Looking for fabulous reads during the festive season for yourself and your loved-reading-ones? Here is a great guide: The Book Lounge’s FESTIVE READING GUIDE
The following Karavan Press & Friends titles feature:
Happy browsing, books shopping and reading!
The iLembe Book Festival (IBF) is a collaborative literary event that brings together readers, writers, and creatives from the iLembe District Municipality and surrounding communities. The festival features panel discussions, a school outreach programme, poetry workshops, and a slam poetry event, all aimed at fostering a deeper appreciation for literature and the spoken word.
This year’s festival is taking place on Saturday, 25 October 2025. Karen Jennings and Andile Cele feature on the programme. For more details, see: iLembe Book Festival.
The first weekend of September is Open Book Festival time (5-7 September 2025), and we – Karavan Press, Holland House Books and our wonderful authors – are thrilled to be part of these inspiring, thought-provoking and soul-restoring conversations.
Karavan Press author Nick Mulgrew is also in town for the festival, but will be wearing his publisher’s hat for the occasion and participating in a celebration of ten years of uHlanga Press. Congratulations, uHlanga, Nick and all your amazing poets. Every uHlanga poetry collection is a celebration of beauty and our humanity. Thank you for ten years of outstanding publishing!
Stellenbosch University, Department of English
DATE: THURSDAY, 28 AUGUST 2025
TIME: 12:10 – 13:10
VENUE: THE YELLOW MOLTENO
The Sunday Times Literary Awards longlists have been announced and we are delighted that they feature five Karavan Press titles. Congratulations to all longlisted authors!
Thank you to all who make these awards possible!
Mountains of gratitude to Karavan Press authors on the lists:
FICTION
Crooked Seeds by Karen Jennings (co-published with Holland House Books)
Who Looks Inside by Anna Stroud
Good Hope by Nick Clelland
NON-FICTION
In Silence My Heart Speaks by Thobeka Yose
Dayspring by C. J. Driver (co-published with uHlanga Press)
For all details, see: Sunday Times Literary Awards
A wonderful opportunity to meet and engage with Andile Cele, the author of Braids & Migraines, published by Holland House Books and distributed in South Africa by Karavan Press and Protea Distribution.
Saturday, 21 June, 10:30 to 12:30 at Woman Zone Library, Artscape
Happy publication day to Andile Cele and Holland House Books! Today, Andile’s debut novel, Braids & Migraines, runner-up in The Island Prize for unpublished African novelists 2023, is officially making its way into the world. Together with Protea Distribution, we are delighted to be the South African distribution partner for the moving debut novel. Please join us on Thursday, 24 April 2025, for the Cape Town launch of Braids & Migraines at The Book Lounge. Andile will be in conversation with Karen Jennings, founder of The Island Prize. Can’t wait!
WE ARE DELIGHTED TO ANNOUNCE THAT KARAVAN PRESS IS THE SOUTH AFRICAN DISTRIBUTION PARTNER FOR BRAIDS & MIGRAINES BY ANDILE CELE, RUNNER-UP FOR THE ISLAND PRIZE 2023.
ABOUT THE BOOK
“A novel of insight and emotion. Cele has the talent to both shatter and uplift, making her an invaluable new voice in South African literature.” The Island Prize Judges
“The beauty of this novel is that while it takes a close-up look at human strife, in doing so it shines a light on the humanity we all share.” From the Foreword by Rachel Edwards
When Nomandla is awarded a scholarship to attend the prestigious Cameron House for Girls in Durban, she thinks her life will improve. Instead it falls apart. Growing up in Ziyabuya township, Nomandla battles poverty, racism, and her own mental health. She is pursued by visions which result in her being hospitalised, and is then made to accompany her father on Saturdays to his gardening job at the home of the Smith family. It is here that she first encounters Casey, a girl who will play a significant role in turning her life upside down, destroying her hope of a better future. Meanwhile, at Cameron House, Nomandla learns that, as a scholarship girl, she is expected to showcase gratitude as well as her culture, being regarded as little more than a display of transformation, unity and acceptance. Unfortunately, the reality is very different.
Andile Cele’s beautiful debut novel considers the complexities around identity, its ties to shame, grief, and to South Africa’s painful history. Braids & Migraines follows Nomandla as she comes to a place of personal understanding and acceptance, without compromise.
South African distribution partner: Karavan Press
Publisher: Holland House Books, UK
Publication date: 17 April 2025
ISBN: 978-1-7391047-6-4
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ANDILE CELE is a writer and communications specialist, born and raised in Stanger, KwaZulu-Natal. She was born in 1986, when apartheid was nearing its end – to a mother who has worked as a domestic worker all her adult life. She has three siblings; one of them, a brother, is autistic and nonverbal. Andile’s advocacy for mental health awareness stems from the experiences they faced as a family – with a member who was and still is, for the most part, misunderstood. Andile has a degree in Journalism from the Tshwane University of Technology, and a Creative Writing and Theory of Literature degree from the University of South Africa. She is an MA candidate at Stellenbosch University, where she is examining the depiction of intergenerational trauma in selected South African women’s writing. She is the current holder of the Gwen Knowles-Williams Bursary, administered by the English Academy of Southern Africa. She dedicates her writing to her mother. Her short fiction has been published in Botsotso and Short.Sharp.Stories.
The 2025 Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist has been announced and we are thrilled to share the news that Crooked Seeds by Karen Jennings is among the sixteen nominated titles.
The full list in alphabetical order by author surname is:
Congratulations, Karen and all other longlisted authors!
Deidre, the “compelling”, in Hedley Twidle’s words, protagonist of Crooked Seeds by Karen Jennings, had her first official outing in her hometown, Cape Town, last night at The Book Lounge. The bookshop was filled with writers and readers who wished Deidre – this broken, fascinating, difficult character – well. “She is horrific,” the author said about her creation, “but I loved writing her.” And she emphasised that no matter how difficult certain aspect of the novel are to read, Crooked Seeds is her love song for South Africa, a country she cares about deeply: “I am in awe of our resilience, and the people who are saving communities, caring for others, despite all the failures of the officials.”
“She is a word surgeon,” Mervyn said of Karen in the introduction to the evening. She is indeed. And Dr Karen Jennings is also a hermit by her own admission, finding “all my writing a never-ending hell. At some point in my life,” she said, “I must have signed a contract with the devil. I asked to be a writer, and I was granted the wish, but I did not read the small print, which said: you will be a writer, but you will be in agony from now on.” Agony and all, she hasn’t lost her humour. And her exquisite writing is a precious gift to our literary world.
Thank you, Karen, for writing another incisive, stunning novel and for being the wonderful person you are. Thank you to Hedley and The Book Lounge team for all the incredible support. To all who were there: mountains of gratitude!
Dear Readers,
May Deidre make you feel, and think about our own fragility and brokenness. She is impossible to ignore …
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