Books

Our interest at Olongo Africa is to promote the interest of African creative works, artists, writers, curators, and producers of culture, and to collaborate in ways to enhance their vision as it intersects with issues of the moment across African countries today.

Karen Hinton, who worked for both Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, joins the pod to discuss her new memoir, Penis Politics: A Memoir of Women, Men and Power.

In the last chapter of Toni Morrison’s Spiritual Vision: Faith, Folktales and Feminism in Her Life and Literature (Fortress Press, 2021), Nadra Nittle writes that “[by] placing…Black women storytellers, seers, healers, and root workers in pivotal roles in her ‘village literature,’ Morrison demonstrated that the African-based cultural practices [that Black women] engaged in had real power too.”

Elizabeth Hall is a full-time lover and a part-time writer. She is the author of the chapbook Two Essays and the book I HAVE DEVOTED MY LIFE TO THE CLITORIS, a Lambda Literary Award Finalist. Bett Williams’ memoir THE WILD KINDNESS: A PSILOCYBIN ODYSSEY is all about the search.

In publishing and creative industries, conversations around diversity sprung up among stakeholders — writers, editors, agents, publishers and marketers. Amongst several shocking revelations, a few facts hit hard: books and stories written by African writers are edited and marketed by their white publishers to target a western audience. It also exists as a barrier to entry, so writers conform to stereotypical storytelling patterns that fixate on hard issues like rape, immigration, race, poverty and politics, to be published or win certain prizes.

Book Club! Podcast! Chrissy is feeling oddly optimistic about the Eric Adams-Andrew Cuomo alliance, and jazz great turned boxing manager Charles Farrell visits the pod to talk with Harry and Vice’s Tim Marchman about his memoir that covers, among other things, playing with Sonny Rollins and Ornette Coleman, fixing fights for the mob, “the Moby Dick of boxing” and lots more. Stick around to the end to hear him play a little piano, too.

An Interview with Lance and Stuart Chen-Hayes About 兩個爸爸. This follows up on an interview conducted following the publication of Double Dads One Teen in English in 2019. Lance is Taiwan’s first out gay dad and their nonbinary teen, Kalani, became the first Taiwanese citizen with two father’s names on both an international birth certificate and an international marriage license

By now, you must have heard about the shortlist of the Ako Caine Prize stories for 2021. It includes stellar offerings from Doreen Baingana, Rémy Ngamije, Meron Hadero, Troy Onyango, and Iryn Tushabe. We at Olongo wish them hearty congratulations! Caine Prizewinners and shortlistees have always gone on to become proud names in African literature, from Binyavanga Wainaina to Chimamanda Adichie to Tọ́pẹ́ Fọlárìn, to name a few.

"Workers' Inquiry and Global Class Struggle: Strategies, Tactics, Objectives," edited by Robert Ovetz, aspires to revive the practice of “workers’ inquiry,” as seen in the works of Marx and other socialist thinkers, as a means of allowing workers to examine their material conditions for a better understanding of how they might overcome.

In this excerpt from Chris Rice’s hardboiled memoir, an artist dumps her boozehound bankrupt boyfriend, steals what is rightfully hers, herself, and retreats to Venice, California.

Author Elon Green joins Nolan Hicks and Harry Siegel to talk about Lost Call: A True Story of Love, Lust, and Murder in Queer New York and how a city crew including Rudy Giuliani’s mom, Bernard Kerik, Robert Morgenthau, Linda Fairstein, William Bulger and Mike McAclary all tie into that story.

Author Alec MacGillis talks about Amazon's New York expansion and America's great divergence.

Gathering around a lazy Susan while sharing bites of squirrel fish was a way to bond with my extended family, the food smoothing over any language barriers between us.