Celebration!
Please join us at The Book Lounge for a celebration of Andrew Brown’s The Bitterness of Olives, winner of the 2024 Sunday Times Fiction Prize.
The Book Lounge is where the story of the publication of this novel with Karavan Press began (join us for the celebration to hear the details) and where the book was officially launched in October last year. Since its publications, The Bitterness of Olives has been offering its readers a deeply empathetic insight into a turbulent history that continues to tragically unfold in front of our eyes. Earlier this month, the bestselling novel has been recognised with the prestigious Sunday Times Fiction Prize.
The Sunday Times Fiction Prize judges called it a “contemporaneous, daring, complex and aesthetically pleasing novel”.
It will be a great joy to celebrate this exquisite book and its wonderful author at the bookshop where it all started!
We hope to see you all there!
Dawn Garisch wins the Nadine Gordimer Short Story Award for her collection, What Remains
We are delighted to announce that Dawn Garisch won SALA‘s Nadine Gordimer Short Story Award 2024 for her collection, What Remains! This is the second prestigious award for What Remains. It also won the HSS Award for Best Fiction Short Stories earlier this year. Congratulations Dawn and What Remains!
The Nadine Gordimer Short Story Award is one of the South African Literature Awards (SALA). This year, two other Karavan Press titles featured on the SALA shortlists: Sipho Banda’s A Crowded Lonely Walk was nominated for the Poetry Award, and Diane Awerbuck’s Inside your body there are flowers was also nominated for Nadine Gordimer Short Story Award. Congratulations to all nominated writers and books! And thank you, Dawn, Sipho and Diane for your amazing contributions to short story writing and poetry.
For the full announcement of this year’s SALA winners, please see: “SALA announces 2024 winners” (LitNet)
Festival of Poetry 2024: 9 November at Bertha House
Please join us for the second day of this year’s Festival of Poetry at Bertha House on Saturday, 9 November, between 11AM and 3.30PM. Looking forward to seeing you there!
11:00 – 11:45
12:00 – 12:45
13:15 – 14:30
14:45 – 15:30
The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown wins the 2024 Sunday Times Fiction Prize
We are thrilled to announce that The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown won the 2024 Sunday Times Fiction Prize. The judges called it a “contemporaneous, daring, complex and aesthetically pleasing novel”. Congratulations, Andrew! And thank you – for writing, for sharing this story with your readers, for publishing it with Karavan Press.
‘Why can you not be friends anymore?’
It was the story of his country, he supposed. Perhaps they could have been friends. Perhaps they were once. The reasons were complex, full of feeling, disappointment, resentment. And, of course, betrayal. This was the Middle East after all.
Avi Dahan, a retired detective mourning his beloved wife in Tel Aviv, and Khalid Mansour, a Palestinian doctor confronting the precarious reality of living in Gaza City, are still reeling from the political fallout that jeopardised their delicate friendship. When a mysterious corpse scarred by history and forbidden love shows up in Khalid’s emergency room, he reaches out to Avi for help. Though the detective is the only one who might be able to assist, he is the last person on earth to agree …
The stage is set for Andrew Brown’s unforgettable new novel, The Bitterness of Olives.
Did it really matter? In the face of chaos, was it important how she had died? That was the guidance he needed from Avi now. He needed to understand that question: did it matter anymore? Was it of any significance, how you died in a war?
ISBN: 978-1-7764581-2-7
Kindle: The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown
ANDREW BROWN is an advocate and a sergeant in the saps reserves and police liaison officer for the Child Protection Unit at Red Cross Children’s Hospital. He is the author of two non-fiction books and five novels, including Coldsleep Lullaby, winner of the Sunday Times Prize for Fiction in 2006, and Refuge, shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Literature (Africa Region) in 2009. Street Blues: The Experiences of a Reluctant Policeman was shortlisted for the Sunday Times Alan Paton Award the same year. Andrew’s books are published in Germany, the Netherlands and the USA. He has three children and lives in Cape Town.
Karavan Press title: Self-portrait of a Guava by Lucienne Argent
Self-portrait of a Guava
Lucienne Argent
Is it a special occasion? Do you deserve a treat? Stew me on the stove. Drain my pips out with a sieve. Mix me with some whipped cream. Add granadilla or just juice. It’s me that you have waited for. It’s me, I am your treat. It’s me that you have waited for, a guava-pink mousse.
“It’s magnificent—quirky, original, young, funny, touching.” FINUALA DOWLING
Author photograph: Sam Wells
LUCIENNE ARGENT is a Cape Town-based writer, artist, and counsellor. In her previous lives, she worked in historical research and online education. She has poems published in the Sol Plaatje European Union Anthology, Stanzas, Think of a Poem and on the AVBOB Poetry website. She also has a short story in Karavan Press’s Tiger anthology. Self-portrait of a Guava is her first poetry collection. She writes about everyday things, like mugs, rocks, fruit, babies, and colonoscopies.
Publisher: Karavan Press
Publication date: December 2024
ISBN: 978-1-0672224-5-1
Author: Lucienne Argent
LUCIENNE ARGENT is a Cape Town-based writer, artist, and counsellor. In her previous lives, she worked in historical research and online education. She has poems published in the Sol Plaatje European Union Anthology, Stanzas, Think of a Poem and on the AVBOB Poetry website. She also has a short story in Karavan Press’s Tiger anthology. Self-portrait of a Guava is her first poetry collection. She writes about everyday things, like mugs, rocks, fruit, babies, and colonoscopies.
Author photograph: Sam Wells
New edition of a cherished novel, The Good Cemetery Guide by Consuelo Roland
THE GOOD CEMETERY GUIDE
CONSUELO ROLAND
SHORTLISTED FOR THE SUNDAY TIMES FICTION PRIZE
ANTHONY LOXTON, reluctant third-generation funeral director by day, is by night Tony the Fox, a guitarist in the bars of Kalk Bay. It looks like there’s no escape from the burden of the past. But when Lily, Tony’s one-night stand, arrives in a body bag at the Loxton Funeral Parlour, he surprises himself by breaking his own rules.
As the boundaries separating the two worlds he has created for himself collapse, Anthony’s journey of self-discovery begins, accompanied by a cast of unforgettable characters. A chain of events takes him to the edge of tragedy and disaster and back again. He discovers that the living are more fragile than the dead and that joy can arise in the most unlikely circumstances.
PRAISE FOR THE BOOK
‘Remarkable … The needs of the dead and those of the living are superbly captured.’ BEVERLEY ROOS MULLER, Cape Argus
‘’n Heerlike boek om jou te laat lag, dink, gril en weer lag.’ MADELEINE ROUX, Volksblad
‘You can smell the sea, hear the 4.30 train to Muizenberg and feel the grit in your eyes when the South-Easter picks up. Highly recommended.’ BARRY TYSON, The Other Guide
‘… the story is eccentrically funny with a chorus of marvellous characters and a cheering resolution … an irresistible tale of human possibility.’ MICHELE MAGWOOD, Sunday Times
‘… dis ’n juweel van ’n boek.’ MADELEINE VAN BILJON, Beeld
‘Unputdownable.’ MANU, Goodreads
CONSUELO ROLAND is a South African author. The new edition of her acclaimed debut, The Good Cemetery Guide, is now available from Karavan Press. With her subsequent novels in the Limbo Trilogy, she continues her exploration of human relationships and the power of possibility. Her poetry and prose appear in various journals and anthologies. She lives with her family in Hout Bay, a coastal town on the Cape Peninsula.
Publisher: Karavan Press
Publication date: November 2024
ISBN: 978-1-0672224-8-2
Kindle: The Good Cemetery Guide
(First published by Double Storey Books, 2005)
Karavan Press at Madibaland @ BookBedonnerd Literary Festival, Richmond Book Town
The Karavan is hitting the road and celebrating all things literary in the wonderful Book Town of Richmond at the end of October/beginning of November. It is time for Madibaland @ BookBedonnerd Literary Festival again and we hope to see many of your there.
Karavan Press titles on the programme:
THURSDAY, 31 OCTOBER 2024
| 08h00 – 08h55 | COFFEE & WRITING WORKSHOP WITH KARINA M. SZCZUREK |
| 12h10 – 12h35 | Michael Boyd, The Weight of Shade |
| 12h35 – 13h00 | Thobeka Yose, In Silence my Heart Speaks |
FRIDAY, 1 NOVEMBER 2024
| 08h00 – 08h55 | COFFEE & WRITING WORKSHOP WITH KARINA M. SZCZUREK |
SATURDAY, 2 NOVEMBER 2024
| 14h00 – 14h30 | C. J. Driver, Dayspring |
| 14h30 – 15h00 | Gail Gilbride, Cat Therapy |
To see the exciting list of all participants, click here: Authors
For the full programme, click here: BookBedonnerd Literary Festival
karavanpress.com 