Biography & Memoir

‘The beginning of an adventure’—Read the late George Bizos’s account of his escape from Nazi-occupied Greece as a child, from his memoir Odyssey To Freedom

The JRB presents an excerpt from Odyssey To Freedom, the memoir of the late George Bizos. Bizos passed away in…

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[Sponsored] Read ‘When my mother came to stay’—Read an excerpt from Yaa Gyasi’s new novel, Transcendent Kingdom (Plus: Interview)

From Yaa Gyasi, the bestselling author of Homegoing, comes Transcendent Kingdom, an epic novel from the heart of contemporary America. Transcendent Kingdom is…

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[Sponsored] Listen to an excerpt from Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell—A tale of dreams, drugs, love, and madness, and of fame’s Faustian pact

Introducing Utopia Avenue, the spectacular new novel from the bestselling author of Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks, David Mitchell!…

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[Sponsored] Gerald Kraak call for submissions—An anthology and prize on the topics of gender, human rights and sexuality, for writers and photographers across Africa

The Jacana Literary Foundation (JLF) and the Other Foundation are pleased to announce that submissions for the fourth annual Gerald Kraak…

Academic

‘Bessie Head’s work jolted me awake … I had not thought it possible that a black woman could be a writer’—Read an excerpt from Barbara Boswell’s new book, And Wrote My Story Anyway

The JRB presents an excerpt from the Author’s Preface of And Wrote My Story Anyway: Black South African Women’s Novels…

Africa

‘We didn’t fight a revolution to stay inside’—Read an excerpt from Mark Gevisser’s new book The Pink Line: Journeys Across the World’s Queer Frontiers

The JRB presents an excerpt from The Pink Line: Journeys Across the World’s Queer Frontiers, the new book by Mark…

Book excerpts

‘The brown man in a white man’s city who is watching other brown men.’ Read an excerpt from Amnesty, the new novel from Man Booker Prize winner Aravind Adiga

The JRB presents an excerpt from Aravind Adiga’s new novel Amnesty, a riveting, suspenseful and exuberant novel about a young…

Book excerpts

‘Those gold men really think this land belongs to them’—Read an excerpt from How Much of These Hills is Gold, C Pam Zhang’s debut novel, which reimagines the myth of the American West

The JRB presents an excerpt from How Much of These Hills is Gold by C Pam Zhang, a revisionist immigrant…

Academic

‘Race matters. It matters because of the meanings we give to it.’ Read an excerpt from Race Otherwise: Forging a New Humanism for South Africa by Zimitri Erasmus

This excerpt is based on a chapter from a Zimitri Erasmus’s book Race Otherwise: Forging a New Humanism for South…

Africa

[Sampler issue] Read an exclusive excerpt from Alain Mabanckou’s new novel The Death of Comrade President, a tale of family and revolution in postcolonial Congo

The JRB presents an exclusive excerpt from The Death of Comrade President, the new novel from Alain Mabanckou. The Death…

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[Sponsored] Pieter-Louis Myburgh wins Taco Kuiper Award for Investigative Reporting for his book Gangster State: Unravelling Ace Magashule’s Web of Capture

Congratulations to Pieter-Louis Myburgh, who has won the Taco Kuiper Award for Investigative Reporting. The Taco Kuiper Award, now in…

Africa

[Sampler issue] Read an excerpt from the first South African edition of the previously banned book Malibongwe: Poems from the Struggle by ANC Women, including poetry by Baleka Mbete

The JRB presents an excerpt from Malibongwe: Poems from the Struggle by ANC Women—a new edition of a lost piece…