Segun Afolabi

Winner of the 2005 Caine Prize for African Writing For the characters in Segun Afolabi's debut collection, 'elsewhere' is a place they must transform into home. The Far East, Europe, the Americas, Africa - the stories are as varied as their geographical settings. In the award-winning 'Monday Morning' a refugee boy puzzles out his place in a new land. A bereaved father in 'Arithmetic' thinks back to a confusing, youthful sexual encounter that has left him emotionally scarred; Jacinta faces a long retirement with a husband she is not sure she likes in 'Jumbo and Jacinta' and 'The Wine Guitar' tells the story of an aging musician who pays a prostitute for the gift of her youth. These are tales of Diaspora, of people making their lives in new lands, some for the first time, others in the second or third generations. Often moving, sometimes funny and occasionally shocking, Afolabi's stories reflect the way we live now; exploring the universal need to establish family and identity in a world where the boundaries of geography, culture and language are increasingly fluid. Afolabi's elegantly restrained prose and his fascination with the internal emotional lives of his characters - the often painful negotiation of relationships and navigation of life's uncertainties - mark him as a highly original and engaging new literary voice.

A Life Elsewhere

It is the summer of 1985 in Berlin. Vincent is an overweight, struggling photographer living in a shabby apartment in Kreuzberg. His neighbors and friends are an ex-marine transsexual escort girl, a Kurdish refugee, a Nigerian playboy, and various "artistic" types. Vincent misses Lucille, the girl he left behind in London; he has not spoken to his adoptive father for years and resents his successful older brother. Content to get drunk in bars and embark on a series of one-night stands, Vincent isn t doing very much at all. Then a chance encounterthe murder of a charismatic politician and an urgent phone call from his auntshake up his world and Vincent finally has to stop slacking and take some control. With unique insight into a Europe of immigrants, this is a moving novel about the personal politics of identity and a gentle exploration of the nature of true love."

Goodbye Lucille

Namwali Serpell

Masande Ntshanga

Elnathan John

F. T. Kola

Now in its sixteenth year, the Caine Prize for African Writing is Africa’s leading literary prize, and is awarded to a short story by an African writer published in English, whether in Africa or elsewhere. This collection collects the five 2015 shortlisted stories, along with stories written at the Caine Prize Writers’ Workshop, which took place in April 2015.

Lusaka Punk and Other Stories: The Caine Prize for African Writing 2015

For the characters in Segun Afolabi's debut collection, 'elsewhere' is a place they must transform into home. In the award-winning 'Monday Morning' a refugee boy puzzles out his place in a new land. A bereaved father in 'Arithmetic' thinks back to a confusing, youthful sexual encounter that has left him emotionally scarred; Jacinta faces a long retirement with a husband she is not sure she likes in 'Jumbo and Jacinta' and 'The Wine Guitar' tells the story of an aging musician who pays a prostitute for the gift of her youth. These are tales of diaspora, of people making their lives in new lands. Moving, funny and occasionally shocking, Afolabi's stories reflect the way we live now. A Life Elsewhere was shorlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize.

Segun Afolabi

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