Jacana Media is thrilled to announce that world rights have been sold for CM Elliott’s Zimbabwean crime novels, the Sibanda series.

The news comes hot on the heels of the television series option being acquired by Brian Cox and Anant Singh of Videovision.

Constable and Co – part of the Little, Brown stable – have acquired world rights (excluding southern Africa) to the series, the first of which (Sibanda and the Rainbird) will be released in B paperback in August 2019.

This crime writing series focuses on Detective Inspector Jabulani Sibanda, a hard-boiled, bush-loving, instinctive crime fighter. Together with his sidekick, Sergeant Thadeus Ncube, an overweight, bumbling, multi-married policeman, they put their lives at risk as they investigate unique crimes and plumb the depths of Africa’s worst depravities. The series is steeped in the African bush and Matabele culture, and keeps one guessing and laughing in turns.

Commenting on this development, Jacana Publishing Director Bridget Impey says: ‘CM Elliott’s Sibanda series has been a huge success in South Africa, and this recent acquisition by Constable, as well as the Videovision option, are testament to this. We are delighted to share Sibanda with the rest of the world, and hope it shares the delight with us.’

Krystyna Green, Publishing Director at Constable, says, ‘It’s been 20 years since Alexander McCall Smith’s No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was published, and what he did for Botswana, CM Elliott
will do for Zimbabwe.

‘It’s a crime series rich in bushcraft as well as all the usual crime conventions of fine writing, an absorbing plot and stunning locations. In short, this series is like taking a safari in a book and it will make us fall in love with Africa all over again.’

There are three books in the Sibanda series, including Sibanda and the Rainbird, Sibanda and the Death’s Head Moth and Sibanda and the Black Sparrowhawk, with a fourth in the pipeline.

Founded in Edinburgh in 1795 by Archibald Constable, Constable and Co is an imprint of Little, Brown, which is owned by Hachette, and publishes both fiction and non-fiction.

Categories Fiction International South Africa

Tags CM Elliott Jacana Media Sibanda and the Black Sparrowhawk Sibanda and the Death’s Head Moth Sibanda and the Rainbird