I’ve been meaning to do this wrap-up and chat about all the things I’ve been up to over the past couple of months leading up to the end of a beautiful 2017 in the literary streets.
The first week of December saw me and a whole bunch of beautiful black people attend 2nd Annual Abantu Book Festival which was held in Soweto from Thursday, 7 December to Sunday, 10 December. A festival for black people by black people. It was amazing – although I only managed to attend one full day being the Saturday – it was lit as the youth say! I’m most definitely looking forward to what the Abantu Book Fest team have in store for all of us for 2018.
Let’s begin with the past couple of months with the time I went to a radio interview in July with Radio Today. That was great fun – read up about it here. The interview was really an eye-opener for me – and it showed me that once I agree to do something – I can do it. Having known Abueng Junior the host prior to the interview also helped a little with the nerves.
Radio Today Interview with the cool Abueng Junior
Moving onto Women’s Month which followed with a whole lot of activity including a book club tour with the Bookwormers Book Club as they reviewed Pamela Power’s Things Unseen. The ladies always know how to throw a good book get-together and this one was not short of all the fun and beautiful outfits and shoes to boot. Oh did I mention that they also know how to make a book-worm addicted to their dishes? The food is always amazing with each host! Perhaps visit them over one of their sessions this coming year.
August is also the month I was asking myself how do the people who have read 30/40 books in a year (by August even) have the time. But I guess they create the time. I was reading Malebo Sephodi’s Miss Behave by this time and I took my sweet time with this epic book. If you haven’t gotten around to getting your copy and your girls a copy – what are you waiting for?
Miss Behave should be read by everyone really. Okay Bbz?
The next important book launch I attended was Professor Pumla Dineo Gqola’s Reflecting Rogue – Inside the Mind of a Feminist. This is one book I have to add onto my book list for 2018 (which keeps growing by the minute as per usual). By September I went through a stumble which I recognized really slowly as I had been going through a mild seasonal depression and shared here. The month proved to be quite filled to the brim with bookish events, some of which I missed out of choice and new stores opening which was a delight! Still is – do go check out the African Flavour Books Braamfontein branch whenever you’re in the area, they have a huge collection of African literature and they also make orders for what they don’t have. Book Circle Capital also opened its doors in Maboneng Precinct around the same time – they have since closed up temporarily due to two cases of flooding in a space of two months which happened soon after they opened. They are still active on Instagram though – so do follow them for updates. I was part of the lovely individuals considered by Literary Alliance duo Phathu Musitha and Nicci Legoka invited to an afternoon of food and wine, paired with lovely books at Book Circle Capital later on in the day, this was another highlight for me. I love meeting new people through our love for books.
In between all of this I managed to read and finish 12 books which I had planned to read as part of my GoodReads Reading Challenge for the year. Yup – even through the complete laziness and mini-seasonal depression. Through the countless book launches the literary space saw, some book discussion with authors and the awesome book clubs I’ve adopted. I read books signed by the authors, which is always a plus for me because we book people brag good – check out one of my favourite autographs on the Instagram timeline.
Speaking of challenges – what are your reading plans this year? I’ve committed to reading the 12 again, with an additional 6. I’m also hoping to finish the books I shared early on in the year before the end of the first 6 months of the year. (Hold thumbs for me please!). An overall amazing year in books for me – here’s to another amazing 12 months of happy reading.
