WEALTH OF IDEAS

Stories Invited for a Zimbabwean Short Story Collection amaBooks Publishers are planning a collection of Zimbabwean short stories, to be published in 2017.  We are inviting submissions by February 14, 2017. There are no restrictions on the length of the stories, and there is no particular theme. Stories for consideration should be emailed as Word attachments, with no artwork or photographs included, to amabooksbyo@gmail.com . Unfortunately, we will be unable to give feedback on those stories that are not accepted for publication. The writers whose work is accepted will each receive a copy of the book and they will retain copyright of their stories. The previous collections of short writings published by amaBooks include Where to Now? Short Stories from Zimbabwe , Long Time Coming: Short Writings from Zimbabwe and Short Writings from Bulawayo I , II and III . Where to Now? was co-published by Parthian Books in the UK and Long Time Coming was selected by New In...

The book launched in Harare at the Zimbabwe International Book Fair. Although I was not there to witness this birth, the first copies fell into the hands of friends Memory Chirere and Ignatius Mabasa, shown in the pictures above, standing with the book's editor, Emmanuel Makadho, on the right. This is important because Chirere and Mabasa are some of the friends who pushed me to consider publishing the Mukoma stories in a collection. Nearly all the stories in the book were originally published in American literary journals, so this puts them in one book, under one title. A Brief History of the Mukoma project The oldest story in the collection, "The Bull of Mototi", was written in 1997 in a journal book. In the original version of the story, the then nameless narrator is asked by a friend at the Students Union cafe at the University of Zimbabwe to talk about his childhood in Mazvihwa, Zvishavane, and he goes on to tell this specific story, before the two friends fini...

And here are the details from the Caine Prize website: The shortlist for the 2013 Caine Prize for African Writing has been announced today (Wednesday 15 May) – and among the five stories chosen are an unprecedented four Nigerian entries.   The Chair of judges, art historian and broadcaster, Gus Casely-Hayford said, “The shortlist was selected from 96 entries from 16 African countries. They are all outstanding African stories that were drawn from an extraordinary body of high quality submissions.”   Gus described the shortlist saying, “The five contrasting titles interrogate aspects of things that we might feel we know of Africa – violence, religion, corruption, family, community – but these are subjects that are deconstructed and beautifully remade. These are challenging, arresting, provocative stories of a continent and its descendants captured at a time of burgeoning change.”   The winner of the £10,000 prize is to be announced at a celebratory dinner at the B...

Joe Melia reports that the 2012 Bristol Short Story Prize is now open.  Melia writes, "Stories can be entered online or by post. The closing date for entries is 31st March 2012. Please read the rules and competition details before entering." The First prize is £1,000.  Twenty stories will be published in the Bristol Short Story Prize Anthology Volume 5. The winning story will, also, be published in Bristol Review of Books and Venue magazine. The 2012 Bristol Short Story Prize awards ceremony will be the final event of our 2 nd ShortStoryVille festival which will be held next July. The 2012 judging panel will be chaired by former Random House editor, Ali Reynolds, who now runs her own Literary Consultancy in Bristol. Ali will be joined on the panel by the writer broadcaster and critic, Bidisha , Anna Britten, writer and contributing editor to Venue magazine, and the celebrated novelist, Chris Wakling , whose latest novel ‘What I Did’ was published by John Murr...

I just receieved my contributor's copy of this new collection of short stories by African writers. Published in the United States by Africa World Press (Trenton, NJ), the collection contains works by writers from 15 African countries. Going down the Contents pages, I see three writers from Zimbabwe, three from Cameroon, thirteen from Nigeria, four from South Africa, five from Morocco, and so on. I recognize some of the names, and a few are my friends: Eresina Hwede (Zimbabwe), Prince Mensah (Ghana), and Temitayo Olofinlua (Nigeria). In all, there are forty-eight (48) writers in the anthology. Basically, this a collection of African flash fiction since the stories are around 800-900 words long. The book was edited by Dike Okoro, professor of English and World Literature at Olive-Harvey College, Chicago. My story is an excerpt from one of my Mukoma stories entitled "A Long Night". The range of issues covered by the stories is wide, but what's more impressive is how th...

At 1196 pages, The Complete Stories of J.G. Ballard has to be the longest short story collection I have ever read. It contains 94 stories, and comes at a time of renewed interest in the short story. I am going to review this book for the Sacramento or San Francisco Book Review , but for now, here are some details from W.W. Norton & Company, the publisher. Ballard passed away in April after a long battle with cancer, so this book comes as a perfect way to commemorate his fiction career. The stories span from 1956 to around 1996. Admired by authors like kingsley Amis, Martin Amis, Graham Greene, Anthony Burgess, Susan Sontag, Ballard is credited with having invented cyberpunk and his novels and short fiction have influenced speculative fiction, but there is a literary quality to his "earnest, thoughtful, and elegant" (Norton) use of the genre. He was obsessed with human life in the face of rapid change, the concept of the near future reigning in all his works, which tend to...

I am a new-comer to the American short story writer and poet, Raymond Carver, but from the moment I read "Cathedral", I have been hooked. I was drawn to him first by what he says in " Principles of a Story ", his 1989 essay, which talks about the ease with which he approached short story writing ("Get in, get out"). Ease in the sense that he had to learn to demystify the writing process and aim for specificity, realism, clarity, and the sheer joy of the writing process (even where it may seem exhausting and time-consuming, the writer was trying to make an honest effort of producing a story, not because it was a special, world-changing story, but a creation, free of gimmicks and pretentiousness). After I finished reading this short essay and sharing it to a writer's workshop last April, I felt liberated, I loosened up in my approach to writing and lost some of the seriousness and faithful belief in the mystery of writing that had for years pursued me. W...

What happened after breakfast, when I mentioned that I was going to leave in an hour, surprised me. It all started with Tete’s eyes glinting in the direction of Viji, who shook her head to signal that she had nothing to do with it. “So what are you leaving us?” said Tete. I didn’t have to think about this one. “I will leave love, lots of love,” I said, looking at Viji. “I mean something we can touch and smell,” Tete said. I could tell by the darting of her eyes that she was getting upset. Even her lips quivered, but she bit them and looked down. Viji came to my rescue: “She’s talking about a sign, you know; something you’ll leave before you leave.” “Sign?” I asked, shaking my head to show that I was confused still. “You know, something to show commitment,” Viji said. “I am sure you know what Tete is talking about.” She sighed. I must have taken too long to respond to Viji because Tete spoke before I did. “Show us that we can relax knowing you are not planning to waste our time. Show u...