As Bongani Madondo experienced tinges of nostalgia occasioned by the twentieth anniversary of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, HipHop Feminist…
In La Bastarda we find a revolutionary piece of literature, where a young girl isn’t saved by her long-lost father,…
Sally Rooney reshapes our understanding of the ordinary in a manner that invites us to imagine better ways of being,…
Constructed around a feminist, though dystopian, future, Nnedi Okorafor’s novel Who Fears Death—now reissued some eight years after its first…
It’s a strange time to be writing a comedy of manners about moneyed New Yorkers, but Patrick deWitt’s French Exit…
Torn for so long between anxiety and awe at the idolisation of Nelson Mandela, The JRB Contributing Editor Bongani Madondo…
OK, Mr Field, the debut novel by acclaimed South African poet Katharine Kilalea, is a pleasingly minimalist, idiosyncratic novel, writes…
Pravasan Pillay’s new collection of short stories, Chatsworth, is a literary necessity, writes Francine Simon. Chatsworth Pravasan Pillay Dye Hard…
This July marks the sixtieth anniversary of the publication of Chinua Achebe’s seminal novel Things Fall Apart. Lebohang Mojapelo reviews…
Colson Whitehead’s The Colossus of New York, reissued fourteen years after its first publication, endures in the quality of its writing and…
Akwaeke Emezi’s Freshwater is a striking, startling, butterfly-net of a novel, writes Wamuwi Mbao.
Ableism and the silent roar: The JRB Francophone and Contributing Editor Efemia Chela travels to Burundi with Roland Rugero’s novel Baho! in The…
Olúmìdé Pópóọlá’s debut novel, When We Speak of Nothing, seems to indicate a blossoming of things to come, writes Outlwile…
The JRB City Editor Niq Mhlongo reviews Clinton Chauke’s debut book, Born in Chains: The Diary of an Angry ‘Born Free’. Born…
Ali Smith’s seasonal quartet is a lesson in how to create novels that reflect the now in all its glory and…
Adekeye Adebajo reviews Woman in the Wings by Carien du Plessis, offering concluding reflections on Agenda 2063, Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma’s dubious…
The Only Story is Julian Barnes’s thirteenth novel in a career spanning thirty-eight years, but his gift for turning grim…
Zadie Smith’s new collection of essays, Feel Free, is a too-rare pleasure, writes The JRB Editor Jennifer Malec. Not many…
Bwesigye bwa Mwesigire reviews Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi’s Kintu, which was recently awarded a prestigious Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction. Kintu Jennifer…
Mohsin Hamid’s new book, Exit West, is a work of speculative fiction that will be read as ‘The Great Migration…
Achille Mbembe’s vision is a guide to the revolution that stands on the other side of revolution, writes Imraan Coovadia. Critique…
The Land is Ours is Tembeka Ngcukaitobi’s first book, and it must not be his last, writes Perfect Hlongwane. The…
Wamuwi Mbao reviews Jesmyn Ward’s Sing, Unburied, Sing, winner of the 2017 National Book Award for fiction. Sing, Unburied, Sing Jesmyn…
The Monk of Mokha’s easygoing optimism glides over the prejudices and hatred that underdog minorities face in the United States,…
Luanda’s Shrödinger’s Woman: Efemia Chela travels to Angola with José Eduardo Agualusa’s A General Theory of Oblivion, which was shortlisted for…
Efemia Chela travels to Guinea-Bissau with Abdulai Silá’s The Ultimate Tragedy in The JRB’s Temporary Sojourner series. The Ultimate Tragedy (A Última Tragédia)…
Wamuwi Mbao reviews The Magic Lamp, a new collection of meditations and stories by Ben Okri, illustrated by Rosemary Clunie. The…
Fear of a black planet, rather than ‘economic anxiety’, gnaws at the West’s hallowed liberal democratic principles, writes Lebohang Mojapelo….
Ta-Nehisi Coates is not the voice of black people—and, crucially, neither does he aspire to be, writes Kibo Ngowi. We…
Jacques Pauw’s new book The President’s Keepers shows that children will have it harder tomorrow and that the children of South…
Like watching JM Coetzee solve a series of Rubik’s cubes, only more entertaining: Wamuwi Mbao reviews Late Essays: 2006–2017. Late Essays: 2006–2017…
How streaked we are by what we see: Teju Cole is at his engrossing best in his new book, Blind…
The perfect tragic vision of love and collective violence: Francophone & Contributing Editor Efemia Chela travels to Sierra Leone by reading Aminatta…
Charles van Onselen’s new book offers a gripping narrative, a witty voice dripping with matchless sarcasm, and unparalleled knowledge of…
In her debut collection of essays, One Day We’ll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter, Scaachi Koul delivers…
Despite a tone of hopelessness, Salman Rushdie’s latest novel The Golden House carries majesty, from its prose to its world-weary gaze….
Take me to the memory of my grandmother’s hands I want to bathe in her voice and remember how…
Men Without Women Haruki Murakami Harvill Secker, 2017 In Haruki Murakami’s collection of seven stories, Men without Women, the characters…
What We Lose Zinzi Clemmons Fourth Estate, 2017 Memory itself is an internal rumour —George Santayana But most of…
Dance of the Jakaranda Peter Kimani Akashic Books, 2017 Two Europeans exchange confidences on a train travelling through the Great Rift…
