrasts and opposites that are the building blocks for a life. Her writing is precise and detailed in conveying her characters’ inner voices; yet, their thought processes are not always easy to comprehend on first reading. Her description of their close physical surroundings is highly evocative; yet, nature can be threatening, deafening, as well as calming and refreshing, once the sun sets over the dry and dusty land and the debilitating heat subsides, whether in Africa or in France.

Building on the distinctive scenarios for her well defined characters, NDiaye delves deep into the complexities of individuals who are somehow and in some way caught between West Africa and France, whether in the present, the past or a dream of a future. For each of the women at the centre – Norah, Fanta and Khady – we are compelled to ask: Where to from here? However, the stories and each protagonist’s circumstances are more complex than this question suggests and over the course of the three accounts we are given part answers and more suggestions, leaving us to imagine alternatives or, maybe, not.

In the first story, for example, Norah’s father retreats for the night into an ancient flame tree growing behind the house to enjoy the cooling air… Complementing her realistic descriptions of circumstances and surroundings, the author introduces recurring symbols and metaphors that indicate or hint at something beyond the reality that we and the protagonist perceive. For instance, birds and wings take special meaning and appear in all three novellas in different forms. In one, they are not just noisy companions and observers, but especially threatening in the mind’s eye of the protagonist. They seem to play games with the human mind… Last but not least, at the end of each section/story NDiaye teases us with a short paragraph, a kind of epilogue, titled “Counterpoint” that suggests a different perspective or conclusion.

NDiaye imagines her central characters caught in a kind of fault line between (West) Africa and France with all that this can represent. One underlying theme is that of individuals moving in one direction or another between France and Senegal, changing places, whether visiting/living/dreaming. Norah, a successful Paris-based lawyer, a young mother with a complicated personal life, is suddenly summoned back to Senegal by a father she hardly remembers. What does he want from her and how will they reconnect, if at all? This story appears to be inspired (or more) by the author’s personal experience. NDiaye defines herself as French; her connection to Senegal and to her father is as slight as that of her heroine… however, for Norah it is somebody else who draws her back and who impacts her future moves. Fanta, a hidden yet very central presence in the second story, appears to have succeeded in bridging the two worlds while Khady… well, nothing more should be revealed. The last story is for me one of the most haunting accounts about people caught in the transcontinental fault line that I have read in a long time. Brilliant in its portrayal, devastating in its substance. Yet, Khady is the one who believes in hope, in her identity and, through her experiences, gains in self-confidence: “She hadn’t really lost very much, she would think later”; she wouldn’t regret the past either.

Going back to the attribute “puissant” in French and “strong” of the English title (or ‘powerful’ as some have suggested as a better translation) is worth an additional comment. At the surface none of the women are particularly strong or powerful. Their inner strength is only slowly revealed by the sensitive and richly imagined narrative. I see NDiaye’s “Three Strong Women” as a kind of triptych: three distinct portrayals of women’s experiences living between two continents and cultures. Seen together, they depict three alternatives of human experiences for women, and to a lesser degree for men, when exposed to the constant inner and outer tensions in their lives as they are trying to negotiate the fault lines.

A paperback edition of Three Strong Women is due to be released on May 21, 2013. Click here to pre-order a copy.

Inspired by her difficult journey back to Nigeria to bury her father’s bones in his homeland, the book offers a captivating and thoughtful look  at Nigerian society. Saro-Wiwa explores Nigerian Christianity, delves into the country’s history of slavery, examines the corrupting effect of oil, and ponders the huge success of Nollywood.

Saro-Wiwa travels from the exuberant chaos of Lagos to the calm beauty of the eastern mountains; from the eccentricity of a Nigerian dog show to the decrepit kitsch of the Transwonderland Amusement Park. She finds the country as exasperating as ever, and frequently despairs at the corruption and inefficiency she encounters. But she also discovers that it isi far more beautiful and varied than she had ever imagined, with its captivating thick tropical rainforest and ancient palaces and monuments. Most engagingly of all, she introduces us to the many people she meets, and gives us hilarious insights into the African character, its passion, wit and ingenuity.

Praise for Looking for Transwonderland

“The remarkable chronicle of a journey home from exile.” —The New York Times Book Review

“The daughter of slain Nigerian activist Ken Saro-Wiwa revisits her homeland as an adult in this absorbing tour of that complex African country…As she tours the country and gets to know people from its many ethnic groups, she gains a better understanding of and appreciation for Nigeria. Saro-Wiwa is a sharp and insightful guide, giving readers an intimate look at the varied regions that comprise this fascinating country.” —Booklist 

How to Enter 

Enter our April 2013 giveaway competition for a chance to win your copy of Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria (by Noo Saro-Wiwa). Simply follow the instructions below. If you are not a registered Africa Book Club subscriber, you will need to join first. Then, simply go ahead and answer the question below to enter.

1. Which Nigerian author won the 2012 Caine Prize for African Writing?

Please email your answers to: memberservices@africabookclub.com with the subject: April 2013 Book Giveaway

Tip: Answers to the questions can be found by browsing the Africa Book Club site.

Remember the Rules:

• This competition is open to all registered subscribers/members of the Africa Book Club anywhere in the world. Non-members can subscribe here to enter the competition.
• This giveaway competition expires Tuesday, April 30, 2013 at midnight (EST).
• The winner will be drawn on (or shortly after) May 1, 2013 from all correct entries received before the closing date.
• The winner will be asked to provide a valid shipping address or an email address in case he or she prefers to receive the ebook edition.
• Africa Book Club will make a good-faith effort to ship books to anywhere in the world at standard international postal rates. Delivery times vary and may take up to five weeks for certain international destinations.
• Only one entry will be accepted per person registered as a subscriber/member of the Africa Book Club.
• The winner will be notified by email using the address through which he or she entered the competition.
• Only the winning entrant will be contacted by Africa Book Club. Our decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into.
• The winner’s name may be published on the Book Club site after the closing of the competition.

How We Select Our Winners

All entries are assigned a unique number, ranging from 1 to the highest number. Winners are then randomly selected using the sequence generator tool. For more about this tool, visit www.random.org.

Doreen Baingana is the author of Tropical Fish: Stories out of Entebbe, which won the 2006 Commonwealth Prize for First Book, Africa Region, and the AWP Award for Short Fiction (US). She also won a Washington Independent Writers Fiction Prize and has twice been a finalist for the Caine Prize for African Writing.

Ms. Baingana obtained a law degree from Makerere University, Uganda, and an M.F.A. from the University of Maryland, USA. She has taught creative writing at various institutions including the University of Maryland, the Writers Center in Maryland, the SLS/Kwani? Literary Festival in Kenya, and with Femrite in Uganda.

For ten years, Ms. Baingana worked at Voice Of America (VOA) and for two years was the managing editor of Storymoja, a publishing house in Kenya. She talked to Africa Book Club recently.

Let’s start with writing, how would you contrast life as a writer versus being a lawyer?

I worked as a lawyer for only one year after university so my experience is limited, but in comparison, I feel the life of a writer is freeing despite its challenges; for me, the main one being discipline.

The monetary rewards may come or not; the most excellent writer will not necessarily become the richest, but the award we receive is the freedom to explore the life of the mind and to create our own worlds. It’s wonderful to have made the choice to do what I really want to do as opposed to being coerced into a career; it’s rare, if at all, that anyone has been forced to become a writer.

However, with this freedom comes the responsibility to produce work, and the anxiety about quality. I ask myself always, am I producing quality work? For as long as you are writing you always feel that you can do better.

Would you say writing is a calling?

Phrases like ‘a calling’ are just words that we choose to use to make certain situations fancier than they actually are. I think writing is work like any other; you have to sit down, put your nose to the grind stone and do it.

A calling brings in this idea of the spiritual – something that you cannot fight, you simply must follow. I don’t think it is for every writer. There are some good writers who have become great bankers or doctors; would you say they haven’t followed their calling? I don’t know.

As writers we are more aware of the fact that every single person tries to make a narrative for themselves: what is my life about, what am I doing, what motivates me? We are aware that the answers are stories we tell to explain our lives to ourselves and others, including the choice to call a career ‘a calling’.

I would just say that writing is something I really enjoy doing and it seems to be what I do best. But I could have been other things as well, and I do other kinds of work too: editing, a bit of journalism, teaching and so on. So I would call it a choice rather than a calling, to emphasize the element of self will.

Do you write full-time?

Now I do, yes. Sometimes I enjoy it, sometimes I don’t. I am also commissioned to write various things which I do to earn a living, so I’m happy to be able to live off writing and writing-related work such as editing and teaching.

Publishing in Africa for the most part means textbooks. What has been your experience with finding publishing opportunities?

I’ve been published in the US, South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda and most recently ‘Tropical Fish’ came out in Swedish. I have actually found it easier to publish outside Uganda than in it. I approached a Ugandan publisher some years ago, but there was a lack of interest, I think because there was no guaranteed market for my book. Like you say, textbooks get published because the publisher is sure of a steady market.

However, I still think that there is space for an innovative, active publisher to try and diversify publishing in East Africa and Africa as a whole. The gaps in the industry create room for someone daring and innovative with a real love for books to come in and do something. I worked with a publishing company like that in Kenya: Storymoja, led by Muthoni Garland, who is also a writer. She and her colleagues feel that we have to get people to love reading, to make people realize they need to read to survive and succeed, and that the books published should be relevant, and well done and marketed aggressively through various channels. They are doing a good job in terms of the marketing, including holding the biggest literary festival in East Africa: the Storymoja Hay Festival, every September in Nairobi.

Some people question the future of books. Are books dying out?

My interest is in the content, whether oral, print, or digital. To me, they are simply different formats in which to tell stories. The important thing is that the stories are told and people get as many stories as possible from as many places as possible and that all those with talent are able to get their stories told and accessed. The storytelling tradition will not die. It’s like when people said radio use would die out because of television; it hasn’t. The more ways people can tell and access stories, the better.

In Tropical Fish: Stories Out of Entebbe, one of the profound themes is that of equity especially in the character of Rosa (Story of Hunger). Why is that?

One of the things I was very much aware of, from my experience in boarding school was class differences and I wanted to explore that.

I learnt more about class difference than I did maths and physics in high school. It was about the posh and the poor; those who were ministers’ daughters and those who came from the village. It was interesting to me how teenagers, even without being fully aware of it, perpetuate these social structures and inequalities that they have received, without even questioning them, I included, of course.

This experience and more provided raw material for the stories in Tropical Fish.

Are you into anything else, besides writing?

I’m currently Chairperson of FEMRITE – the Uganda Women Writers Association, which promotes women’s writing through training, advocacy, publication, networking and more.

I am also involved with WAZO – Talking Arts, a new initiative that brings together artists and art lovers of all disciplines to talk about what they do, why and how; in literature, visual arts, film production, etc in a structured way. We held our tenth discussion forum in April 2013, and continue to meet the first Tuesday of every month at The Hub in Kamwokya. Check our facebook page for details.

As I said earlier, I teach creative writing classes quite often; for example in January I co-facilitated the 4^th Femrite African Women’s Writer’s Residency, which brought together writers from across Africa to write, workshop, network and exchange ideas for ten days outside Kampala. I enjoyed that immensely.

Besides Tropical Fish, you’ve written two children’s books namely; “Gamba the Gecko wants to Drum” and “My Fingers are stuck” Of all the three, which one was the most difficult to pen?

Tropical Fish is the more complex book; each story had its own intricacies, structure and point of view.

The children’s books were birthed out of my son’s curiosity and stories I tell him, and I was guided by my publisher, Storymoja.

What is your next writing project?

My goal is to finish a travelogue on Somaliland this year, and then continue with my novel-in-progress.