Karina Literary Award

SA Book Awards 2025 Shortlist announced

We are delighted to announce that the SA Book Awards 2025 Adult Fiction Shortlist includes The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown! Congratulations, Andrew, and all other shortlisted authors!

OFFICIAL PRESS RELEASE

SA Book Awards celebrates 25 years by announcing the 2025 Shortlist

This year marks the 25th annual SA Book Awards, powered by NielsenIQ BookData and supported by PASA and SA Booksellers Association. The awards strive to celebrate books written and published in South Africa, as voted for by South African booksellers and last year recognised authors Deon Meyer, André de Ruyter and Zandile Ndhlovu.

Booksellers have voted in their hundreds for their favourite titles in three categories from a longlist of bestselling titles published in South Africa and written by South African authors, as measured by NielsenIQ BookScan South Africa in 2024.

We are delighted to share the shortlisted titles as chosen by booksellers below:

Fiction Prize

A Short Life – Nicky Greenwall

Spud: The Reunion – John van de Ruit

The Bitterness of Olives – Andrew Brown

The Lost Love of Akbar Manzil – Shubnum Khan

The Tea Merchant – Jackie Phamotse

Non–Fiction Prize

Capitec: Stalking Giants – T.J. Strydom

Disciple: Walking with God – Rorisang Thandekiso & Nkhensani Manabe

Exit Wounds: A Story of Love, Loss and Occasional Wars – Peter Godwin

How Did We Get Here? – Mpoomy Ledwaba

Zapiro Annual 2024: Have I Got GNUs For You – Zapiro

Children’s Prize

Cook–off at Gogo’s Spaza:(Disaster at Gogo’s Spaza 2) – Salamina Mosese, illustrated by Vian Oelofsen

Into the Uncut Grass – Trevor Noah, illustrated by Sabina Hahn

My First South African Animals – Van den Berg

Springboekie – Fanie Viljoen, illustrated by Elsabe Ebersohn

The Speedy Six Olympics – Roslynne Toerien, illustrated by Julie Smith–Belton

Each category winner will be awarded R5,000.00 and the overall winner, receiving the highest number of votes, will be presented with R20,000.00.

This year, to celebrate the 25–year Anniversary of the SA Book Awards we also asked booksellers to vote for their favourite title from the list of previous Overall Winners.

Celebrating 25 Years: Favourite previous winner shortlist:

Born a Crime – Trevor  Noah (2017 and 2020)

How many ways to say Hello? – Refiloe Moahloli (2021)

Leo – Deon Meyer (2024)

Manage your Money – Sam Beckbessinger (2019)

Recipes for Love and Murder – Sally Andrew (2016)

Spud – John van de Ruit (2006)

The President’s Keeper – Jacques Pauw (2018)

On winning last year’s Fiction and Overall Prize for Leo, Deon Meyer said: “I am deeply honoured and grateful to receive the two awards bestowed by the South African booksellers. This recognition means the world to me, and I extend my heartfelt thanks to the association’s members who have supported my journey as an author over the past thirty years. Their acknowledgment inspires me to keep telling stories that connect and resonate.”

We wish all the shortlisted authors the warmest of congratulations and the very best of luck! The winners will be announced at a virtual ceremony and on social media on Tuesday 23 September 2025. All are welcome to join the ceremony, for more information email: marketing.book@nielseniq.com

To read our special anniversary article: Celebrating 25 years of South African literature, visit: NielsenIQ

Karina Author, Book, Festival

Karavan Press at Books on the Bay 2025

Please join us between 14 and 16 March 2025 for Books on the Bay, a wonderful celebration of local literature and inspiration, now in its third year.

Karavan Press authors participating:

Saturday, 15 March 2025

10:15-11:00 METHODIST CHURCH

In the famous words of Lorrie Moore, “A short story is a love affair, a novel is a marriage.” Award-winning short story exponents Dawn Garisch and Diane Awerbuck discuss with Bongani Kona the joys and challenges of their relationship with the alluring genre.

13:15-14:15 METHODIST CHURCH

The art of memoir: Anthony Akerman, Lucky Bastard; Thobeka Yose, In Silence My Heart Speaks; Julia Martin, The Blackridge House. Led by Jo-Anne Richards, three leading exponents reflect on life-writing and the life-changing process of memoir writing.

Sunday, 16 March 2025

9:00-10:00 TOWN HALL

Karen Jennings – Crooked Seeds, longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction

11:30-12:30 TOWN HALL

Andrew Brown – The Bitterness of Olives: In this remarkable novel set in Gaza City, Andrew Brown – current Sunday Times Fiction Award holder – explores a complex friendship battered by political forces. In conversation with Michele Magwood.

Karina Author, Book, Event, Literary Award, Prize

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!

Karina Author, Book, Literary Awards, Prize

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.

Karina Author, Book, Literary Awards, Prize

The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown shortlisted for the Sunday Times Fiction Prize

The shortlists of the 2024 Sunday Times Literary Awards have been announced today and The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown features on the Fiction Prize shortlist.

Fiction Prize Criteria

The winner should be a novel of rare imagination and style, evocative, textured and a tale so compelling as to become an enduring landmark of contemporary fiction.

Judges:

Siphiwo Mahala
Dr Alma-Nelisha Cele
Michele Magwood

CHAIR OF JUDGES SIPHIWO MAHALA SAYS:

The judging panel approached the books entered for this year’s Fiction Prize with a keen interest to delve into a world of the unknown. In turn, we were introduced to a kaleidoscopic array of writing from both the seasoned and emerging writers alike. The result was a pleasantly edifying and exhilarating experience, as reading these novels was embarking on a journey punctuated with diverse themes, surprising and experimental narrative styles and boundless imagery. The wide range of settings, encompassing familiar and unfamiliar locations, bears testament to the universality of our stories and illustrate that our narratives transcend the realist preoccupations with the present moment. These five shortlisted novels, each in its own unique way, represent masterful works of rare, unfettered and powerful imagination. 

Here is the fiction shortlist in order of the author’s surname:

  • Buried Treasure by Sven Axelrad (Umuzi)
  • The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown (Karavan Press)
  • The Egg Dilemma by Morabo Morojele (Jacana)
  • The Institute for Creative Dying by Jarred Thompson (Picador Africa)
  • Mirage by David Ralph Viviers (Umuzi)

The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown (Karavan Press)
Written before the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip on October 7, Brown’s latest novel is set against the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A retired detective in Tel Aviv and Palestinian doctor in Gaza with a shared past, must resolve their differences to investigate a murder. 
Judges said: A harrowing account of a moment of strife, beautifully told. The author, endowed with vivid imagination coupled with acumen and erudition, deftly immerses the reader in a brutal and bewildering landscape. A wholly sublime narrative, this novel is contemporaneous, daring, complex and aesthetically pleasing.

Read the full press release here: Sunday Times

Karina Author, Book, Literary Awards

The 2024 Sunday Times Literary Awards Fiction longlist

The 2024 Sunday Times Literary Awards longlists have been announced on Sunday, and the Fiction Prize longlist features four Karavan Press titles as well as one title we distribute locally:

Congratulations to Mike, Andrew, Sarah, Nick, Lethu and all other longlisted Authors!

FICTION PRIZE

This is the 21st year of the Sunday Times fiction prize. The criteria stipulate that the winning novel should be one of “rare imagination and style … a tale so compelling as to become an enduring landmark of contemporary fiction”.

JUDGES

Siphiwo Mahala – Chair

Mahala is an award-winning author, playwright and academic, with a PhD in English Literature. He is the author of the novel, When a Man Cries (2007), two short story collections, African Delights and Red Apple Dreams and Other Stories, and two critically acclaimed plays, The House of Truth and Bloke and His American Bantu. His latest book Can Themba: The Making and Breaking of the Intellectual Tsotsi (2022), won the Creative Non-Fiction Award at the SA Literary Awards. He is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Johannesburg, Senior Fellow at the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study and editor of Imbiza Journal for African Writing.

Michele Magwood

In her long career Magwood has worked in radio, magazines and television and for 20 years was the Books Editor of the Sunday Times. She is the winner of two Mondi awards and the SALA award for literary journalism. A sought-after interviewer at book festivals, she currently works as a writer and editor and assesses manuscripts for publishers. She writes a books column for Business Day Wanted magazine. Magwood has a BA Honours degree from UKZN.

Dr Alma-Nalisha Cele

Cele is an experienced doctor with a demonstrated history of working in the pharmaceutical & health care industry. She is skilled in clinical skills, quality patient care, analytical skills, communication, and medicine. She holds a Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery – MBBCH focused in Medicine from University of the Witwatersrand and a postgraduate diploma (cum laude) in medicine development at University of Stellenbosch. She is also the co-founder of The Cheeky Natives, a literary podcast primarily focused on the review, curatorship and archiving of black literature. In 2019, she was named one of the Mandela Washington Fellows to undertake a prestigious fellowship in the United States. She was also named one of the Mail & Guardian’s top 200 Young South Africans in 2019.

Karina Author, Book, Festival

Karavan Press at the Kingsmead Book Fair 2024

We are all looking forward to the next Kingsmead Book Fair, taking place at Kingsmead College on Saturday, 25 May 2024. Hope to see you there!

09:30-10:30 | Mackenzie 2

Dawn Garisch (What Remains) confirms, with Diane Awerbuck (Inside your body there are flowers), Frankie Murrey (Everyone Dies: A Series), Alex Latimer (Love Stories for Ghosts), and Barbara Ludman (Moving On), that brevity is the soul of wit. And drama. And romance.

09:30-10:30 | Mackenzie 3

Fiona Snyckers (The Hidden) asks Owen Salmon (A Weakness to Die For) and Andrew Brown (The Bitterness of Olives) to unpack the male gaze in storytelling.

12:30 – 13:30 | Music Centre
Georgina Geddes asks Alistair Mackay (The Child), Craig Higginson (The Ghost of Sam Webster), Shubnum Khan (The Lost Love of Akbar Manzil) and Amy Heydenrych (Bad Luck Penny) what it is that makes stories ‘literary’.

12:30 – 13:30 | Chapel

Diane Awerbuck (Inside your body there are flowers) answers the call of nature with Adam Welz (The End of Eden), and Nick Norman (The Woodpecker Mystery: The Inevitability of the Improbable).

12:30 – 13:30 | Mornington

Kate Sidley (Katie Gayle – Julia Bird Mysteries) asks Saaleha Bhamjee (Home Scar), Anna Stroud (Who Looks Inside) and Janine Jellars (When the Filter Fades) what it takes to really own your writing space as a woman.

14:30 – 15:30 | Mornington
Amy Heydenrych (Chasing Marian, Bad Luck Penny) sees if she can find a reason why the characters created by Ashling McCarthy (Down at Jika Jika Tavern), Marina Auer (Double Edged), Femi Kayode (Gaslight) and Natalie Conyer (Present Tense) need to worry about their welfare.

16:00 – 17:00 | Lange Hall
Police reservist Andrew Brown (The Bitterness of Olives) guides Daniel Steyn (The Thabo Bester Story), Naledi Shange (Killer Cop – The Rosemary Ndlovu Story), Karl Kemp (Why We Kill: Mob Justice and the New Vigilantism in South Africa) and Nechama Brodie (Domestic Terror) into the minds of murderers both famous and anonymous.

16:00 – 17:00 | Music Centre

Alex Latimer (Love Stories for Ghosts) discovers if the future is fantastic or frightening with Mandla Moyo (The Fallen Angel), Sarah M Naidoo (A Remedy for Death), Alistair Mackay (The Child) and Babette Gallard (Future Imperfect).

Full programme:

KBF 2024

Tickets:

Webtickets