Poets & Writers Theater

In this Louisiana Channel interview, Imbolo Mbue speaks about her love of New York City and the challenges of being black and working-class in America, which she explores in her debut novel, Behold the Dreamers (Random House, 2016). Mbue is one of the debut authors featured in “First Fiction 2016” in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“I wanted it to be very clear, all of the ways that slavery has come to leave a lasting legacy on American history, on Ghanaian history, and on many other countries’ histories.” Yaa Gyasi joins host Shad on CBC Radio to speak about exploring slavery and history through the individual characters in her debut novel, Homegoing (Knopf, 2016). Gyasi is featured in "First Fiction 2016" in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine and can be heard in the eighth episode of Ampersand: The Poets & Writers Podcast.

"One thing that I had always wanted for this book was that by the time you got to the end of it, you couldn't say that you didn't understand why black people in America are the way they are, or why they might feel the things that they feel—you get to see exactly what steps have led to the current state of racial tension in America." Read more about Yaa Gyasi in "First Fiction 2016" in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine and hear her read from her debut novel, Homegoing (Knopf, 2016), on Ampersand: The Poets & Writers Podcast.

Rumaan Alam reads from his short story "A Certainty" at an event for the Center for Fiction's literary magazine, The Literarian, alongside Terese Svoboda and Sigrid Nunez. Alam is featured in "First Fiction 2016" in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine and reads from his debut novel, Rich and Pretty (Ecco, 2016), on Ampersand: The Poets & Writers Podcast.

"In a public library, surrounded by all these books, I felt very much at home." Imbolo Mbue talks about her love of public libraries, reading Toni Morrison's 1977 novel, Song of Solomon, for the first time, and her experience writing her debut novel, Behold the Dreamers (Random House, 2016). Read more about Mbue in "First Fiction 2016" in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine and listen to her read from her debut novel on Ampersand: The Poets & Writers Podcast.

“There was no drinking gourd, no spiritual soothing enough to mend a broken spirit.” Yaa Gyasi reads from her debut novel, Homegoing (Knopf, 2016), for the Harvard Book Store's New Voices in Fiction series.

At Politics and Prose Bookstore in Washington, D.C., Yaa Gyasi speaks about her debut novel, Homegoing (Knopf, 2016), with Dolen Perkins-Valdez, and how a visit to the Cape Coast Castle in Ghana inspired the book.

South African novelist Masande Ntshanga talks about his debut novel, The Reactive (Two Dollar Radio, 2016), for an interview on the SABC News. The novel is featured in Page One in the May/June issue and Ntshanga is a featured author in "First Fiction 2016" in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.