bookshy: May 2013

As mentioned in my previous post, on a recent trip to DC I decided to create my own bookstore crawl. Here's the final instalment featuring Idle Time Books and Busboys and Poets. Enjoy!!!

Located in Adam's Morgan Idle Time Books might have been my favourite of all the bookstores I went to as it had many of the things I love under one roof. It's got new, used and out-of-print books. There's also post cards, newspapers, vintage magazines, records and CDs. It was three floors of books, and even a chair by the window to look out while you read. What's there not to love?? Here is where I got Peter Abrahams Mine Boy.

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As mentioned in my previous post, on a recent trip to the States for a wedding/mini-break I decided to create my own bookstore crawl. Here's part 2 featuring Second Story Books and Books 4 America. Enjoy!!!

Second Story Books is a really cool used and rare bookstore also in Dupont. I noticed a lot of first edition books, unique books, rare maps and a pretty good selection of fiction/non-fiction. Here is where I got Buchi Emecheta's Second Class Citizen, Zakes Mda The Madonna of Excelsior, and Dave Eggers What is What.

Such beautiful words. And they had it all ...

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A couple of months ago I was in the States for a friends wedding/mini-break. The wedding was in Virginia, I stayed in Maryland, and went down to DC a few times. On my first foray into DC, I went to Georgetown and while walking noticed a bookstore. By now it might have been established that I have a problem - I can't walk by a bookstore without going into it. So obviously I walked in ... and might have bought myself a book. After Georgetown, I did go into DC a couple more times, but this was less book related and more checking out the city.

A few days before I returned to London I realised DC had a lot of bookstores, but with very little time there was only so much I could do. So I decided to create my own bookstore crawl and check out some of the city's bookstores. I just focused on the ones around Dupont Circle and Adams Morgan. And luckily, the day before I left I met a friend for brunch at Busboys and Poets and had the added bonus of checking the bookstore out (ah! simple pleasures). I have to say the one thing I loved about DC was the number of independent bookstores it had and and I can't wait to check out the rest when next I'm there. (PS. I kinda took a lot of photos so I'm splitting these into a few posts). So here's part 1 of my mini DC bookstore crawl featuring Bridge Street Books and Kramerbooks. Enjoy!!!

Bridge Street Books is an independent bookstore in Georgetown. It's a cute little bookstore in a converted townhouse with books stacked from floor to ceiling, with so many genres. Here is where I got a copy of Chris Abani's Graceland.

Caught my eye as I was walking into Georgetown

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Blogging the Caine Prize, 2013 is back. For the last two years, Aaron Bady has been organising a conversation between a group of bloggers/writers on the Caine Prize shortlisted stories. From next week until end of June, on a weekly basis this year's stories will be read, reviewed and posted.

I will be taking part again this year and I'm super excited it's back. I had so much fun doing it last year. As someone who wasn't the greatest fan of short stories (I am slowly getting into them), it was a great way for me to get into them. It was also nice reading the other co-bloggers views on the stories. You can read more about it on The New Inquiry, and here's the schedule, with links to the short stories:

May 27 - June 1: Tope Folarin (Nigeria) “Miracle”
June 3 - June 8: Pede Hollist (Sierra Leone) “Foreign Aid”
June 10 - June 15: Abubakar Adam Ibrahim (Nigeria) “The Whispering Trees”
June 17 - June 22: Elnathan John (Nigeria) “Bayan Layi”
June 24 - June 29: Chinelo Okparanta (Nigeria) “America”

Who will be reading with us? You can also join the conversation on twitter (#caineprize). Oh and you can email Aaron Brady if you would like to take part.

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It's that time of year again for the Caine Prize annual shortlist for African writing. It was announced today and the Chair of judges, Gus Casely-Hayford, described the shortlist, from 96 countries and 16 African countries, 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 Bodleian Library, Oxford, on Monday 8 July.

Here are this year's shortlisted authors:

Elnathan John (Nigeria) ‘Bayan Layi’ from Per Contra, Issue 25 (USA, 2012)
Tope Folarin (Nigeria) ‘Miracle’ from Transition, Issue 109 (Bloomington, 2012)
Pede Hollist (Sierra Leone) ‘Foreign Aid’ from Journal of Progressive Human Services, Vol. 23.3 (Philadelphia, 2012)
Abubakar Adam Ibrahim (Nigeria) ‘The Whispering Trees’ from The Whispering Trees, published by Parrésia Publishers (Lagos, 2012)
Chinelo Okparanta (Nigeria) ‘America’ from Granta, Issue 118 (London, 2012)

Congratulations to all shortlisted authors and more on the Caine Prize shortlist here.

A few questions on my mind to end this post: 4 of 5 of the shortlisted author's are Nigerians, will another Nigerian take it (last year's winner was Rotimi Babatunde), or will Pede Hollist from Sierra Leone be the overall winner? When does Blogging the Caine Prize, 2013 begin? And will 3bute be collaborating with the Caine Prize again this year to adapt all shortlisted stories? Oh and who will be reading this year's shortlisted stories?

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I haven't done a confessional post in a while. Although this is less a confessional post, and more an apology for my silence over the past few weeks. This is due to me being at what is called the "End Game" of a long and arduous process, also known as the PhD, which I began almost four years ago. I won't bore you with details of my research, but I am very happy to say that I am coming to the end of it. However, finishing it demands ~~seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks and months of~~ commitment, which in turn requires tough decisions and sacrifices.

I will still be blogging and posting, but it won't be as regular as I would like it to be. This is where I ask for patience (and prayers, for those out there who pray), as in exactly 20 weeks (yes, I have been counting), I can say goodbye to the thesis (minus oral defense) and hello to whatever the world has for me on the other side of my thesis.

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Book two in the action-packed crime series set in Nairobi featuring an American cop teamed up with a Kenyan Partner, will be published in June 2013.

When a bomb explodes in a downtown Nairobi hotel, private detectives Ishmael and Odhiambo quickly make the connection to a murder case they're investigating. It's the first big break for their new detective agency, Black Star, formed after they were teamed together as policemen and they tracked down a Rwandan war criminal through the violent Kenyan underworld.

But then the CIA and the local police claim the bombing was the work of Al Qaeda, though it's clear to Ishmael and O that something else is going on. They're under pressure to back up from the investigation, until a startling violence tips the scales - and the detectives take off on a round-the-globe pursuit of the shadowy forces that appear to be behind it all.

With Kenya riven with ethnic violence, following the disputed elections of 2007, and Obama on the campaign train in the United States, Ishmael, an American cop who'd made a new life for himself in Africa, confronts a changed world, where everything he though he knew gets thrown into doubt - and the only way to find the answers is to go to extremes.

A thrilling, hard-hitting sequel to Nairobi Heat, from a major new crime talent.

- Synopsis from Melville House Books

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"Emecheta’s writings document the author’s multi-layered yet intersecting identities: the diasporic single woman, the sociologist observing grim urban realities, the best-selling novelist, the narrator of African myths and traditions that clash against modernization, the re-creator of her continent’s enslaved traumatic historical past". British Council Literature

A couple of weeks ago, I read Buchi Emecheta's Second Class Citizen (review to come shortly). Having also read The Joys of Motherhood it is clear why she is so highly regarded. I may have only read two of her novels, but the way she writes about African women and the issues they face at home and abroad is amazing. I could go on and on, but I won't. Instead, here's my celebration of some of her novels. A list of all her works can be found on Sable LitMag.