Black Book News

Interview with Margaret Busby

2012-02-22T22:32:00.001Z

Margaret Busby is the co-founder of Allison and Busbypublishers, which began in 1967. It is still operates as an independentpublishers today. Margaret is one of the most eminent people in the UK’spublishing community.

She is a now a publisher, broadcaster and reviewer and thisyear she will be supporting and encouraging new and established writers through her involvement in the following literature prizes. First, she is the Chair of the Commonwealth Book Prize,

the shortlist will be announced in April 2012 and the winner announced in May2012. Later in the year Margaret will also be judging the SI Leeds Literary Prize, which is a brand new award for unpublished fiction (30,000 words) byblack and Asian women writers. This prize is supported by the independentpublishers, Peepal Tree Press.

Margaret’s recent reviews in The Observer and The Guardianinclude:

Little Liberia: An African Odyssey in New York City, by Jonny Steinberg

The Last Holiday: A Memoir by Gil Scott Heron

Tell us a little about Allison and Busby.

Although Allison & Busby still exists as an independentpublisher, I have had no formal involvement with it for quite a while (and thesame was true of Clive Allison), so can’t comment on their current publishingpolicy. The style and content ofthe list now is obviously very different from what it was originally, since thepeople involved with choosing the books are different, with differinginterests, politics, etc.

When we started the company it was to do the sort ofpublishing we did not think was being done at that time; in the first place, itwas certainly an unusual thing for a small publisher to start up, and ourapproach was also something of a departure from what was then happening. The A&B list featured both newwriters and established authors, in a mixture of poetry, fiction, non-fiction(particularly political) and children’s books. We brought back into print many titles we though wereimportant and well as discovering, nurturing and making successful new writers.

Someone once paid what I consider a high compliment aboutthe A&B list of those days: “You never knew what Allison & Busby wouldpublish next, but you knew it was going to be interesting.”

Which book[s] are you most proud ofpublishing?

Most of them, for one reason or another! The very first novel we published –which had been rejected by publishers on both sides of the Atlantic – was SamGreenlee’s The Spook Who Sat By the Door (a subversive political thriller, the first book by an African American). We made it into a success, with extracts in The Observer, translation rights sold round the world, etc, and it wasmade into a film that has achieved cult status.

It was good to be able to bring back into print importantwriters who had been neglected for years. For example, most of work of CLR James was out of print in this country when I began to republish his work in the1970s. In terms of othersignificant black writers, we published George Lamming, Roy Heath, Buch Emecheta, etc.

Which of your published works would you likedto have seen do better than it did?

Sometimes there has been the occasional book that has beenso well reviewed everywhere that people think they already know everything aboutit and don’t bother to buy it…

Which book do you wish you had published?

Too many books I admire to mention. Every publisher will have regrets aboutthe ones that got away; in our case, it was sometimes that we did not haveenough money to compete with other richer, bigger outfits. But you have to focus on what you arepublishing, rather than the ones that got away. What did occasionally happen is that authors who becamesuccessful at A&B were then taken away by their agents to other publishinghouses who were better heeled – although authors also found out that more moneydid not necessarily mean a happier editorial relationship with the publisher.

What do you think about the future of publishing in the UK?

E-books seem to be on the rise, and the internet, online publication, print-on-demand are all things that are impacting on the tradition face of publishing.

Do you think that the publishing world is too conservative and so finds it difficult to accommodate black literature?

I think the publishing industry needs to be more diverse in terms of personnel, so that there is greater input from a black perspective. It’s hard to think of any black editors in the mainstream companies at the moment.

You are judging the exciting new SI Leeds Literary Prize (a new award for unpublished fiction by Black and Asian women) What inspires you most about this literaryinitiative?

It will be interesting to see what is being written beforeit gets filtered through the usual publishing channels.

What do you enjoy most about reviewing books?

The chance to read and enjoy new talent - and get paid forit…though not very much!

What don’t you like about reviewing books?

Much as I love reading good “Black books”, I wish I that I werealso asked to review books outside that perceived “expertise” of beingblack! I hope the assumption isnot that I am so narrow-minded as to have no interest in a broad range ofwriting and topics. I endorse whatToni Morrison once said: “I really think the range of emotions and perceptionsI have had access to as a black person and a female person are greater than thoseof people who are neither… My world did not shrink because I was a black femalewriter. It just got bigger.”

What book(s) would you liked to have reviewed?

Maybe more music books. For a change. Because I love music.

I have enjoyed reading your book reviews andyour sensitive and kind obituaries and I guess that you have met some amazingpoets and writers, do you plan to write a book?

Eventually…

I thought that your obituary of the Jamaican playwright, Barry Reckord was a revelation. It’s been a while since I read her books, but he did not seem to me to be the same person that his lover and author, Diana Athill, described, do you think that the time has come to reclaim and celebrate his legacy?

It is important to document and celebrate the achievements of many of our black creatives, such as Barry Reckord and others, so that they do not get written out of history simply because their importance may not be recognised by the mainstream. “Until the lions have their say, tales of victory will be written by the hunter."

Which book would be your ultimate survivalmanual?

I once published a book by a 16^th centuryJapanese samurai called Miyamoto Musashi, called A Book of Five Rings (in fact it’s still in print with Allison& Busby I think) – it’s a philosophical take on martial arts and strategy for winningbattles. That’s not my ultimatesurvival manual though I do believe one has to choose which battles are worthfighting, knowing one can’t win them all and certainly not single-handedly.

What are you looking forward reading for yourown enjoyment, after you have finished judging the Commonwealth Book and the SILiterary prizes?

No doubt by then I will have had a surfeit of fiction, sopossibly some poetry, perhaps by one of the exciting South African poets on thescene at the moment, e.g. Phillippa Yaa de Villiers.

Which writers inspire you?

Toni Morrison is always an inspiration, for herability to challenge the imagination and make language new; and I also relateto the fact that she used to be an editor in a publishing house and in thatcapacity helped a lot of other black writers break through.

What book would you recommend for the BlackReading Group?

I recommend something byEarl Lovelace – lots to choose from…his most recent novel is called Is Just a Movie, and the one before that was Salt (Commonwealth Writers’ Prize in 1997). How about Christie Watson’s Tiny Sunbirds Far Away. Sam Selvon’s The Lonely Londoners is a classic that’s well worth checking out. (I once abridged it for BBC Radio 4’sBook at Bedtime.)

This is the Lime magazine March 2012 theme isthe Goddess issue: What’s so fabulous about being a woman?

Every woman/goddessshould realise that it’s amazing what you can do when you don’t care who takesthe credit.

What question should I have asked you, andwhat is the answer?

Who was it that said: “Chocolate is the answer. Who cares what the question is?”

You could have asked why I didn’t choose an easierlife! No good answer…but we’ve allgot to do our bit to make a difference and make things better – if we do not,who will?

An edited version of this interview will be published in the March 2012 edition of Lime magazine.

Book Club: Sunday 26 February 2012

2012-02-12T17:43:00.000Z

First edition cover

The Black Reading Group’s classics season continues withToni Morrison’s Song of Solomon.

The meeting will take place on Sunday 26 February 2012,Waterstone’s Piccadilly branch at 3pm. Take the lift to the 5^th floorrestaurant and turn left, go through the arch, and we will be at the roundtable on the left hand side. Link to Waterstone's 5th floor

About the author

Toni Morrison was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in1993 - the only black women to have won it. She is the author of nine novels, including The Bluest Eye, Beloved,(made into a major film and she won the Pulitzer Prize for it in 1997), and mostrecently A Mercy, and has received the National Book Foundation Award, which isawarded to a writer ‘who has enriched our literary heritage over a life ofservice’. Toni’s new novel Home will be published in May in the UK. Link to the new book: Home Wikipedia entry about Toni Morrison

From the 1993 NobelPrize for Literature Award Ceremony:

In her depictions of the world of the black people, inlife as in legend, Toni Morrison has given the Afro-American people theirhistory back, piece by piece.

Milkman Dead, the protagonist of Song of Solomon,reflects one of the basic themes of Miss Morrison's novels, in his quest forself. Milkman's paternal grandfather was a liberated slave. When he wasregistering his freedom, he responded to a question about his father with theword "Dead", thus acquiring his macabre surname from the drunken officialwho asked. His family was prepared to accept this name: "It was new andwould wipe out the past. Wipe it all out." The Solomon whose name occursin the title of the novel, Milkman's peculiar southern forefather, was to befound even in the song that went with children's games. The intensity of hisinner life had carried him through the air back to the Africa of his origins.Solomon's rapture was ultimately Milkman's as well.

What they say aboutit:

(the comments on the back of the 1998 Vintage edition)

A complex, wonderfully alive and imaginative story – MsMorrison has woven, among gritty realities of hardship and resentment. Aglittering strand of fable. DailyTelegraph

Toni Morrison has written a brilliant prose tale thatsurveys nearly a century of American history as it impinges on a single family.

New York Times BookReview

Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon grips as a novel ofextraordinary truth, wisdom and humour.

Sunday Telegraph

No dreams or tricks. No potions or superstitions, no accentor betrayal will be allowed to escape as she weaves her spell of Black Americasinging its past.

Melvyn Bragg

A first class novel… I could not put it down.

Auberon Waugh,Evening Standard

Following up her novels, The Bluest Eye and Sula, Morrisonhas produced a novel about the black experience in America that is anextraordinary in the imaginative. Dramatic feeling as Roots… A spell-bindingtale, superbly written.

Publishers Weekly.

Pulitzer Prize winingauthor, Junot Diaz on Song of Solomon:

And as far as books canpropel me, I will never forget the dumbest story that I repeat again and againand again—the first real year I went to college, the first class that I satdown in, the first book we had to read was Song of Solomon. Song ofSolomon transformed my life from reading junk, which I love—I think it’svery important!—to suddenly discovering that it was possible not only to betransformed at the level of fantasy—but to be transformed on the mostfundamental human level. Suddenly not only did I see the real world that I livedin, but I saw myself in ways I’d never seen before. I still think that damnedbook put me on the road to being a writer. Song of Solomon, beyondeverything, is an extraordinary book to encounter as your first literary text. Boston Review, December 2010

First Impressions

I have not actuallystarted reading this book quite yet, I have been besotted by Tiny Sunbirds Far Away by Christie Watson and have not yet finished that. So my comments are based onwhy Song of Solomon is worth reading now. It continues our book club reading season ofwhat’s a black classic? In this regard surely this book most be it? Not only becauseit was cited in the Morrison’s Nobel Prize award – I have quoted from it above,because I thought that it was a moving testament. A classic certainly because it is telling the search for history and identity of black people in America and also making the connections back toAfrica. I think it will surely be a deep and broad novel that will stand the test of time. Fingers crossed. Iam particularly looking forward to reading a novel by an American author, asthey seem to have dropped of my reading lists of late.

Black Book Swap: 3 March 2012

2012-01-30T21:37:00.000Z

The first ever Black Book Swap event will take place onSaturday 3 March. There will be books to swap, authors to meet: Alex Wheatle;Chibundu Onuzo; Colin Grant; Sonja Lewis & Bim Adewunmi, and also thechance to meet other book lovers and dedicated readers. It’s free! We’re soexcited! We can’t wait! Put this date in your diary now. (Saturday 3 March 2012, 1pm - 5.00pm Cottons Caribbean Restaurant, 70 Exmouth Market, London EC1R 4QP)

Bring a book to swap: whether you loved it and want others toknow that joy; or hated it but cannot bring yourself to bin it, bring it alongand swap it. You are bound to find an exciting read to replace it. Come along andjoin in even if you don’t have a book to swap. Any leftover books will bedonated to charity.

Black Book Swap is free but as places are limited, so bestto reserve a place, email: blackbookswap[at]gmail.com

The authors and writers in conversation at Black Book Swap will be:

Alex Wheatle: Brixton’s Bard has spent theautumn on tour with his one man show Uprising, and that followed thepublication of his third novel, Brenton Brown last summer. Most recently, Alexhas been telling it as it is in articles in The Independent. You can watch Alex talk about his show: Uprising Twitter: @brixtonbard

Sonja Lewis: An American in London, Sonjapublished her novel, The Barreness last April. The book follows a woman’s journey to deciding whether ornot motherhood is for her. A new edition of the book is to be published in theUS in February for Black History Month there, and in the UK in March for Women’sInternational Day.

www.sonjalewis.com

Colin Grant: Best known as an historian, ‘…explainingthe Afrocentric side of Jamaican culture and history to the world,’ Colin’s newbook Bageye at the Wheel (published in April) is a memoir of growing up as oneof the few black families in Luton during the 1970s.

Twitter: @colincraiggrant

Chibundu Onuzo: Only just 21, Chibundu is a thirdyear student at King’s College London. Her first book The Spider King’sDaughter is published this month (March) by Faber. Chibundu is wonderfullytalented writer. The Spider King’s Daughter is about love across the classdivide in Lagos. www.authorsoundsbetterthanwriter.blogspot.com

Twitter: @ChibunduOnuzo

Bim Adewunmi: Journalist and blogger, Bim specialisesin popular culture, feminism and race. She blogs at www.yorubagirldancing.com It wasBim’s tweet to her MP - Diane Abbott – about the media’s lazy description ofthe ‘black community’ that caused the recent twitter storm about divide andrule. Twitter: @bimadew

We felt that it was time to have a black book/literary event. We have been to the literaturefestivals here in London and Hay-on-Wye, we have been to the slams, the salons, thefeatured authors events - all good fun, of course and we’d certainly not want tobe without them. It is just that apart from the splendid African Writers Evenings,London is bit light on gatherings that celebrate black readers and writers.

So a group of us thought we’d have a go ourselves. Alice fromCatch A Vibe www.catchavibe.co.uk/ ; Angela, the founderof the Black Reading Group; Nanette an uber project manager - and myself.Together we have devised Black Book Swap, and it will be taking place inone of London’s long established Caribbean restaurants.

To reserve a place: email

blackbookswap(at)gmail.com

How to get to the Black Book Swap venue:

Cottons, 70 Exmouth Market. EC1R 4QP Map

Buses - 19, 38, 341

Underground Stations Farringdon Tube,10 minutes walk; Angel Tube 11 minutes walk

Railway Stations Farringdon Rail,10 minutes walk King 's Cross Thameslink Railway Station 14 minutes walk

Car Parks near Exmouth Market

Bowling Green Lane NCP, 3 minutes walk Skinner Street NCP, 3 minutes walk

We are grateful for the support and advice from:

Hackney Library Service

Stoke Newington Literary Festival

Wandsworth Libraries

The Bestselling Black Author of 2011

2012-01-15T20:16:00.000Z

The top selling black author of 2011 is Lorraine Pascale.Her first book, Baking Made Easy came in at 41 in the top 100 UK book saleslist. It sold 182,258 copies, and earned her publishers over £1.9m. It was originally priced at £18.99 butmostly sold for £10.60. Here is the review that I did of it back last April: Lorraine Pascale – the only time to be honest, that I have cooked from it.

Lorraine has proved to be the only contender for Jamie’s chefcookbook crown - his book came in at number 2 on the list, generating over £6m.Lorraine’s newest book, published last September, Home Cooking Made Easy, (at no60) has already sold 157,817 copies, and made £1.6m. The recommended price is£20, and it is selling mostly at under £10 per copy – though, as with the first book,it also had a TV tie-in and was of course, published in time for the Christmasgift market.

Interestingly, the only other black author on the top 100 list,is Andrea Levy, for her 2010 Booker long-listed The Long Song. It was publishedon the same day (6 Jan 2011, paperback edition) as Lorraine’s first book, andcame in at number 58, selling 161,466 and making £863,649.92 for herpublishers. These are the figures for both paperback and hardback sales, sowhile it may look as though there is only almost 20k copies in sales differencebetween Andrea’s book and Baking Made Easy, neither of Lorraine’s books are yetavailable in paperback. When they are, this could mean that Lorraine could beon the top sellers list for a long time to come, as generally paperbacks sellmore than hardbacks.

A number of people sent me the link to Catherine Johnson’sComment is Free article from The Guardian – entitled Where are Britain’s Black Writers? In it she laments the lack of profile and drama writing work given toblack authors. Catherine is a published author and a scriptwriter. While Idon’t at all disagree with her messages in the article – in fact I’d go evenfurther to say that there should be more black reviewers and commentatorsacross all topics, I did think that a few things have been overlooked andconflated in her article.

First is about who buys books, and what they buy. As you cansee from the UK’s top 10 list, dead authors, cooking and thrillers/crime inpaperback are what pay. It is this type of work that generates the income thatfund other books’ publication – essentially, what I prefer to read, well-writtenliterary books. Of course many of the readers buying any of the books on thelist will be black, but in the overall scheme of things the collective blackpurchasing power is limited, as well as dispersed.

Catherine cites as garnering more editorial coverage becausethey have white authors, Stephen Kelman’s Pigeon English – long-listed during the yearfor many literary prizes, and the recent Costa Prize new book award winningTiny Sunbirds Far Away by Christie Watson – which was actually published lastMarch, and has hardly been reviewed at all. If we take the Kelman book, its USP was the shocking murder of the youngschool boy Damilola Taylor – which as a nation I don’t think that we will everrecover from. It is probably for this reason that Waterstones picked up on it, promoting it before it was published. The book is about gang culture and so the London Riots fell into itspromotional path (framed as they were as being about marginalised urban youth & race - most of us knew that there were more complex than that), making it seem more topical than it might otherwise have been.Yet, Pigeon English is not on this top 100. Published as it was in the smartmore expensive paperback format, with all that promotion (particularly in thepress) isn’t it surprising that it does not make the top 100 in its first year?It has only just been released in a cheaper paperback format. I wasparticularly disappointed that Catherine’s piece failed to acknowledge what acompetitive world the publishing world is – for anyone. Though I do note that the book that hasdone tremendously well – is Emma Donoghue’s Room (no 4 on the top seller list.) Just like the Kelman book, it too comesfrom a particularly gruesome true story that will live in the collective psychefor a long-time.

I picked up somewhere recently, that it is not actuallyeditorial coverage and book reviews in the smart papers such as The Guardian, The Independent or The Sunday Times that sells book. What sells books in the UK isgetting on BBC Radio 4. High profile, often highly and frustratingly parochial,but as a spoken word radio station, hardly mainstream.

My final point about Catherine’s article relates to thedrama/script writing. I think that when so much of mainstream British TV isdevoted week after week to the pursuit of the untalented, through shows likethe X-Factor. I find it hard to criticise Channel 4 (which is not really amainstream TV station) for supporting new drama writing in one of its highprofile evening slots. It seems to me that even where new drama writing exists,it seems to focus on period pieces – more Downton Abbey anyone? I am sure thatBirdsong (the adaptation of Sebastian’s Faulks’ book) will be great – but it isstill after all another First World War adaptation. As an aside, I reckon thatEsi Edugyan’s Half Blood Blues will be made for TV or filmed before PigeonEnglish, simply because it is partially set in World War 2 (and it is also about Jazz.) I actually believethat Half Blood Blues, with hardly any major newspaper reviews, is a far more successfulbook than Pigeon English. It is a better story, well told and it did make theBooker 2011 shortlist and has won Canada's top literary prize for itsCanadian-Nigerian author. So I guess that I am saying in response to Catherine,is don’t let what is getting editorial coverage blind you to what is actuallybeing read and shared by word of mouth.

The other thing that occurs to me about the top 100 list…not that I actually know about the contents of all the books on the list - butI am going to state this anyway. It occurs to me, that the only book in the top40 with black people in it is Kathryn Stockett’s The Help. At number 5 on thelist, it was originally published in the UK in May 2010, and has sold almost400,000 copies and made just over £2m for the publishers in 2011 (The versionof The Help, that is being calculated here – is the film tie-in edition.) So yes.Maids. Again. As much as I admire the work of the actresses in the film, and Iknow that the wonderful Viola Davis is an Oscar contender, I am however inconflict with the thought that in 2012, the next black actress with a chance ofwinning this major award will have played a maid, over 70 years after HattieMcDaniels won an Oscar for also portraying a maid in Gone with the Wind. Do let me know if you have come across more positiveblack characters in any of the top 40 books on the top UK 2011 book sales list.

Data source: Nielsen via The Guardian

Book Club: Sunday 29 January 2012

2012-01-04T23:11:00.001Z

2012 Black Reading Groups reading year will begin with ToSir With Love by E.R. Braithwaite.The overarching theme of the discussion will be “Is there aBlack British Classic?" We shall meet on Sunday 29 January, 3pm in Waterstones’ Piccadilly (London) branch. Go to the 5^th floor – turn left out ofthe lift and go through the arch, we’ll be at the big round table on the left.

To Sir With Love was originally published in 1959 and sothere will be many editions about, but if you get the 2005 Vintage Classics edition, that would be great, as it has an introduction by the author andprofessor of English, Caryl Phillips. (My review of his latest book Colour Me English.)

What’s it about?

When a woman refuses to sit next to him on the bus. RickBraithwaite is saddened and angered by her prejudice. In post-war cosmopolitanLondon he had hoped for a more enlightened attitude. When he begins his firstteaching job in a tough East End school reactions are the same.

Slowly and painfully some of the barriers are broken down.He shames his pupils, wrestles with them, enlightens them and eventually comesto love them. To Sir With Love is the true story of a dedicated teacher whoturns hate into love, teenage rebelliousness into self-respect, contempt intoconsideration for others – the story of a man’s integrity winning throughagainst all odds.

More about the book To Sir With Love
Wikipedia profile of E.R. Braithwaite
Caryl Phillips essay in Vintage edition of the book
The book covers through the years: To Sir With Love

About the author

E.R. Braithwaite was born in 1922 in British Guiana andeducated there, in the United States. He served in the RAF during World War 2,he attended Cambridge University after the war. His publications include To SirWith Love (1959); Paid Servant: A Report about Welfare Work in London (1962); AKind of Home-Coming: A Visit to Africa (1963); A Choice of Straws (1965) andHonorary White (1975).

Impressions

This is a re-reading of E.R. Braithwaites wonderful book. Icannot even remember when I first read it, though like most people I probablysaw the film 1967 film, with Sidney Poitier, Lulu and Patricia Routledge (film info here) long before I read the book. Reading the book again afters so many years, it isfascinating how much of its issues and messages still resonate (as in remain unresolved) and are in facttotally contemporary. Topics such as education, and most specifically how tokeep young adults engaged in learning. Getting yourcareer started: you have the right the skills, the best qualifications, and thebitter realisation that despite everything that they are never going to hireyou. Workplace politics. Mixed race relationships. It feels as though some issues have hardly changed and weare still talking about the same things. Even the economic phrases last usedpost-war such as ‘austerity times’ are back in vogue now. So most definitely avaluable read for a contemporary audience, particularly those interested insecondary education.

Braithwaite is part of an exclusive West Indian elite (bothhis parents were Oxford graduates, and he attended Cambridge University), asPhillips states in the introductory essay, he was not typical of the WestIndians that would have arrived in the UK during this time. He’s superior andnot easy to like, but his powers of observation are absorbing, through his eyesyou get a complete sense of the exhausted and down at heel East End of London.His skills as a teacher are clever and life changing for both him and hisstudents – at least for the time that they are within in his classroom. Theycome to love him and he they, and most certainly the descriptions and analysisof life in the school with the pupils, and the other teachers is the mostexpressively told and the where the greatest changes are seen. I particularlyenjoyed the first part of the book, and the failed interviews section of thebook is an essay in draining despair. The final sections I found less engaging –less flowing and a bit rushed even.

When I selected this book for the Black Reading Groups' firstread of 2012, I was thinking that To Sir With Love would be one that we could considera classic. I am less sure onre-reading it. I think that the issue is, while I don’t think that a Britishclassic should particularly mirror an American one, I am more clear now, thatmaybe as with say a Zora Neale Hurston or say an Alice Walker, or RichardWright, a Black British classic should say something about black life in theUK. And while To Sir With Lovedoes give us a sense of British life, Braithwaite’s role as the observer of theindigenous Brits, however insightful and beautifully written, says very littleabout how life was for most Black Britons at that time. We have to go elsewherefor that. What do you think? Is there a Black British classic? What should it be about? Looking forwardto the discussion.

50 Black British Books

2012-01-02T18:42:00.000Z

Towardsthe end of last summer I was browsing through my twitter timeline and noticed alink to the 100 African-American must read books. I was incredibly impressed, butnot in the least bit surprised at the breadth of the list, many of which I’dread myself over the years, such has been the power of African-Americanliterature in the UK. I began towonder what a must read Black British book list would look like. I knew that I probablycould be able to get to 100, but with help of friends, I was sure that we’d certainlybe able to get to 50.

Istarted with Jacquie who runs the London Afro-Caribbean Book Club, we shared our lists and we foundthat we’d already arrived at over 40 books, but with duplications of either thesame book, or the same author, but with a different book. A few months later, over dinner with Angela,the founder of the Black Reading Group, (the 12-year old reading group that Inow co-ordinate and our friend Sasha, we fine-tuned the list and found that we had indeedarrived at 50 published books. Finally, I sent the list to the author, FionaJoseph (Fiona’s biography of the philanthropist Beatrice Cadbury is nowavailable ), and with her contributions, the project moved into getting the list back downto 50. Together I think that weare a formidable and knowledgeable group of commentators on literaturegenerally, and Black British literature in particular.

My originalidea for inclusion to the list is: one book - one author, published by a UK-basedpublishing company. No anthologies or compilations. It did not have to be literary fiction, but it had to be thewritten word, so plays, poetry, biographies, even academic publications areincluded, but no photography books, for example. [The African American list thatI had seen was primarily literary fiction.]

Asindicated, we found that we had selected the same author, but often a differentbook. So blame me if you don’t see your favourite book here, often I have optedfor the prize winning book, for example Andrea Levy’s Small Island, (32) ratherthan my favourite – Every Light in the House Burnin’; Dreda Say Mitchell’s celebratedfirst book Running Hot, (42), won the top crime writers fiction award, and Ben Okri’s Booker prize winning The FamishedRoad 36, even though in both the latter cases their more recent work would be consideredthe much more admired of their work. In other instances, my co-workers on theproject, made such strong cases, and so I have I stuck with that selection,which is why, for example, Aminatta Forna’s first book (18), the memoir abouther father appears here, rather than the more recent, Commonwealth prizewinning, Memory of Love.

Thelist spans over 200 years. I’d heard of Oladiuah Equiano’s book (15) – theoldest on the list, first published in 1789, (and I look forward to ChikeUnigwe’s biography of him that will be published later this year), but I onlycame across Mary Prince’s book (41), published in 1831, as I was researchingthis list. Alex Wheatle’s sequel to Brixton Rock, Brenton Brown (46) is thenewest title on the list as it was published last spring.

Iam not really a theatre goer, I prefer film, and while I have seen Debbie TuckerGreen (45) and Roy Williams’ (48) work performed, it is thanks to Jacquie, thatthe selection of playwrights is as full as it is here. On the other hand, I ameternally grateful to who ever it was in my East Anglian home town who in thelate 80s and early 90s funded a series of evening presentations by BlackBritish poets, the result is that I am happily able to include on the list JeanBinta Breeze (7), James Berry (6), Linton Kwesi Johnson (29) and Fred D’Aguiar(12) based on their memorable performances, talks and chance to buy their booksa couple of decades ago.

Manyon the list you may wonder are they still writing? This where are they nowsection of the list includes: Buchi Emecheta (14), Diran Adebayo (1), VictorHeadly (23) and Patrick Augustus (4). Others, I imagine will always be on listssuch as this: Zadie Smith (44), Andrea Levy (32), or Caryl Phillips (38). Atthe same time those that sell huge amounts Malorie Blackman (8), Mike Gayle(19),Dorothy Koomson (27) & Benjamin Zephaniah (50) are critical to this list,as their work is so widely read. I would say that the ones to watch are HelenOyeyemi (37), Yvvette Edwards (13), Nadifa Mohamed (34) & Diana Evans (16)– and I am looking forward to seeing future work of theirs. Though the authorsI admire most are the ones who also take the time to nurture and encourageothers, while still creating their own work, Courttia Newland (34), NiiAyikiwei (5), Alex Wheatle (46) and Bernadine Evaristo (17). I can imagine how hard it would havebeen trying to get published in George Lamming (30) and Sam Selvon’s (43) days -incredible works, that define the Caribbean experience in 1940s & ‘50sLondon, but even harder to create the book that Doreen Lawrence (31) has doneabout the murder of her son Stephen. As I write this, the jury is deliberatingit’s decision – 14 years after the crime was committed. Doreens’s book describes her life inrural Jamaica and her early married life in the London of the 70s and it is so beautifullywritten.

LikeDoreen, Oona King (26) is not strictly a writer, but I have included her book here, not only because I thougt that she was a very goodhardworking MP, but because this book is an honest look at the demanding area Britishpolitics at national and local level during the Blair years. As with theDoreen’s book, Oona also details the very private areas of her personal lifetoo.

Ihope that you will agree that this is a rich and varied list, spanning over 200years of Black British writing. You might not agree with some of the selectionshere, and I may well have omitted authors you think should have been included.I am not saying that this is only list or that they are the best - though I dothink that many here are, I am just thinking that the collation and sharing ofa Black British literature cannon is important and we should make more effortto discuss it and let people know that it exists. I believe that this set ofbooks should be available in all public libraries. What do you think?

Here are the 50 books in alphabetical order, with links mostly to Amazon and the earliest edition of the book that I could find. On some occasions the link will be to Wikipedia or some other interesting article that I found about the author and their work.

1. Diran Adebayo: Some Kind of Black

2. Sade Adendrine: Imagine This

3. Bola Agbaje:Not Black & White

4. Patrick Augustus: Baby Father

5. Nii Ayikiwei Parkes: Tail of the Blue Bird

6. James Berry: When I Dance

7. Jean Binta Breeze: Riddim Ravings & Other Poems

8. Malorie Blackman: Noughts & Crosses

9. E.R. Braithwaite: To Sir With Love

10. Constance Briscoe: Ugly

11. David Dabydeen: Black British History

12. Fred D’Aguiar: Bill of Rights

13. Yvvette Edwards: A Cupboard Full of Coats

14. Buchi Emecheta: The Joys of Motherhood

15. Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Narrative & Other Stories

16. Diana Evans: 26a

17. Bernadine Evaristo: Blonde Roots

18. Aminatta Forna: The Devil That Danced on Water

19. Mike Gayle: Brand New Friend

20. Beryl Gilroy: Black Teacher

21. Paul Gilroy: There Ain’t No Black in The Union Jack

22. Colin Grant:Negro with a Hat: Marcus Garvey

23. Victor Headley: Yardie

24. C.L.R. James: The Black Jacobins

25. Jackie Kay: Trumpet

26. Oona KinG: Oona King Diaries: House Music

27. Dorothy Koomson: The Cupid Effect

28. Kwame Kwei-Armah:Statement of Regret/Elmina’s Kitchen

29. Linton Kwesi Johnson: Tings an’ Times

30. George Lamming: The Emigrants

31. Doreen Lawrence: And Still I Rise

32. Andrea Levy: Small Island

33. E.A. Markham:Hinterland

34. Nadifa Mohamed: Black Mamba Boy

35. Courttia Newland: The Scholar: A West Side Story

36. Ben Okri: The Famished Road

37. Helen Oyeyemi: The Icarus Girl

38. Caryl Phillips: A Distant Shore

39. Trevor & Mike Phillips: Windrush: The Irresistible Rise of Multi-Racial Britain

40. Hannah Pool: My Father’s Daughter

41. Mary Prince: The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave

42. Dreda Say MiTchell: Running Hot

43. Sam Selvon: The Lonely Londoners

44. Zadie Smith: White Teeth

45. Debbie TuckerGreen: Random

46. Alex Wheatle:Brenton Brown

47. Precious Williams: Precious

48. Roy Williams: Starstruck

49. Gary Younge: No Place Like Home

50. Benjamin Zephaniah: Refugee Boy

Looking ahead to 2012

2011-12-04T19:11:00.001Z

Read real books!

I did this look ahead piece for the Dec/Jan (Hot in 2012) issue of Lime magazine.

This bookyear has been the year of the Kindle; so many people are now reading booksthrough this new medium. It’s been fascinating to see readers around Londonengrossed in their misty grey screens. I am sure that Kindles will be underthousands of Christmas trees this year. So far, I have not succumbed, mostlybecause I genuinely believe that books are such beautiful things, I am notready to give up that tactile sensuality. A Kindle makes all books feel thesame; going back to old books always bring back such wonderful memories. Icannot imagine that you get the same experience with a Kindle. Kindles are saidto give access to millions of books, but I do wonder if the books that I reallyreally want would be there. In contrast to the anonymity of Kindle books, I amoverjoyed to see how many more publishers are giving careful thought to howbooks look, and are designing whole collections to be evermore gorgeous. I hopethat will continue.

Looking aheadto the 2012, it seems that every moment there are literary prizes or bookawards of some sort. One that is hardly mentioned is the Commonwealth prizes – thereis a book award and a short story award. These are highly competed forworld-wide awards that raises entries from fifty four nations across 4continents. For 2012 I am reassured to see that the judges include writersBernadine Evaristo, Nii Ayikwei Parkes, Kei Williams, and publishers BillyKahora and Margaret Busby. This is an excellent selection of judges who reallyunderstand both writers and what people want to read. The application deadlineshave just closed and the winners for both awards will be announced next June.
More information here: Commonwealth Prize

MargaretBusby is also the chair of judges for the newly launched SI Leeds LiteraryPrize for Black and Asian women. It will be awarded in October for anunpublished work of fiction. Supported by the Peepal Tree Press, the Leedsbased publishers of Black British & Caribbean works, the first prize is tobe £2,000.
More information here: SI Leeds Literary Prize

Lizzy Attreebecame the chief administrator of The Caine Prize this summer. The prizeawarded for a published short story to an African writer has proved a signifierof quality writing and many of today’s star names have either won or beenshortlisted for the Caine prize. It will be interesting to see how Lizzy takesthe prize into its next phase of evolution, celebrating the depth and breadthof African fine writing. The Caine Prize is awarded in July. More information here: The Caine Prize

I did not getto enough book events this year, but I heard good things about the LewishamLiterary Festival, I hope that they get the funding for another festival in2012.
More information here: Lewisham Literary Festival

One event Idid get to was the first ever public reading by Chibundu Onuzo. Still a historystudent at King’s College, London, Chibundu’s book The Spider King’s Daughter will be published by Faber & Faber in March.
Follow: Chibundu’s blog

Founded in1970, the book shop, community centre and café, Centrprise in Dalston, isfighting for survival. Hackney Council is seeking to terminate the lease on itsbuilding. Centrerpise runs the Word Power books events and also hosts a seriesof readings and other literary events about throughout the year. For aninternational city of its size London is not exactly flush with bookshops forblack and ethnic minority groups. It will be such a shame if we loseCenterprise.
Sign the petition here: Save Centerprise

Interview with Lola Shoneyin

2011-11-14T21:33:00.001Z

Terribly excited to have had Lola Shoneyin answer my questions. She is the author of The Secrets of Baba Segi’s Wives, which the Black Reading Group throughly enjoyed reading and talking about back in August. Lola is based inAbuja, but will be in London for the TEDxEuston event at the end of this month. Unsurprisingly this popular event is now sold out, but you can join the waitinglist: info TEDxEuston.

Why did youdecide to write about polygamy?

The novel is based on a true story that I heardwhen I was fourteen. My brother’s girlfriend, a medical doctor, saw the episodeunfold. She was there when a wealthy middle-aged man dragged his new,university-educated wife to hospital to find a solution to her barrenness. Iwas intrigued by the drama of it all and thought it would make a great stageplay. Fast forward twenty years, I needed a new project when I couldn’t find apublisher for my second unpublished novel. I wanted something fresh andexciting that I could really get my teeth into. The story of Baba Segi and hiswives was perfect. It was fairly easy to write because I had a lot of materialfrom the stories my mother told me about the polygamous home she grew up in.Polygamy is all around you in Nigeria. I don’t know a lot of people of mygeneration whose grandfather’s weren’t polygamists.

How have the partnersor children of such marriages/partnerships responded to the book?

The general reaction to the novel has been wonderful. Onelady (who is a daughter of a very prominent Nigerian polygamist) did argue thatbecoming a co-wife is ‘better than living as an unmarried whore’. Suchstatements, especially from women, demonstrate an attitude that I can only politelydescribe as defeatist. Many of the invasive cultural practices, though probablyimposed by patriarchal thinking, are enforced and supported by women. Itembarrasses me when the ‘enlightened’ women of my generation make statementsthat limit and diminish women. Conversely, women often write to me to thank mefor writing their stories. Some say they are amazed by the similarities betweenmy portrayal of Baba Segi’s household and the homes that they grew up in. Thenovel continues to be very well-received in Nigeria and I am very pleased aboutthis.

Why did youprefer to explore this issue in a book, rather than poetry?

It’s funny you should ask thatbecause I have realized that I have done exactly that and have for a while,albeit subconsciously, nursed strong views about polygamy. In my firstcollection of poems, So All the Time IWas Sitting on an Egg (1997) there’s a long narrative poem titled, ‘YouDidn’t Know’, where a first wife addresses the folly of a new wife who has justjoined the family. A few months ago, I found a journal that I kept in 1988, theyear that I read Soyinka’s The Lion and the Jewel. I wrote how much I despisedBaroka, the village chief who used his influence and wealth to entrap the mostbeautiful damsels.

I thought thatone of the strongest themes in the book is the role of the mother/motherhood,you explore that in a variety of ways, why that particular focus?

I have had a somewhat troubled relationship with my motherfor most of my life. It’s amazing how much you learn about yourself during thedrawn-out process of writing a novel. I wanted to explore the complexity ofmother/ daughter relationships and how the nature of these relationships canhave devastating consequences for young girls approaching womanhood. Severaltypes of mothers are represented in the novel.

Do you have afavorite section of the book?

I have a few sections that are dear to me but thoseare not the parts that I read at book events because they are way too sad.Writing them took a lot out of me. I had to dig deep and go to some very dark areasof my consciousness.

The book had 3different covers, which was your favorite and why?

The book has had seven differentcovers and that’s a very difficult question to answer, given the hard work thatthe publishers put into creating the different covers for the differentmarkets. I love them all when theyare newly published. I also go through phases. Right now, I’m loving the coverof the Hebrew edition. I like the clean white background and the colourfulheadgear that adorns the silhouette of a mysterious black woman. It’s out thismonth and it’s just beautiful.

Were youinvolved in the decision to change the title for the US edition?

I was taken aback when my publishers told me theywanted to change the title because some people thought having ‘Baba Segi’ inthe title might be a put-off. Idecided to go with the experts. I love the name Segi. It’s not a modern name.It’s an old name like Gertrude or Beryl and to a Yorube person, it reflects thebackground of the main characters.

In the BlackReading Group book club discussion in August, most people were sympathetic toBaba Segi, does that fit with the response you have had elsewhere?

Yes, readers start off hating him and by the end ofthe novel, they find themselves feeling sorry for him. I adore Baba Segibecause he is such a devoted father to the children in his household. He’s abit of a dinosaur but that’s because he knows no better.

Do you have afavorite character?

Yes, I really enjoyed writing Iya Femi. Life dealt hersome pretty awful cards but she took the world on with the every nerve in herbody. I like a fighter.

Might you useany of the characters in future books?

Possibly.The novel I’m writing now is very different to Baba Segi. It’s set in Abuja,where I live at the moment and the characters are from a slightly differentworld.

What is your ideal writing environment?

I write on my bed. Iam one of those people who can live their entire lives in their bedrooms. Ithink it’s a habit I picked up at university. I love my bedroom and wherever Iam, it has to be a space that I am content with. I am happy when I can see mybed and even happier when I can lie on it. I do all my writing on my bed. Ilike leaning against the headboard, lying on my belly with my torso supportedby three pillows but my favourite position is kneeling on a pillow on the floorwith the laptop on bed. I can go hours.

What books did you enjoy as a child/teenager?

I readall sorts but like most girls growing up in Nigeria, I read Mills and Boonnovels. There were short novels called Pacesetters authored by Africans but Iwas a voracious reader and there weren’t enough of them to sustain my appetite.There were loads of M&Bs though and I read them at the rate of one a dayfor nearly two years. After a while, I just kind of outgrew them. In my earlyteens however, there were three books that I read over and over again: My Father’s Daughter by Mabel Segun, The Children of Ananse by Peggy Appiahand So Long a Letter by Mariama Ba.

What book do you wish you had written?

Sula by Toni Morrison.

What’s your favourite book?

Sula is my favouritebook. It explores human imperfection with sensitivity. I have always been drawn to tragicheroes. I also admire writing that captures human frailty, our flaws, ourappetite for excess. I pay tribute to Sula in The Secret Wives of Baba Segi’s Wives.

What are you reading now?

A Little Bit Marvellousby Dawn French. I love Dawn French. She makes me laugh so hard. What a greatgift that is, to be able to make people laugh.

Which otherwriters inspire you?

John Steinbeck, Margaret Atwood, Ishmael Reed.

Did you study writing?

I studied literature atuniversity and did a course or two in creative writing and I am privileged tohave attended the Iowa InternationalWriting Programme in 1999. They’d just revived the programme that year so alongwith the other fellows, I spent six weeks touring various American states andstayed at the University of Iowa for about ten days. It was an incredibleexperience but I didn’t actually ‘study’ writing. I was at some point desperate to go somewhere,anywhere for a substantial amount of time I don’t have the luxury of leaving myfamily for anything more than a few days.

What would you say to encourage new writers?

Embrace your life’sexperiences with enthusiasm and engage rigorously with your chosen genre.

What are you working on now?

SomethingI really like. There’s a lot going on in Nigeria at the moment. The Abuja I live in used to be a safe haven,but is now making the headlines for all the wrong reasons- bomb blast andreligious extremism. Slowly, life as we know it in Nigeria is disappearing. Ifind it tragic that people can just plod on, settling into a permanent feelingof dread.

You are going to be in the UK in November for TEDx Euston inNovember, what are looking forward to most when you are here?

I attended a Ted Talkin London a year ago and I’ve always been a huge fan. I’m getting ready to listeningto co-speakers- a few of which are my friends. What an incredible line-up!

What book wouldyou recommend for the Black Reading Group [We have read JM Coetzee, Tendai Hucbu,Jackie Kay, EC Osondu, Maggie Gee, Chike Unigwe, Amanda Craig, Toni Morrison.We are about to do Zadie Smith’s essay’s; then new Binyavanga Wainaina, and theFrench Algerian writer Faiza Guene.]

This is a really difficult one as I have a few pals onthis list you’ve presented me with. As a cop-out, I would suggest ToniMorrison’s Song of Solomon. Pirate isone of my favourite characters of all time but then I’d recommend ChikaUnigwe’s On Black Sisters’ Street. Itmight be interesting to read two Nigerian books and look at the similaritiesand differences, to get a broader understanding of the country. To develop arobust understanding of the continent, you would also enjoy Pettina Gappah’s collectionof stories.

What question should I have asked you, and what is theanswer?

Question:How are you finding Twitter?

Answer: Wndrfl.

An editedversion of this interview will be published in the Dec/Jan edition of Limemagazine.

Book Review: You Are Not Alone: Michael Through A Brother's Eyes

2011-11-13T20:44:00.001Z

This review of You Are Not Alone: Michael Through A Brother's Eyes by Jermaine Jackson appears in the November edition of Lime magazine:

Like that quote ‘It is too soon to say’, regularly attributed to the impact of the French Revolution, it feels too soon for a definitive study of Michael Jackson. What this book, by elder brother Jermaine, does is to draw a line on what the family wants to say. The thing is that most of us grew up with Michael, and while we adored him for so long, there were many years when we desperately wanted to avert our eyes. The early years in Gary, Indiana, joining Motown, followed by a roll call of stars, such as Marvin Gaye, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, is fascinating and well described in this ghost written tome.

I had not known that Michael was a deeply committed Jehovah’s Witness. Surprised though that things you want to understand from the Jackson family perspective are skated over. Michael’s striking change of features and skin colour is barely discussed, certainly not analysed in any meaningful way. The business of befriending a monkey is presented as ‘everyday.’ This attitude makes sense, when you later learn that Jermaine had a pet Bengali Tiger he would take on tour.

This is a book for the fan, one that believes that Michael could no wrong. And to paraphrase the Motown mantra, the only thing that really matters ‘is what’s in the groove.’

Here are my more detailed thoughts on the book:

I'd had no indication that this book was coming out until the publishers asked if I'd like to see it. While I am these days an armchair clubber, just watching those 80s music channels on TV, I have always admired Michael Jackson going back to the days of The Jackson 5 cartoon programme that used to show on Saturday mornings - well before Saturday morning TV as we now know it.

It is a bit of a brick of a book, but then again Michael's career lasted for almost 4 decades. I thought it would be an interesting read, as the biographies I've read this year have been about musicians (Bob Marley & the Wailers, and Shirley Bassey) I am not a reader of biographies particularly, but I found those ones fascinating and they generated deep and illuminating discussions at book club. What I had not really considered is that in effect this Michael Jackson book is in fact a memoir - all be it a ghost written one. Where as the authors of the biographies Colin Grant (I&I The Natural Mystics) and John L Williams (Miss Shirley Bassey) write as impartial historians trying to set their subjects in a wider context, and mindful of their imperfections, Jermaine is emotionally involved and Michael comes across as a kind of music messiah, that he helped to nurture from the moment he was born. Some family members are rarely mentioned and when they are, it is about making Michael look good or sensitive.

As I read it, I did continuously wonder 'What would Michael say?' Would this particular story be important to him or would he have placed another emphasis on it? As someone of a post-Windrush fractured family, I have siblings who grew up on another continent, and so I could not begin to tell their stories. And even the sibling that I did grow up with, we'd probably tell our stories in such completely different ways you'd not imagine we came from the same place. So this is much more Jermaine's story than it is Michael's. It is about setting out the Jackson family line before many others begin to do so - other members of the family included. I write this at the end of the week when Michael's doctor was sentenced for manslaughter, and the family may yet go on to take civil action against him. When you consider that the family has sold music rights to a record company to publish Michael's music for seven new albums over the next decade, then there is an awful lot to protect.

I felt that the early life in Gary, Indiana,(9 children and parents in a 2-bed home) and the chitlin circuit touring days was well told. Though the touring days may not be a surprise to you if you have already read the stories or seen the bio-pic films of other early to mid-20th century jazz or R&B musicians.

The first few chapters are on the lives of the parents, majoring on the father Joe. Jermaine argues that he's not trying to write an apology for Joe, who is well known as a tough disciplinarian, he does though try to protect and clean up his reputation. I felt that while I better understood where Joe came from, in the end there is nothing that can hide the fact that he bullied and battered his kids for years.

I really enjoyed Jermaine's name dropping: Smokey Robinson, Jackie Wilson Lionel Ritchie & the Commodores, Gladys Knight, Diana Ross, Bob Marley, Stevie Wonder and many others have 'walk on' parts. Motown's founder Berry Gordy's approach to business at a time just before and after he took on the Jacksons was quite mesmerising, particularly in terms of how he built up a story and anticipation around the boys and their growing fan base. Keen Jackson fans will already know that Jermaine's first wife was Gordy's adored daughter. I was totally un-impressed by Jermaine's perving about Whitney Houston, he's not a gentleman. I also thought that he was far too harsh on the music producer Quincy Jones describing him as 'a mechanic' to Michael's genius.

I was not so involved in the second part of the book, finding it a bit of a chore, mainly because Michael's not really there. I guess, that Jermaine was not part of Michael's life during this time. To me it feels like it has been crafted from newspaper cuttings or personal papers since his death.

The end of Lime review seems glib on re-reading, I was struggling to make sense of a big book in 200 words. I don't subscribe to the notion that stars are better than us 'ordinary' folk, or even that they are nice people. Michael was a musical genius and performer, but by 2009 his best years were behind him. Even worse than that he'd been shown, whatever the results of the court cases, to be an extremely flawed man. However, in my opinion the music is and will always be phenomenal. It is what's in the groove (the music) that counts.

As I said in the Lime review, you really have to be a keen Jackson fan to really want plough through this book. The publishers (Harper Collins) have done a fine job with the publication. The dust jacket shows Michael with much of his face hidden, when you take the dust jacket off he stares out moodily on the front cover, on the back he's larking around, while on the inside back of the dust jacket his arms are spread wide in that iconic end of performance pose. Beautiful. An index to the book would have been good though.

Book Club: Sunday 27 November 2011

2011-11-06T23:03:00.002Z

The November meeting will be on Sunday 27 at 3pm at Waterstones' Piccadilly branch. We will be in the 5th Floor restaurant.

Bar Balto is a whodunnit set in Making-Ends Meet, a dead end town too far from Paris. Joel, AKA 'The Rink' (because he's so bald you could skate on it), the unpopular owner of the only bar in town, has been murdered. When he is found, stark naked, punctured with multiple stab wounds and surrounded by rivers of blood, it's not so much a question of who did kill him as who didn't. His customers have plenty of motives.

In a series of riveting monologues, the locals tell us their stories of what they did on the night of the murder. There's Magalie, the teenage girl obsessed with Paris Hilton who talks text speak. Tani her boyfriend, a troublemaker who has dropped out of college. Madame Yeva, his mother who has to endure Joel's lecherous gaze when she buys her fags at the bar. Jacko, her unemployed gambling daytime-TV addicted husband. Young, their younger son, who has learning difficulties but perfect memory recall, and newcomers. Ali and Nadia, the Muslim twins from Marseille, who are struggling to fit in. As the tension mounts and we're still none the wiser, the ending - in the form of Joel's macabre, posthumous confession - is as tragic as it is unexpected.

Faïza Guène flexes her signature wit, ear for real voices and commitment to 'ordinary lives' giving us the human tales that lie behind unthinking everyday prejudice and racism. Bar Balto is a rollicking murder-mystery set in the gritty here and now.

Review in The Guardian Saturday 1 January 2011

Slight but engaging, the third novel from this young French-Algerian writer is set in Making-Ends-Meet, a shabby suburb on the outskirts of Paris full of barrack-like homes for citizens who are very definitely "other ranks". The owner of the eponymous bar is so unpopular that, when he is found stabbed to death, there are plenty of suspects. Along with the corpse himself, they tell their stories in a series of monologues, and this is where Guène, with the help of an excellent translation by Ardizzone, really shines. Her boys and girls of Generation X-Factor, obsessed with trash culture and hopelessly deluded about everything from their prospects to their attractiveness, are dead-on accurate. Older characters, disappointed by the hand life has dealt them, are equally good. No one listens to anyone else, and the various immigrant groups are as suspicious of each other as they are of the indigenous population. All this adds up to a marvellous kaleidoscope – it's just a shame that the solution verges on the implausible.

About the Author

Faïza Guène was born in France in 1985 to Algerian parents. She wrote her first novel Just Like Tomorrow, when she was seventeen years old. It was a huge success in France, selling over 360,000 copies and translation rights round the world, and was shortlisted for the Young Minds Book Award 2006 and longlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2007. Her second book was Dreams from the Endz.

The Translator

Sarah Aroizzdone won the Scott Moncrieff Prize in 2007 for Faïza Guène's first novel Just Like Tomorrow, with English PEN recommending her translation of Dreams for the Endz in 2008. She has a special interest in translating urban slang, after living in an Algerian quarter of Marseille. Sarah is also twice winner of the Marsh Award for Children's Literature in Translation.

Interviews with the author

April 2006 Interview from The Observer

May 2006 Interview from The Guardian

What they say about the book

A gripping, disturbing and hilarious whodunnit set in a Parisian suburb, from the young, French-Algerian star.

A NATURAL NOVELIST, a young writer of real talent.
Alan Massie, Scotsman

Super-Young Super Cool and fast becoming known as one of the HOTTEST LITERARY TALENTS of multicultural Europe.
Sunday Telegraph

First Thoughts

It has been some time since the reading group read a translation from Europe. In 2009 we really enjoyed Paris based, Marguerite Abouet's Aya of Yop City as a summer read. Set in the Ivory Coast, it showed the every day concerns of ordinary people in the Marguerite's homeland. Abouet's book is a beautiful graphic novel, so this actually means the only (continental) European based novel we've read recently [in Jan 2010] is Chika Unigwe's On Black Sisters' Street (set in Belgium) which was originally published in Dutch.

I'd actually wanted to plot in the 2009 Prix Goncourt winner Marie NDiaye's book Three Women, but it seems that publication in English is still not due until well into next year.

I am though looking forward to reading, Bar Balto, Faïza Guène's third book. Still only in her mid-twenties, she writes of the lives of people living in Paris' northern suburbs - the banlieues. It's a community of people from largely North Africa and other French people of colour. Faïza's family background is Algerian, and as France goes to election next year with an incumbent President not known for his sensitivities in race relations, it will be an interesting time to consider how a young writer considers race and identity in the French context.

The translator did a lot of work around matching the styles of more informal styles of French speech in English. She carried out live readings in English, testing out her translations with young south Londoners, thus the speech styles of northern Paris, is rendered Brixton style. It has also been a while since we read an intentionally funny book, or even a murder mystery, so much room for a lively discussion on 27 November.

Interview with Fiona Joseph

2011-10-30T21:13:00.000Z

Fiona Joseph contacted me after I reviewed NicoleMoore’s Hair Power Skin Revolution anthology in June 2010, in which she hadcontributed one of the short stories. It touched a chord with me. We havestayed in contact via Twitter ever since. I am really pleased to be able totalk to her about her forthcoming biography of Beatrice Cadbury. Fiona's work is a true labourof love that allows us to understand Beatrice, a heiress who gave allher money away in order to live a life that made her feel more true to herself.

Why did you decide to write about BeatriceCadbury?

Icame across Beatrice’s story quite by chance after chatting to a Dutch businessclient who mentioned that he used to teach at the experimental ‘Werkplaats’School in the Netherlands. “Perhaps you’ve heard of it,” he said. “It’s ratherfamous here. Our present queen went there as a little girl in the 1950s.” Ihadn’t heard of it(!) but a quick Google search told me that the school,founded in Bilthoven in the 1920s, was the idealistic venture of animpoverished married couple – a Dutchman named Kees Boeke and his English wifeBetty Boeke (nee Cadbury). At that point I idly wondered if Betty was in anyway related to the famous Cadbury family of my home town, Birmingham. With thehelp of my local librarian I established that Betty Boeke was not just any oldCadbury, but in fact the youngest daughter of Richard Cadbury, who togetherwith his brother George had created the chocolate empire at Bournville.

ButI was puzzled. Some of the facts didn’t square with my preconceptions of how a(presumably) rich heiress would be living in the 1920s. Why wasBeatrice, her husband and their eight young children living a hand-to-mouthexistence in a remote Dutch town, rather than enjoying a comfortable,privileged lifestyle within the bosom of the Cadbury family in Birmingham? Hada family feud cut Beatrice out of her father’s will? (Admittedly, that didn’tsound very Quaker-like.) The truth, I eventually discovered, was even moreamazing than I had anticipated. Beatrice was poor by her own volition: she hadchosen to give all her Cadbury shares ‘back’ to the Cadbury workers. She couldno longer reconcile her vast personal wealth with all the poverty andinequality she saw around her. It was a bold and completely unique way ofaddressing what she saw as the evils of capitalism.

Somy book, Beatrice: The Cadbury heiress who gave awayher fortune, is the story of a rich and respectableentrepreneur’s daughter who turned her back on her privileged lifestyle topursue her own vision of a fair and equal society – not so much rags-to-richesas riches-to-rags.

I am publishing the book under my own imprint, Foxwell Press. It’ll be available as aKindle version first, on or before 1 December, followed by a limited printedition. In the New Year it will be available globally via Amazon as well as toorder in bookshops.

Beatrice Cadbury as a child

What are the plans to promote the book?

For the last eighteen months I’ve been giving talksabout Beatrice in libraries, at Women’s Institute and University of the ThirdAge (U3A) groups, on local radio,and the Greenbelt festival. I havemore events scheduled now and in the New Year. People I’ve met have beenfascinated by Beatrice’s story and have already been helping me to spread theword. I hope her story will resonate very powerfully as it finds a wider audience.

Tell us a little bit more about Beatrice?

Beatrice (LittleB) was born in 1884 in Birmingham and was the last of Richard Cadbury’s eightchildren. Her upbringing was pretty much what you’d expect for the daughter ofa wealthy Victorian entrepreneur: fine mansions with servants, extensive travelaround the world, a well-rounded education. At the same time however herfather’s philanthropic and charity work exposed her to the ‘have-nots’ insociety. She and her Dutch husband Kees Boeke actively campaigned against theFirst World War and he was arrested and deported back to Holland, so Beatriceand their children settled there where she and Kees became peace activists.Both of them suffered spells in prison for refusing to pay their tax in protestagainst government spending on arms. Her decision to give away her fortune leftthe family destitute and appalled her Cadbury relatives back home inBirmingham.

Is there much information about her?

When I started my research there was very littleabout Beatrice to be found in the UK. The best sources were at BirminghamCentral Library, the Bournville archives, Woodbrooke Study Centre and theBritish Library. I knew however there was a large archive of personal documents,which had been donated by one of Beatrice’s daughters to an institute inAmsterdam. I successfully applied for permission to access the archive and tooka trip to the Netherlands to continue my research.

Howdid you decide what to leave out?

I knew I didn't want a very bloated book withfootnotes and an index. So I have a bibliography and will add more extensivenotes online if there is demand. An early decision was to end the main story of her life in the 1950s(Beatrice died in 1976) and then to summarise the rest of her life in apostscript – a bit like the notes you sometimes get at the end of a TV biopic,which I always find strangely poignant.

Were her living relatives supportive of thebook?

Many of the living relatives in Birmingham knew alittle about their radical ancestor but were apologetic for not being able tocontribute anecdotes or information. With help I eventually tracked down one ofher daughters in the Netherlands (one of only two who is still living). She is91 and she wrote me a wonderful letter wishing me luck for the task I had setmyself. We subsequently spoke on the phone – we had quite a jolly chat and shesaid she trusted me not to write a salacious book!

Do you have a favourite section of the book?

Good question and tricky to answer. My favourite partis when some readers may begin to lose sympathy with Beatrice and her ideals.She really did take her convictions to the extreme! But the final quarter ofthe book turns around when she realises she has to compromise. My editor and anotherearly reader confessed to feeling quite emotional when reading the final linesof the book.

Did you find yourself in any surprisingsituations or conversations when researching the book?

I took a trip (call it a pilgrimage) to Bilthoven andfound myself outside Beatrice’s former home. As luck would have it the presentowner was outside and after I introduced myself he said, “Would you like tocome inside and take some photographs?” That was an unexpected delight and areal highlight of my research.

Which biographers do you admire and why?

Margaret Forster's biography of Daphne du Maurier isexemplary: clear and lucid prose; sympathetic without being blinded to hersubject's faults. It's a very intimate portrait of a troubled person withoutbeing in the least bit sensationalist. I am also inspired by Clare Mulley’sbiography of Eglantyne Jebb who founded the charity Save the Children, whichtells the story of how a woman who was not even fond of children became anindefatigable campaigner for children’s human rights.

What is your ideal writing environment?

In my fantasy world I'm in solitude, probably on awriter's retreat in spartan surroundings. The reality is that I'm a partner,mum, a businesswoman and an engaged public citizen so I’d feel guilty aboutdisappearing for days on end. When things get too chaotic I go for a couple ofhours to my local church hall. But usually I work in my office, flittingbetween tasks quite happily and wouldn't have it any other way. I try not toget too precious about my writing space or equipment. The flip side is I canNEVER find a pen when I want one.

You run your own publishing business, tell usabout that?

My partner Peter Travis and I set up Flo-Joe in 2000to write and publish online resources for students learning English as aForeign Language (EFL). Our website gets between one and two million page viewsper month. Flo-Joe is my day job. I adore being my own boss and I can honestlysay we have some of the nicest customers! The best part is when students writeto us on results day to tell us they’ve passed their EFL exams. There’s nogreater buzz. I have started writing stories for this audience too (languagelearner fiction) so it all ties in very nicely.

Did you study writing?

I started with a writing class at my local AdultEducation centre in 2003, which was great for learning the basic craft elementsof writing: plot, characterisation, setting, theme, point of view, style, etc.In addition I read just about every craft book I could get my hands on.

My all-time favourites are:

Self-editingfor Fiction Writers by Renni Browne/Dave King

TheArt of Fiction by John Gardner (although it’s pretty daunting forthe writer starting out.)

TheArvon Book of Life Writing by Sally Cline and Carole Angier.

TheArt and Craft of Poetry by Michael Bugeja (also usefulfor short stories)

Then in 2008, following a (very kind) rejection for apoem from a local magazine, I enrolled on a Graduate Diploma in Writing atBirmingham City University and graduated earlier this year. I met some greatwriting partners, received sound editorial advice from my tutors and learned totake my writing much more seriously. If you can’t afford the time and money tocommit to a course I'd say look at writers’ blogs. There’s plenty offree-available advice out there too.

What book do you wish you had written?

Eats,Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss. Who would havethought a book on punctuation would be a runaway success?

What’s your favourite book?

TheHouse of Stairs by Barbara Vine remains my comfort reading – theliterary equivalent of being snuggled under the duvet with a mug of cocoa. Notthat it's a comfortable read. On the contrary it's a dark psychological thriller,very loosely based on the plot of Henry James' The Wings of the Dove. It’s not awhodunnit or even a whydunnit,but more of a who-did-what-to-whom-and-why. When you reach the breathtakingdenouement you realise just how skillfully you’ve been misdirected! Thecharacters are very carefully and lovingly drawn. So too is the 1960s NottingHill setting – you can almost smell the cannabis wafting from the pages as youread. All this along with plenty of epigrammatic observations from thenarrator, make it pretty much my perfect book.

What are you reading now?

When I was little, my mum used to say, “How can youpossibly read three books atthe same time?” I haven’t changed – if anything I’m even worse! I usually havefour or five books on the go and I pick whichever suits my mood.

So, on my Kindle I’m flitting between CatherineSmith’s TheBiting Point’ (a brilliant short story collection), WinifredHoltby’s SouthRiding, and David Nicholls’ One Day.

Top of the tower on my bedside table is MelissaBenn’s book SchoolWars, which I’m finding useful in my role as a schoolgovernor. Underneath is another old favourite, James Berry’s Chain of Dayspoetry collection, which I think sadly may be out of print, although I found awonderful recording of In-a Brixtan Markithere: Audio and poem link

Which other writers inspire you?

RoyMcFarlane, who has just come to the end of his tenure as Birmingham PoetLaureate, is an up-and-coming talent. He has tremendous energy and vitality asa performance poet and I hope to see his first poetry collection soon.

I hugely admire Nicole Moore of Shangwe for beingencouraging to new writers and for her ability to take an idea and then executeit so well (for example, in the HairPower Skin Revolution anthology).

Other writers inspire me just by the sheer number ofbooks they produce. How do they do that? I heard Malorie Blackman speak at theBirmingham Book Festival and I remember wanting to touch her, just so that someof her industriousness would rub off on me!

What would you say to encourage new writers?

The bestand most useful advice I ever had was from one of my Fiction course tutors, thenovelist Jackie Gay. “Be bold,” she said, “and write what you want to write.And what only you can write.Don’t worry about what other people think.” So, for my assignment I wrote along short story that was experimental in structure – actually, a story withina story – and which dealt with two ‘taboo’ topics (religion and abortion). Thestory won the course Prize for Fiction that year. This success spurred me intowriting more ‘edgy’ stories, one of which (TheHills and the Fortune) won a prize in a storycompetition judged by Janice Galloway. I’d urge all new writers not to beafraid of taking risks in terms of theme or subject matter. Don’t write whatyou think you should write. I still remind myself frequently of Jackie’s words:“Be bold!”

You are based in Birmingham, what is theliterary/book world like there?

In a word – fabulous! We have the Birmingham BookFestival (and a Fringe Festival) and Black History Month every October, as wellas Arts Fest and Spring Thing. Birmingham is home too to the excellentindependent publisher Tindal Street Press, which is small in size but a realbig-hitter in terms of its quality fiction and literary prizes/shortlistings.We have writing groups galore, including Tindal Street Fiction Group, of whichI’m a member. Reading is also very well supported in Birmingham Librariesthrough reading groups and author events (big name authors such as Ian Rankinand Tess Gerritsen have recently appeared). Thereader development staff also put on a two-weekchildren's literature festival ‘Young Readers Birmingham’.

What are you working on now?

Once the book is published I’d love to make adocumentary about Beatrice.

What book would you recommend for the BlackReading Group?

How about the classic To Sir with Love by E.R.Braithwaite, his fish-out-of-water memoir about being a Guyanese-born ex-RAFman teaching in a tough London school? I can see plenty for a reading group toget its collective teeth into! The descriptive passages are excellent; he has akeen eye for the telling detail, such as the ‘great blobs of mucus everywhere’in the school playground. His style overall is very measured, although somemight find it a little pompous. But it has so much to say about society andschooling today as it did when it was written in 1959. Plus it shines a lighton the peculiar nature of British prejudice – Braithwaite was an oddity becauseof his colour and his class. I haven’t seenthe film but it would be a good tie-in.

Lime magazine question for its communityedition: When was the last time you did something foryour community?

Community is really important to me. I'm veryprivileged to serve as a Parent Governor at the local state primary school,recently rated Outstanding by Ofsted, which was a huge boost to everybody.Within that role I'm chair of the Teaching and Learning committee and drop intothe school quite often. I'm also one of a small band of volunteers who organisethe local carnival every July. One of my tasks is to persuade the localbusinesses to advertise in the programme – a job requiring the all charms ofBeyonce and the tenacity of Ruth Badger! In addition I belong to a localcampaign group that seeks to improve the public realm.

What question should I have asked you, andwhat is the answer?

What would Beatrice Cadbury have made oftoday’s anti-capitalism protests, e.g. the Occupy movement?

I think she would be saddened that the gap betweenthe haves and have-nots is greater than ever, but also gratified to see peopleuniting in peaceful protest.

Fiona Joseph's blog's at http://fionajoseph.com and tweets @FionaJoseph

An edited version of this interview is in November Lime magazine.

Man Booker 2011

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My review of Pigeon English as published in Lime magazine:

It has been fascinating to observe the trajectory of StephenKelman’s first book, Pigeon English. Before it was published last March,Waterstone’s hailed it as one to watch. Prior to that 12 publishers fought tohave it and Kelman was given a big advance. It made the shortlist for the 2011Man Booker prize and is also up for the Guardian First Book Award.

Kelman has imagined the life of a Damilola Taylor typecharacter, before the fateful day when he was murdered by boys, not that mucholder than he was. The narrator, Harri, is an 11 year-old Ghanaian, who mightbe living in London illegally, with his mother and sister. His father and youngersister are still in Ghana. Harri and his friends are trying to solve the murderof a school friend, by interrogating their school colleagues and neighbours, inwhat tends to be described as a ‘gritty’ South London tower block estate.

Harri and friends have adventures in a world that is not atall innocent, the issues of loyalty, gangs, abuse against women, and singleparenthood are all considered. Unfortunately since these are all viewed throughthe eyes of an 11 year-old boy, there is not really much insight, or realdevelopment of the issues. While this is a book for adults, it is clear thatthe publishers are positioning it as a book to be read in schools, and I’ve nodoubt that it is where it will end up. A shame really, as there are so many otherbooks that better cover multi-racial London.

The review above is about 200 words for Lime magazine. My other points on the Stephen Kelman are as follows:

I am pleased that he wrote about this experience. More people need to write about real life on the estates of Britain. Kelman is most authentic in the voice of Harri as a young boy, his innocence is amusing, and the desire for adventures, to help solve the crime and do good is appealing. I found that some of the language/dialogue was a bit repetitive - even though I imagine that pre-teen boys do have words that they overuse. I am less convinced that it this was a particularly Ghanian experience, though Kelman has said that he grew up in such a community. The relationship with the sister worked well, as an elder sister myself I can look back and remember the snotty behaviour, and at other times the 'in cahoots' sibling bonding.

I prefer the Australian cover

Overall I enjoyed it far more than I thought that I would, but it felt as though it had been heavily edited. So for example the tense aspects of relationships between West Indians and Africans, Eastern Europeans and Black people are touched upon but never fully developed and then disappear all together. Kelman portrays a community where no-one is really enjoying life or particularly caring for one another, and despite difficult times, I just don't believe that this is a realistic portrayal. It seems odd that he seems to believe that everyone in living in estates in the UK are depressed, angry, cheap, abusers, abused, giving up or just plain wicked. It's not that hopeless, people do have ambition and dreams and the gumption to get things done for themselves and their communities. It's a shame that this was not shown.

Another reason that I think that the book has been edited by someone not quite understanding what Kelman's getting at is around the pigeon. Unfortunately I have to mention the pigeon. It is the weakest bit of the book. I think that it is supposed to be some greater being, someone/thing looking out for Harri, that he grows to believe in. It does not work because it allowed to establish as a theme/character and certainly does not work as anything allegorical. The only funny bit of the whole book for me was that the pigeon seemed to have knowledge of local government policy on pigeon clearing. Having said that, every time I see a magpie now, I think of them as the gangsters of the urban bird world.

Also on the shortlist is Ghanian-Candian Esi Edugyan's second book Half Blood Blues.

I have bought Half Blood Blues but not yet read it yet.

Here is Esi on this morning's (17 October 2011) BBC Radio 4 Today programme: Esi on Today

Her story is of black jazz musicians in Germany during the second world war. Years later friends go back to search for the friend that was left behind as the Nazi's came to power and stormed through Europe. Here's Bernadine Evaristo's review of it from The Guardian. She did not like it all, though she admires Esi as a writer, and goes on to recommend Destined to Witness: Growing up Black in Nazi Germany by Hans Massaquoi instead.

For my work's book club I have also read The Sisters Brothers; I actually enjoyed it very much, I did not really know anything about it, as it was selected as the book club read by ballot. It reminds me of the film In Bruges, and I while I don't do gruesome at all really, the idea of hired killers aching for a better life resonates with me; and both the film and this book are wickedly funny. Patrick De Witt is an excellent writer. The work's next book club read is Julian Barnes' The Sense of An Ending which I did vote for in the ballot, as I was unlikely to read it otherwise and I want to know what all the fuss is about. I have not opened it yet, but its short - more of a novella, so I really don't feel overwhelmed by the supposed grandeur of writing, even though it is about death. I heard Barnes say on the radio the other day - 'it is not about dying.' Barnes is the favourite to win the Man Booker and if he wins will keep the literary traditionalists happy. If you include A Cupboard Full of Coats by Yvvette Edwards, I will have read far more of the Man Booker list this year, than I have in many previous years. That is many many years when I bought no Booker reads at all. If the Man Booker prize is about getting people to read good stories, things they might not have tried before, then I believe it is an absolute success. I understand that far more of the 2011 shortlisted books have been bought than in previous years, so people have really been inspired to read by these works. We should leave the harping old codgers to enjoy their fusty old un-intelligible literary works.

Round-Up 21

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Sam Selvon's The Lonely Londoners

I have not done a round-up for months and months, but I have been collecting the stories and information. So here's a canter through some of the things that I have noted during the past few months.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche's new book is to be called The Small Redemption of Lagos. In the UK it is to be published by Fourth Estate and in the US & Canada by Knopf. European publishers have already bought it up too. It is is the story of childhood friends who reconnect in Lagos, after spending years in apart in the US and UK. No publication date yet. It was great to see Chimamanda at the recent Book Slam event- here's an interview (audio) that she did with the BBC while she was here: Chimamanda interview It has been so long since Half a Yellow Sun. Totally looking forward to The Small Redemption of Lagos.

I love that when the film director Joe Wright (Atonement, The Soloist, Pride & Prejudice) was asked what film he wished he'd made, he turned the answer into the one he really wants to do. It's Sam Selvon's The Lonely Londoners. I hope that he does it, as it would be great to see a film of that key moment in the Black British post-Windrush experience, set in 50s Notting Hill. I believe that Joe Wright would do it justice. I cannot believe that there is no film of this book.

Shakespeare Mash-Up sounds great. Ben Arogundade has combined the stories of Othello and Romeo and Juliet into one. Using Shakespeare's original verse Arogundade has Othello running of with Juliet and Desdemona falling for Romeo. This is only available as an e-book.

The academic Kenneth W. Warren’s latest book is What Was African American Literature? He's stirred up a hornet's nest of a discussion that will run for years. In his polemic he's reckons, as I understand it, that since there are no longer laws of discrimination against African Americans, the literature that responds to that context cannot be called 'African-American' Literature. It is still literature he argues, but cannot defined by ethnicity when people are more equal. Here is the an article where he sets out his views: article
and a transcript of a live online chat that he had about it with Louis Gates Jnr. Online chat

The second part of Ngugi Thiongo'o's memoir In the House of the Interpreter was one of the highlights of last week's Frankfurt Book Fair. The German city hosts the world's biggest gathering of the book publishing industry.

The Commonwealth writers 2011 award went to The Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna and the First Book award to South African Cynthia Jele for Happiness is a Four -Letter Word. Earlier in the year I wrote of my confusion on how the categories had been organised and the fact that there were no entries from the Caribbean. Recently the organisers undertook a short survey of Caribbean writers and authors via the Caribbean Literary Salon network. You can read the responses here: responses. I have heard that change is in the pipeline.

Sapphire stirred up a debate when she passed through London on her way to the Edinburgh Book Festival to promote her new book The Kid. Here is the interview with Sapphire in the Guardian: Sapphire interview I can understand what she's saying, and it is interesting that similar sentiments appear in the Rhianna interview in the current edition of UK Vogue. Essentially both ladies are saying that there's a view that their work is from pure experience rather than them conjuring up another world. They are presented with an assumption that is not possible for them to be creative. I totally agree that is very limiting and is evidently very annoying for them. I find it odd that people don't take a step back and listen to what they are saying, and try to understand, rather than giving them a hard time about it.

Here's Jackie Kay at the Edinburgh Book Festival - Jackie in conversation. Jackie starts talking at about 4 minutes in. Jackie's memoir Red Dust Road won the Scottish book of the year ward.

Great to hear the singer Pauline Black's voice again. She was with ska band Selector in the late 70s-80s. She published her story in Black by Design: A2-Tone Memoir during the summer. I had no idea that she'd been adopted and grew up in a white working class family in Romford, Essex.

Never did get round to reading Kathryn Stockett's The Help. I did not even buy it when I saw it going cheap at a book stall in Broadway Market. I've heard some of it on BBC Woman's Hour readings when it was published in the UK a couple of years ago. I guess I've always considered it Kathryn's story, her experience and retelling of a moment from her own perspective and imagination. The film is released here on the 26 October, I imagine that it will be on all over the place, if the amount of people reading the book around London is anything to go by. The film has some excellent actresses in it and I am looking forward to seeing it for that reason. It has been fascinating to see the US reviews of the the film and the controversy that it has caused there. Here is a conversation on US Amazon that has been going on about the book/film: The 10 Issues that Tarnish The Help.

Another controversial book from the US is Is Marriage for White People?: How the African American Marriage Decline Affects Everyone. The African American author, Ralph Richards Banks, a law professor at Stanford University, thinks that African Americans are least likely to marry, and most likely to divorce.

Kwasi Kwarteng, the Conservative MP for Spelthorne in Surrey (10k plus majority & he's on the right of his party) has a new history book out. Ghosts of Empire: Britain's Legacies in the Modern World, is essentially a biography of empire. It gathered a number of prime spot reviews in the papers. The Economist's review is quite tart, but surprisingly, like The Telegraph's review ends with positive comments on what Kwasi has achieved with this work. Seems like he's a fine historian, shame about the politics.

Five Chester Himes novels were re-published in Penguin Modern Classics paperback brand.There were A Rage in Harlem, introduced by Luc Sante; Cotton Comes to Harlem, introduced by Will Self; The Heat's On, introduced by Noel 'Razor' Smith; The Real Cool Killers; and All Shot Up.

Elmore Leonard's DJibouti about piracy of the east coast of Africa is now out in paperback.

Pao Kerry Young's first book, considers love cross the races in Jamaica. The narrator is Chinese, and the story covers the second half of the twentieth century through the lead character's rise to the top of the violent underworld.

Nuruddin Farah's Crossbones, is about a Somali-American professor returns to his African homeland after 20 years in the US.

Helon Habila's Oil on Water is now out in paperback. Helon has also put together The Granta Book of the African Short Story. In this anthology he selects the work of the post-nationalist generation of African writers, those whose work has come to the fore since 1960. It starts with the youngest Chimamada, and ends with the oldest, the South African writer, Alex La Guma. Petina Gappah did an excellent review of it in the Financial TImes on the 24 September. Sorry but I cannot find the link for you.

Benjamin Zephaniah's autobiography My Story is due to be published shortly and he's also has a children's book When I Grow Up coming out. and this follows the non-fiction book about Kung Fu that came out earlier this year. Loved his answers in the Q&A in yesterday's Guardian (15 October)

Malorie Blackman did a similar Q&A in the Financial Times, where she says 'Getting published took two years 82 rejection letters and nine books.' Read it here
Malorie's latest book Boys Don't Cry is out in paperback.

Domingos Alvares, African Healing, and the Intellectual History of the Atlantic World by James H. Sweet. Could really have done with a much snappier title. It is a study of an African healer and vodun priest who between 1730 and 1750 was captured into slavery in Benin, transported to a sugar plantation in Pernambuco, Brazil, and exiled to Portugal as a prisoner of the Inquisition.

I've never read anything by Barry Unsworth, but it seems that his latest work The Quality of Mercy, is a sequel to the Booker prize winning Sacred Hunger. Set in the 18th-century it's about the world of a slave ship owner.

I'd not heard of or read any of the work of Gabriel Gradamosi either, but he wrote an insightful response to the London riots on the Granta website: Blazing Light in August

The UK based poet David Dabydeen won Guyana's Literature prize for the 4th time with his book of poetry Molly and the Muslim Stick. The First book award went to the Haitian author Myriam Chauncy for The Loneliness of Angela. Read about it here: Repeating Islands blog.

Chibundu Onuzo's The Spider King's Daughter

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I attended my first 2011 Black History Month event lastnight at King’s College London. Chibundu Onuzo gave her first public reading ofher yet to be published book, The Spider King’s Daughter. At 20 year’s old, a second year historystudent at King’s, Chibundu has already secured a two-book deal with Faber. Yes,that is the Faber of TS Eliot, Lord of the Flies, and who also look after thewriters Orhan Pamuk and Derek Walcott.

It is hard to believe that this was Chibundu’s first publicreading. With barely any nerves, a quiet prayer, she was off, confidentlytelling us why she writes. She was an assured performer, who clearly lovedtalking about writing (she wrote it in 10 months and spent another 2 years refining The Spider King's Daughter with her editors) and sharing her characters with us. From the first moment, 'I'm going to start at Chapter One' it was obvious that she is outrageously talented, with agreat sense of humour and an eye for detail and nuance that makes you want tounderstand Lagos. I could have happily listened to her read the whole book. I’mnot going to say that she’s like anyone else, Chibundu is very much her ownwoman. I am left wondering though, what it is about Nigeria that it creates suchphenomenal writers.

The Spider King’s Daughter is not published until the 15March 2012, but you can already place orders on Amazon. It is a story of friendship acrossclass lines. Abika is an indulged rich man’s daughter, who falls for a streethawker. The story is told from each lover’s point of view. Chibundu exploreswhether they can achieve a meaningful and happy relationship. And if they can’tis it because of who they are or something else.

While waiting for 15 March to roll around you can keep intouch with Chibundu at her blog - http://authorsoundsbetterthanwriter.blogspot.com/ (Great blog title!)

This is what Black History Month should be about - celebrating and encouraging the vibrant and talented of Black Britain.

CLR James Legacy Project

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Last year Hackney Council decided out of the blue to try and rename the CLR James Library in Dalston. It caused outrage. A group came together and ran a successful campaign - collecting 2.5k signatures - to oppose this decision, which would have seen the name of one of UK's most important West Indian writer and political activist, discarded for bland corporate gain.

There is barely any commemoration of the first generation of West Indian's endeavours or genius anywhere in the UK. Making sure that CLR James' work is not forgotten is, I believe, important work.

The group that ran the campaign has plans to preserve the legacy of the CLR James, the next phase will be launched on the last day of Black History Month - 30 October.
Below the book cover, is their promotional note/invitation to the event. Please circulate this information.

First edition signed copy of CLR James' The Black Jacobins: here
Information about the campaign in the local paper: Hackney Citizen

Come and join us for a celebration of CLR James' legacy

and a planning meeting to discuss how we can keep that legacy alive. 2pm - 3pm on Sunday 30 October at Open the Gate cultural centre in Dalston: 33-35 Stoke Newington Rd, London N16 8BJ

Speakers will be announced in the coming weeks, but it will be an interactive event, where we develop a programme to build on the legacy of CLR James.

The event from will also be an opportunity for us to launch our teaching pack on the life of CLR James.

Register for this free event here

We also have a really excellent centre page spread, designed by Gavern Bennett on the life of CLR James, in the September Hackney Unites community newspaper.

How you can help:
• Promote and publicise the 30 October event through your networks
• Contribute to our (still fledgling) website http://www.clrjameslegacyproject.org.uk/ We need articles about CLR James and his legacy, reviews of his writings, any photos that you have and general discussion pieces.
• Do you know any teachers who would be interested in using our CLR James teaching pack? If so, please let us know.

Our mailing address is:
CLR James Legacy Project
c/o HCVS Ground Floor
84 Springfield House, 5 Tyssen Street
London, England E8 2LY
E: hackneyunites@btinternet.com

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Book Club: Tuesday 25 October 2011

2011-10-12T20:59:00.000+01:00

Binyavanga Wainaina will be with us for the October Black Reading Group meeting. I am so excited - really looking forward to it. He will be talking to us about his long awaited first book – amemoir - One Day I Will Write About this Place, and it is not even officiallypublished in the UK yet.

Pleasenote the change of day, instead of our usual last Sunday of the month, we are meeting on Tuesday 25 October, at 6.30, Waterstones’ Piccadilly branch. (Go to the 5^th floor, turn toleft at the top of the stairs or lift and go through the arch – we will be atthe big round table on the left hand side.)

Agreat big thank you to Granta for thinking of the Black Reading Group.

Binyavangawill also be at the Royal African Society on the following evening – Wednesday26 October 2011

Aboutthe author

BinyavangaWainaina won the 2002 Caine Prize for African Writing. He is the foundingeditor of Kwani? a leading African literary magazine based in Kenya. He haswritten for the East African, National Geographic, Tin House, VirginiaQuarterly Review, Vanity Fair, Granta, the New York Times, and the Guardian(UK). Wainaina has taught at Union College and Williams College, and iscurrently the director of the Chinua Achebe Centre for African Writers andArtists at Bard College.

Granta(UK) edition: published 3 November

WhenBinyavanga Wainaina’s essay ‘How to Write about Africa’ – satirical piece inmocking state, exoticised white representations of his continent – waspublished in Granta magazine in 2005 it caused reverberations around the world,and became the most requested piece in the magazine’s history. Now with hismuch-anticipated memoir, One Day I Will Write About This Place, Wainaina offersan utterly convincing and compelling alternative view of the continent. This isan Africa you probably have not read about. Tribes, colonialism and Kenyan politicsfeature, but the book is not about these issues: Wainaina does not generaliseor deliver sermons; instead, he looks, listens, reads, travels, questions… andwrites.

Wainainadescribes his middle-class childhood as a boy slightly out of kilter with theworld around him, and obsessed with Michael Jackson and the Six Million DollarMan; his growing sensitivity to books and words in a country with manylanguages; his mother longing for her childhood home in Uganda; and finally,his emergence as a writer. Hecaptures his flounderings and his triumphs in vivid prose that offers us asurprising new lens through which to view Kenya and Africa.

GraywolfPress (American) edition

BinyavangaWainaina tumbled through his middle-class Kenyan childhood out of kilter withthose around him. Life came to him as a chaos of loud and colourful sounds: thehairdryers at his mother’s beauty parlour, black mamba bicycle bells, mechanicsin Nairobi, the music of Michael Jackson.

Inthis vivid and compelling debut memoir, Wainaina takes us through his schooldays, through his mothers religious period, his failed attempt to studycommerce in South Africa, a moving family reunion in Uganda, and his travelaround Kenya. The landscape in front of him always claims his main attention,but he also evokes the shifting political scent that unsettles his views onfamily, tribe, and nationhood. Resolutely avoiding stereotype and cliché,Wainaina paints every scene in One Day I Will Write About This Place with ahigh distinctive and hugely memorable brush.

Whatthey say about it

“Harriedreader, I’ll save you precious time: skip this review and head directly to thebookstore for Binyavanga Wainaina’s stand-up-and-cheer coming-of-age memoir…(it is) brimming with insouciant virtuosity.”

AlexandraFuller, New York Times

“Ilove this book. An insight into a world I’ve never seen before. BinyavangaWainaina opens the doors and beckons us into the portrait of an artist as ayoung Kenyan. Great stuff.”

ColumMcCann

BinyavangaWainaina writes with an unparalleled grace, a language that burns withtenderness and a scorching melancholy and an honesty rarely encountered in amemoir. A long awaited and brilliant book.

Chris Abani, author of GraceLand and The Virgin of Flames

‘Brilliant,What makes the book good is its impassioned account of the Africa we need tohear more about the Africa of schools, weddings, television shows, jokes,politics, family gossip and idiosyncratic dreams. What makes it great areWainaina’s beautifully elastic sentences, stretch and snap back into place.’

Teju Cole, author of Open City

‘BinyavangaWainaina is a singer and painter in words… The memoir bursts with life andlaughter and pathos in every line and paragraph.‘

Ngugi wa Thiong”o, author of Wizard of the Crow

FirstImpressions

Ihad three categories/themes to fulfil for the Black Reading Group autumn winterreads. A classic ( still no idea what that might be), a translation (by Faiza Guene, French-Algerian writer) and something about East Africa. For the latter I had beenconsidering one of the Habesha writers – from Ethiopia or Eritrea, but I’d beenunable to decide what would work well. The truth is, while I have heardexcellent talks about their work from Hannah Pool & Nadifa Mohammed,unfortunately, it was not either of their books that I’d actually begun to read. I foundthe characters and pace in the one I’d bought so confusing, I gave up defeated. My moment to read it has not yet arrived.

So it was a fortuitous moment when Granta’s publicity department contacted me to find out if the book club would be interested in reading OneI Day Will Write about This Place and have an exclusive session with theauthor. The decision on reading about East Africa was made in a moment, andalready I have learnt so much about the nuances of many African people and places, and I am barely half way throughit. ( bought the US edition as the UK one is not published until 3 Nov.)

Asthe book blurb above states Binyavanga won the Caine Prize in 2002, and hisfamous satirical essay on writing about Africa was published in Granta in 2005.It is clear he’s been busynurturing Kenyan writers through his literature network/magazine Kwani? [He used his Caine Prize money to start the magazine.] He’s also been working in the States for the Chinua Achebe centreat Bard College. And despite allthat he’s been busy writing, this his first full scale book, as the Caine Prizestory was published as a novella. It has taken him many years, but it is, Ihave to say, well worth the wait. It his own story told in slivers that arecomplete in themselves, but seamlessly linking to what follows, and somehowyour understanding of his family, his home town, Nakuru, links to Uganda, andschool life, even the local and national politics of Kenya are opened up. This is a layered memoir where you take in much,even while it feels that it is lightly told. Binyavanga’s sense of humour is infectious,often popping up when you least expect it. I have particularly enjoyed the waythat his prose often turns into what I can only describe as lyricalremarks or asides, that are there just because he loves playing with words.

Ifyou grew up here in the UK your sense of Africa will have been mediated througha gaze that’s often under the impression that apart from possibly, the people inSouth Africa, Africans are somehow living in a completely different century. One Day Iwill Write About this Place, lets you know that people there knowmore about the West than the media cares to imagine.

Silly Street: Designer Bookmark

2011-10-09T21:28:00.000+01:00

Ihave shamelessly borrowed this heading from a feature in the Financial Times’glossy magazine How to Spend It. On their luxury technology page they review a productand wonder at the pointlessness of it, and consider who would possibly buy it.

Recently (17-25 September) the design world rolled into town for London Design Festival. On very the lastday I wandered around the Tent London show at Truman Brewery, and could not resistbuying this designer bookmark. Even though I knew I was going to have it, I still let the young salesmen go through his sales spiel.

Certainlyit is something that I never knew anyone needed, a designer bookmark with a dualfeature, to make complicated lives easier. Imagine that you are so engrossed ina book you cannot put it down. That would be the moment when you’d think “Ijust wish I could hang my book over my shoulder, so that both my hands could befree.” Well this is the item for you.

Reader,I bought two, a blue one for Mr Muse. I have not yet even used mine as abookmark, never mind to string it across my shoulder. The photos are just foryou. I cannot imagine I would ever do so in public. Precisely Silly Street.

Wangari Maathai: Obituary

2011-10-02T21:51:00.000+01:00

Professor Wangari Maathai the environmental activist, human rights campaigner and hero far beyond her home country of Kenya, died last Sunday (25 September). She had kept her illness private, so it was quite a shock to hear that she'd been ill and died in hospital during surgery. The videos below tell her story and mission far better than I can. The work of the organisation that she founded - Green Belt Movement will go on. Wangari Maathai will be much missed.

Guardian Obituary of Wangari Maathai

Unbowed, Wangari Maathai's autobiography

Bookshop: Assouline at Liberty

2011-09-12T17:45:00.000+01:00

Like most people I do most of my book shopping online thesedays. It certainly makes an exciting difference to me, to be able to buy thebooks that I want and get them promptly. For many years I’d often I go into abookshop and the book that I wanted to buy was not available, even if it hadbeen the subject of good reviews in the papers. Borders was good for a momentin the late 90s and early 2000s, because it (the Oxford St branch) did have awell-considered Black books section. I know that some people hate the idea ofsuch a section, but at least the shops that have such collections actually havethe books in stock. It seems to me, that the bookshops that don’t have such sectionsdon’t stock the books that I am most likely to want at all. In later yearsBorders went ‘off’ and there would not be much more than a random selection ofEric Jerome Dickey’s – and you only need read one of those in a lifetime. Ithas been amusing to see the arguments – negative and positive - around the WHSmith’s decision to remove the title ‘Women’s fiction’ from ‘romance’ books. Atleast those books are in bookshops, whatever they are collectively called.

These days, because of Amazon, if the bookshop does not havethe book I am after, I am less inclined to pay full price and than also have towait for the book to be called in from the publishers. On the other hand I doactually buy a lot of books – probably more than the average. I still lovegoing to bookshops and now and again I make random full priced purchases –often guilt ridden ones, as contrarily, I really do believe I should be buyingmore from, and supporting proper bookshops. For a reader looking for moreinternational works, Daunts is good, I have not been as regularly as I used tooa few years ago, but they have a table where they place the works of new fictionwriters from the Middle East, Africa and India. This selection is regularlyupdated. Maybe this works at Daunt’s because the original (Marylebone) store ofthe now growing chain, is a travel bookshop. I love they way that they continueto file all books by country and continent together, rather than by topic. I alwaysthought that was such a sensible idea, whether you were going travelling ornot.

I am lucky to have a local bookshop that is known for itscollection of books – old and new – about London. I have done a couple of open-airevents on the green with them to raise money for our residents’ association.This is the shop that I visit most and browse in the window pretty much eachtime I go by. I also have what I call, a ‘work’s bookshop’, where I will spend lunchtimesbrowsing the staff recommendations and checking to see if there is anything thatmight be of interest for the blog. This is in fact, the shop least likely tohave what I want, and most likely to tell me to go to the edge of the M25, topick up the only copy they have of the book that I want. [You think I‘m joking!]

The strangest bookshop that I have been to recently is a new addition to London’s most beautiful department store, Liberty. It is styled as a ‘LiteraryLounge’, looks like a room in a grand country house and only sells booksproduced by one publishing company. Assouline was started in France, by ahusband and wife team, and now operates from New York. Apparently it is thepublishing company best loved by the fashion and luxury goods companies.Essentially the books it publishes are coffee-table style tomes on fashion,photography, travel, and architecture. The books have masses of glossy imagesand relatively few words. So it makes the use of ‘Literary Lounge’ weirdlyabsurd. While there my eye caught two titles, Lost Africa and Africa Is In Style. The shop assistant noted my interest and told me about their vintageselection of books that they had on Africa. The one on display seemed to beabout ‘big game’ hunting so I did not pursue that. I thought that the Africa IsIn Style looked most interesting, such a striking cover image, so I bought acopy. I don’t buy coffee-table books, so I checked out Lost Africaon Amazon, where I was utterly amazed to see, even at Amazon prices new copiesare a whopping £133.

I found the essay in the front of Africa Is In Style, by BéréniceGeoffroy-Schneiter, interesting – slightly academic, but as a brief essay onthe history of styles worn across Africa – it seemed knowledgeable, particularlyif you are prepared to ignore the fact that, she seems to believe that theAfrican influence on western fashion began in the 1950s, when Malick Sibidéstarted taking photographs around Bamako in Mali. That’s the appropriation offashion history for you.

Most of the photographs are lovely, a few extremely suspect,I would say, as to why they have been included. The publishers have mixed the workof the 12 African designers (that include Alphadi, Seydou, Ombang, Xuly Bët),that they are supposed to be celebrating, along side the work of some of thebig name French, Italian, and British designers you’d see in British orAmerican glossy magazines. Clearly at some point they decided not to pursue theoriginal theme of the book, reckoning I guess, that people in the West weremost likely to purchase this book, because of the work of Lagerfeld, Westwood,or Yves St Laurent. I think that they will say that they are showing the influenceof the African designers by setting them side-by-side. However some of thespreads only show African work next to the African influencers.

The words in the Glossary did not seem to connect toanything, and the biographies of the African designers, and the picture captions(placed at the back of the book) are so tiny, they are almost impossible toread.

Definitely a book to buy as a gift for someone interested infashion, they would use it for inspiration or to create a mood board. Africa IsIn Style feels expensive, but I think from a publishing point of view is probablynot at all expensive to produce. It was published in 2006, and with that, Icannot but feel were ‘Literary Lounge’ in another part of London it would be aremainder bookshop.

I’m not against fashion or luxury; this is certainly abookshop for a quiet leisurely browse. If you prefer a good read, you alreadyknow that Amazon or a proper bookshop is really the place to be.

Book Review: Colour Me English by Caryl Phillips

2011-09-10T20:28:00.000+01:00

Caryl Phillips’ latest book is a collection of essays, (Colour Me English) many of which were publishedin The Guardian during the early 2000s, although the oldest entry was writtenlong before that in 1995. Phillips was born in St Kitts and arrived in England four months old,he says, ‘as hand luggage’ whenhis parents came to Leeds in the late 1950s.

Theessays all explore identity and belonging to a great or lesser degree, often the Black British experience, but Phillips also considers what itmeans to be American, based upon his own decision to move there. He’s currentlyprofessor at Yale University and a visiting professor at Columbia University.This week he began the BBC’s 9/11 Letters series on Radio Four, in which hedescribed seeing the first plane hit the tower. This talk on the radio is thebasis of the essay GroundZero. Information here

Manyof the essays feel like lectures (the kind that you would never want to miss!)or even as though you are beside Phillips while he is doing his research. Ifound these really informative as they give great insight into the work of otherwriters. These other writers include, Chinua Achebe, James Baldwin, ERBraithwaite, Joseph Conrad, Colin MacInnes, Angela Carter, and Claude McKay, a Jamaican-American Harlem Renaissance writer and poet. I had not heard ofbefore. McKay's Wikipeda profile says that he was (in 1920) the first blackjournalist in the England.

Phillips’enthusiasm for writing and writers shine through, his essay Shusaku Endo: Confession of a True Believer is a fan’s tribute to a Japaneseauthor that continues to inspire him every time he starts a new book of his own. I particularly enjoyed the review of Coloured People where he considers HenryLouis Gates’ 1994 bestselling memoir, he sets outs its faults, but nonethelesscharts its success as “…one that offers the black intellectual a way to reclaimthe romance of his past without giving up the perks of his present.”

Anotherof Gates’ work is also reviewed in the essay Literature: The New Jazz? Essentially Phillips takes apart the Norton Anthology of African American Literature and by way of music (‘… musicis the art form which has benefited most from African American genius in thetwentieth century’), he links it to the fact that Toni Morrison’s Nobel Prize for Literature (the first African American to be awarded the Nobel) could only have been for a book entitled Jazz. Phillips goes on to state that literature will bethe African American art form of the twenty-first century. One tip though, ifTerry McMillan is your heroine, you might want to avoid this particular essay.

Ireally loved the essays where Phillips writes about growing up in Leeds and hisrelationship with his parents. It is important to have the non-London blackexperience shared. RudeI am in my speech takes you from Othello’s isolation in Venice to explore the differencesbetween the first generation and second generation West Indian in the UK,highlighting degrees of belonging. As with his life story A Life in Ten Chapters, I winced with recognitionof similar experiences.

Myfavourite piece of Phillips’ writing is the tribute/obituary to Luther Vandross. Read this essay and thengo the Guardian website (or a national newspaper of your choice) and put inLuther Vandross. Then read the Phillips piece again. How can it be that thiswell-loved and multi-million selling composer and singer’s actual music had been so rarelyreviewed during his lifetime. Reader, I would have bought this book for thisessay alone.

Itis always a particular pleasure to celebrate the work of Phillips, since as ahalf-Kittian myself, he’s the only writer that I know of from there. (In fact,my Phillips relatives say that we are related – who knows.) Even with thatallegiance and that the most recent essay was completed as long ago as 2008, I stilldo think it wonderful to have these pieces all in one place. Phillips describesVandross as ‘a master craftsman.’ I say, it takes one to know one.

CarylPhillips latest piece for The Guardian is a book review in today’s (10September 2011) paper: book review.

Book Review: Lynch's Road by D.D. Armstrong

2011-09-07T12:38:00.000+01:00

Iwas pleased to be asked to take a look at Lynch’s Road the first book of the newpublishers Smash & Grab press. It is their ambition to focus on promotingwork of ‘popular and urban literature prints,’ and so their striking website reclaimsthe well known late 19^th/early 20^th century magazinegenre, restyling it PULP.

DD Armstrongis an ambitious writer, who certainly knows how to unpack a gripping story, haswritten Lynch’s Road. Thefirst, of a three-book deal that he has with Smash & Grab press.

Thisis an exciting debut and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Well, that is exceptfor the most violent of scenes, where I had to skip a few pages.

Setin west London, it describes the lives of a range of characters operating in aworld where drugs are viewed as the most valuable of commodities. Everyone isaffected by the search and consumption of it, whether to make money,to be king of the road, to get rid of the woes of the everyday or just toescape when life deals to many hurts. The most affected, are those who are notinvolved in the trade, but refuse to give up on those loved ones who are.

Thereare two interacting narratives, one is current and immediate, the second isreflective and advisory, a warning on how things must change. The link is thatthree of the main characters in the first narrative are reading the secondnarrative in a book that through the twists of the story they’ve been handed byanother character.

Ithink that D.D. Armstrong is strongest when writing dialogue, from the middleclass ladies’ row over dinner, through to conversations between mother anddaughter, between sisters, and most particularly between the friends – whethermale or female, that is when Lynch’s Road is really alive with the energy andvariety of London life. He flicks between the London argot, and Jamaicaninflected expressions, in a completely genuine way.

The‘preachy and ranty’ sections of ‘TheJourney of a Slave’ the title of the book within the book, did not convince me. It seemedless well written, though I am left wondering if that was the point. I enjoyedthe ‘walk-on’ parts given to the heroes - Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, GilScott Heron, W.E.B. Dubois, Marcus Garvey and explorations of theirtheories/ideologies.

Thereare some brilliantly depicted villains in ‘both’ books, Bains, the white BNPnemesis of Ivan; the slave owner, and the contemporary Fagin-like boss drugdealer Sparks. All are conjured up in a horribly believable way. Eventhough that is a list of men, I do also think that the women (all good peopleor idolised as such), Jade - Ivan’s girlfriend; and her friend Tania, Alicia, Anita and Mrs Godfrey are excellent characterisations,people you can recognise.

Iam encouraged to see that D.D. Armstrong is being supported and mentored by theactor, film director and screenwriter Noel Clarke of Kidulthood and Adulthoodfame, they knew one another as youngsters and have kept in touch randomly overthe years. Noel has written a wonderful foreword that explains the commitmentof D.D. Armstrong to achieving his goals and his potential to carve out avaluable writing career for himself.

Iam happy to recommend this book, because it gives credible insight into boththe prison experience and the drug dealing world, the latter particularly earlyon in the book, is described in the kind of style that was depicted in the TVprogramme The Wire – that is as a commercial business, rather than purecriminal activity. It’s a stressful anxious life for all involved, and thatD.D. realises this honestly, and much like The Wire, certainly does notglorify, or make it glamorous in anyway.

Theone proviso to my recommendation, and I think that it is an important one, isthat what lets Lynch’s Road down, is the editing and sub-editing. It reallyneeded to be gone through with a fine-tooth comb, not to change the storystructure or the characters, the pace or the dialogue; these are all strong andclear. It is just that I believe that some of the grammatical and typographicalerrors throughout the book are un-forgiveable. This extra work would have meantbetter sentence construction, and clarity around meaning and the right wordsbeing used in the correct way. The most surprising was Innocents (the fruit smoothiecompany) instead of innocence. Capitalletters seem to appear, disappear and reappear from phrase to phrase inconnecting sentences. Also, the point of the Oxford Dictionary is that it does notuse Americanised spellings. How could the appearance of 'z' in a such a definition have happened?

It is clear to me that money and effort has going into the production, distribution and promotion, so why scrimp on the editing side of things? I pretty much came acrossall the commonly confused words and grammar mistakes, and this really is not my area atall. (I look forward to the comments pointing out my own errors.) I recognisethat some mistakes are easily made, particularly with computers that think theyknow what you mean before you’ve barely typed it. However a professionalre-reading by someone who really knows about these things - you can get thatdone relatively easily, or get to grips with the issues yourself – it’s yourbusiness. I still have an ancient copy of Bill Bryson’s Troublesome Words, thatwe were made to buy when I started PR training many years ago, and I refer toeven now. And there are many other style guides that cover these wordsmithprinciples.

Sortit out guys, it is the boring stuff of the publishing world, but it’s whatreally sorts out those who know what they are doing. Especially sinceeverything else you are doing is so fantastic.

Use this link to buy a copy of Lynch's Road, D.D. Armstrong.

Book Club: Sunday 25 September 2011

2011-09-05T21:23:00.000+01:00

The September book for the Black Reading Group is ZadieSmith’s Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays. The meeting will be on Sunday 25 September, Waterstone’sPiccadilly branch 5th Floor, at 3pm.

This is an opportunityto savour the work of one the UK’s most impressive writers.

Do by all means readthe whoIe book, but if you read nothing else, please read the followingsections, as they will form the basis of our discussion:

Reading: first chapter(p3-13) Their Eyes were Watching God: What does Soulfful Mean? (about ZoraNeale Hurston's classic book);
Seeing: chapter12 (p182 – 214) a series of film reviews from 2006, that include 50 Cents' Get Rich or Die Tryin and the South African film Tstotsi.
Feeling: (p227-254) A series of memoir pieces about Zadie’s family.)

(Page numbers are from the hardback edition.)

What’s it about?

How did George Eliot’s love life affect her prose? Why didKafka write at three in the morning? In what ways is Barack Obama like ElizaDoolittle? Can you be overdressed for the Oscars? What is Italian Feminism? IfRoland Barthes killed the Author, can Nabokov revive him? What does ‘soulful’mean? Is Date Movie the worst film ever made?

Split into five sections – ‘Reading’, ‘Being’ ‘Seeing’,‘Feeling’ and ‘Remembering’ – Changing My Mind finds Zadie Smith casting anacute eye over material both personal and cultural. This engaging collection ofessays – some published here for the first time – reveals Smith as a passionateand precise essayist, equally at home in the world of great books and badmovies, family and philosophy, British comedians and Italian divas. Whetherwriting of Obama, Katherine Hepburn, Kafka, Anna Magnani or David FosterWallace, she brings a practitioner’s care to the art of criticism, with a styleas sympathetic as it is insightful.

Changing My Mind is journalism at its most expansive,intelligent and funny – a gift to readers writers bother. Within its covers anessay is more than a column of opinions: it’s a space in which to think freely.

About the Author

Zadie Smith was born in north-west London in 1975 and stilllives in the area (and also in the US.) She is the author of White Teeth, TheAutograph Man and On Beauty, and the editor of The Book of Other People, all ofwhich are published by Penguin.

Zadie is a professor in the creative writing department ofNew York City University and also does a monthly book review for Harper’smagazine – the second oldest magazine in the US.

What they say about it

'A sparking collection of Zadie Smith’s non-fiction.'

'A preternaturally gifted writer with a voice that’sstreet-smart and learned, sassy and philosophical all at the same time.’

The New York Times

In a collection of essays on books, films, travel andfamily, Zadie Smith reveals herself to be an invigorating writer ofnon-fiction. ‘This is not the way critics are supposed to comport themselves,’Peter Conrad wrote in the Observer. ‘Smith’s enthusiasm is almost shocking; shebreaks the rules established by the black-gowned, gruel-blooded nerds inuniversities who murder books by dissecting them, reduce poems and novels to textswhich are no more than snarled networks of verbal signals and revengethemselves on the literature they secretly hate by writing badly about it.Reading for Smith is a mind-changing, life-giving, soul-saving affair and hercriticism has a missionary urgency.’

London Review of Books

Newspaper Reviews

The Observer The Telegraph The Independent

First Impressions

I have no idea how it can be that I have arrived atSeptember and only now have selected the work of a Black British woman writerfor the reading group, but there it is. Further, I’ve not selected fictioneither, so that means of all the British authors that we’ve read this year –Colin Grant on The Wailers and John L Williams on Shirley Bassey (bothbiographies), we will not have read any Black British fiction at all this year.It is not deliberate, there is no real plan - except to read work by authors of African descent, or others who write about the people and issues that areof interest to us. So for September the wonderful insight of Zadie Smith, fromher collection of essays including film and book reviews, commentary, travelwriting and memoir on all kinds of topics, is the book.

It is 10 years since Zadie Smith burst into our literarylives with White Teeth (2000), and given that it is a ‘classic’, a style ofbook we have not covered, so far this year at book club either, I could haveselected White Teeth to read. White Teeth had been the subject of book auctionin 1997, on the basis of a few chapters, while Zadie was still a student. Theword is, that Hamish Hamilton got it for £250,000. Since then she has onlypublished two other books The Autograph Man (2002) and On Beauty (2005), andedited a book of short stories The Book of Other People (2007). The selectedbook, Changing My Mind – Occasional Essays, is a series of commissions that shedid for a variety of publications. A book she says ‘… was written without herknowledge.’ Published at the end of 2009, I have chosen it partially because itis her most recent book. The paperback edition was published this June.

I have also selected it for September for a number of otherreasons, it is about writing –and is itself fabulous writing, of course; and inreviewing and commenting on books that she likes and loathes, it is also a bookfor and about readers. That’s what both this blog and the book club is about,the role, thoughts and challenges of the reader.

As I have already intimated selecting books to read eachmonth is not easy – mostly because I have to make a decision. But this bookpicks up on a couple of things that have come up since I have been selectingbooks for the Black Reading Group. One is that people who never come to bookclub, keep asking to read Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.Zadie writes about the book as her first essay here, so that, in my eyes, is acheck in the box for Zora. Since I reckon that most of the people who regularly attend book club have already read Their Eyes Were Watching God, andthey, I think, will prefer to read and discuss things they’ve not read before.Or as in this particular case, have the chance to discuss Zora through the eyes of a contemporary writer.

However, for the book club’s non-attendees it seems to me, abook of essays that you can dip in and out of, that is short bursts of well writteninspiration, should encourage satisfaction. This is a much more achievable read, than our usual 300 page or sonovel, which can be too daunting for many each month.

What do you think? Whether you come to this book club, attend another, or none at all, do let me know.

Interview with Alex Wheatle

2011-08-30T19:59:00.000+01:00

Alex Wheatle’s latest book Brenton Brown is set in Brixton, in south London in the mid-2000s. It is a story of tense, unsettled relationships. In this sequel, set 10 years after his debut Brixton Rock, Alex returns to the admirable hero Brenton, to conclude a fraught tale of love.

Tell us about the themes that inspired Brenton Brown.

Themes of BrixtonRock and its sequel Brenton Brownis trying to come to terms of a nightmare past and attempting to let go of theonly real love one has experienced. I also found it a challenge to write about a taboo love. Incest.

This latest book is part of a sequel did you start with a two-part storyin mind?

When I wrote about Brenton Brown I didn’t expect to be writing a sequel about him someten years later but so many readers of BrixtonRock wanted to know what happened to the main characters.

How did working on this book compare to writing your earlier books?

Working on BrentonBrown was like coming home. Brenton was the first character in my fiction and he’ll always be myfavourite.

How would you say that Brixton has changed since you started writingabout it?

Brixton is much more multi-cultural now. There are small communities of peoplefrom Portugal, North Africa, Eastern Europe, West Africa and other nations. Property prices have shot through theroof and Brixton is slowly being gentrified.

Has any of your friend or family seen themselves in the book?

Yes, a few friends think they are certaincharacters but I steal snippets of quite a few characters I know to build one.

I loved the way that you had a music theme throughout the book, how didyou decide what track went with which person or moment.

I usually write with reggae music in thebackground and sometimes, I might highlight a track I’m listening to at thetime. Nothing is planned.

Which were your favourite tracks?

So many to mention. I particularly like DennisBrown, Barrington Levy, Sugar Minott, Gregory Isaacs and Johnny Osbourne.

What have you been doing to promote Brenton Brown?

A number of bookshop events. I’ll be going on tour with my one-manshow, UPRISING that tells the story behind BrixtonRock and Brenton Brown. It is a remarkable story initself. I had to dust off my oldsound system DJ microphone and start spitting lyrics the way I did as ateenager.

What is your favourite part of Brenton Brown?

I guess the flashbacks to Brenton’s childhood. Veryreal.

Do you plan to use any of the characters in future books?

Probably – I have a habit of doing that.

What other art forms influence or inspire your writing life?

Reggae, films, theatre, art, rapping, anddancehall - the list is endless.

When I first met you, you were in conversation with the author CourttiaNewland about Urban Fiction, neither of you were convinced about that phrase,how did the event end up with title?

Not sure how the event ended up with the urbantitle. For me I think it’s a toonarrow description of what I offer as a writer.

What does Urban Fiction mean to you?

I think many people regard ‘urban fiction’ asblack street fiction which again, I believe is a too narrow term to describe mywriting. I have set stories in theJamaican countryside and the Surrey Hills. Yes, I write about a particular part of South London, butCharles Dickens wrote about a particular slice of London in a few of hisbooks. No one has labeled him anurban writer.

Have you ever discussed Urban Fiction with any of the black womenwriters who have written about contemporary life in London [eg Zadie Smith/AndreaLevy/Diana Evans etc]

Never had a conversation or even metZadie. Had a single reading eventwith Andrea many years ago. Onlymet Diana very briefly a couple of times. Not enough time to discuss contemporary life in London. Black writers should be known forwriting anything, whether it be literary fiction, crime, sci-fi, children’sfiction, biographies, chick lit, whatever.

What is your ideal writing environment?

Sit down at my dining table, reggae in thebackground and away I go.

What books did you enjoy as a child/teenager?

Huckleberry Finn, Ivanhoe, boys adventure stories. Then at around seven I discovered football and cricket.

What book do you wish you had written?

Oh man! If I were pushed I would say The Black Jacobins by CLR JAMES.

What’s your favourite book?

So many to mention. At the moment I’m really enjoying the biography Life: Keith Richards.

Which writers inspire you?

Courttia Newland, John Steinbeck, ChesterHimes, Alan Sillitoe, Roddy Doyle, Richard Wright…so many.

Did you study writing?

Nope, never studied writing. I left formal education at 15.

What would you say to encourage new writers?

Persevere, that’s half the battle.

What are you working on now?

A children’s fantasy series.

When will the film [of Brixton Rock] be out?

Subject to funding and so many other things. Brixton Rock, the play, will probablycome first. Patricia Cumper, whoalso did the adaptation of Small Islandfor radio, is adapting it.

Suggest a book that you think that The Black Reading Group could read.

Oh man! Her name escapes me... Yvvette something. She was just long-listed for the Booker Prize. Greatachievement. (A Cupboard Full of Coats – Black Book News interview here.)

What question should I have asked you, and what is the answer?

How did I become a writer?

Answer? Check out my UPRISING show to find out.

(Alex’sshow UPRISING marks the 30th anniversary of the Brixton riots, where he willtell his moving autobiographical story of how he became a writer.

11-14October, The Albany, Deptford )

The theme of Lime’s September 2011 is Knowledge is Power and thequestion is What do you know now about writing that you wish you had learnedwhen you first started out?

Do not waste words. If you can say what you want to say in ten words don’t do itin twenty.

An edited version of this interview is in the September edition of Lime magazine.

Four Women-For Women: Black Women All Grown Up

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Nina Simone

I just received the email below from US based Debra Powell Wright. Debra, who has won a grant to publish a book of short stories and poems from black women around the world. She’s still hoping for more contributors and all the contact details to find out more and contact her are in the links below. (Submissions need to be in at the end of this month.) The book, to be called Four Women - For Women: Black Women All Grown Up is inspired by Nina Simone’s 1966 song For Women. Each verse tells the stories of black women’s pain, struggles and search for freedom. Hip Hop performer and poet Talib Kweli has also paid tribute to Nina, with a cover version of the song.

Sounds like it will be afantastic project and book. With all best wishes to Debra, and I do hope thatsome of you reading this will contribute too.

Greetings, I am excited to announcethat I've received a grant from Leeway Foundation for publication of acollection of short stories and poems (see below).
Have you written ashort story, or are you about to write a poem that might fit into my upcoming"For Women" collection? For this collection, where you're fromreally does matter. I'm looking for writing that places Black women inlocales around the world--from Tennessee to Tanzania, Mississippi to Mali,Georgia to Jamaica, Brooklyn to Brixton, and everywhere in between. Essays and poems should demonstrate a clear cultural aestheticwith particular customs relative to those locations, whileaddressing issues around relationships with men, children, other women, love,pain, beauty, sex, loneliness--you get the picture. Take a momentto listen to Nina Simone's "Four Women" or Talib Kweli's"For Women" (if you haven't already done so) and read between thelines for ideas about the topical range of writing being sought for thispublication. Submission deadline:August 31st. Questions: email me at mzwrightnow@msn.com or call 267-334-1526. And please pass theword if you know anyone who might be interested.

Details of the grant to Debra: Leeway Foundation

Debra’s own short story FourWomen--For Women: Black Women All Grown Up has been featured in theanthology edited by Dr. Carol E. Henderson: Imagining the Black Female Body

Nina Simone: For Women : Watch the video

My skin is black

My arms are long

My hair is woolly

My back is strong

Strong enough to take thepain

Inflicted again and again

What do they call me?

My name is AUNT SARAH

My name is Aunt Sarah

Aunt Sarah

My skin is yellow

My hair is long

Between two worlds

I do belong

My father was rich andwhite

He forced my mother lateone night

What do they call me?

My name is SAFFRONIA

My name is Saffronia

My skin is tan

My hair is fine

My hips invite you

My mouth is like wine

Whose little girl am I?

Anyone who has money tobuy

What do they call me?

My name is SWEET THING

My name is Sweet Thing

My skin is brown

my manner is tough

I'll kill the firstmother I see

my life has to been toorough

I'm awfully bitter thesedays

because my parents wereslaves

What do they call me?

My name is PEACHES

Talib Kweli Watch the video The Lyrics

Don't Miss: Random, 23 August, Channel 4

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I saw this play, Random, at the Royal Court and thought itwas the most amazing and affecting story. Set in one day it is shows the everyday routine of a family before and after they hear the about the random way inwhich their son has been taken from them. On stage it was performed solely byNadine Marshall, who plays the part again on TV in this Channel 4 film. I leftthe theatre wondering how she’d been able to inhabit such different characters sostrongly and movingly. Totally gripping. She barely moved from the centre ofthe stage. It was an enthralling performance, and I was sorry to have missed itwhen it did a short run in a shop at Elephant & Castle. By all accountsthat performance, with the real sounds of London intruding into the performancewas amazing. The writer Debbie Tucker Green is an acclaimed playwright, focusedon depicting black life and this is her directorial debut, which will also premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. Her next play at the Royal Court, Truthand Reconciliation runs from 1-24 September.

Don’t miss it: Tuesday 23 August Channel 4 at 10pm.

Buy a copy of the play: Random

BBC Interview with Nadine Marshall and Debbie Tucker Green

Book the new play: Truth and Reconciliation at the RoyalCourt Theatre