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Find out more about Mubanga Kalimamukwento’s novel The Mourning Bird, winner of the Dinaane Debut Fiction Award
Mubanga Kalimamukwento is the winner of this year’s Dinaane Debut Fiction Award, for her novel The Mourning Bird.
The book will be on shelves on 1 June 2019.
About the book
The Mourning Bird is the story of a Zambian street kid turned prostitute, told through the eyes of Chimuka Grace Mwiya.
Following the deaths of her parents from Aids and suicide, Chimuka is forced to live on the street and later resorts to prostitution as a way to survive.
The Mourning Bird is set in the 1990s, Lusaka, and explores the Zambian psyche in times of death, political instability, economic change and growth. Chimuka’s experiences expose the paradox that is Zambia. A country that boldly declares itself as a Christian nation and hub of peace and yet neglects the children who stand witness to decades of poor political decisions that led to increased unemployment, a failing health system and the unspoken stigma lived by victims of HIV.
About the author
Mubanga Kalimamukwento is a criminal lawyer from Zambia. She has been writing stories since she was 10 years old as a way of coping with the grief of losing her mother at a young age. She is a single mother of two boys and a fellow of the Young African Leadership Initiative (2017) and the prestigious Hubert Humphrey Fellowship (2018/19).
Categories Fiction South Africa
Tags Dinaane Debut Fiction Award Jacana Media Mubanga Kalimamukwento New books New releases The Mourning Bird
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