Canada-based South African writer, Kagiso Lesego Molope wins the 2019 Ottawa Book Awards English Fiction Category, for her book, “This Book Betrays My Brother.”
Established in 1985, The Ottawa Book Awards and Prix du livre d’Ottawa recognize the top English and French books published in the previous year. The both prizes are awarded in the categories of fiction and nonfiction. All shortlisted writers receive CAD1000 and the winners in the different categories receive CAD7500 each.
Kagiso Lesego Molope, seems to be in the spotlight of late and the encomium is well deserved. She recently emerged the winner of the Pius Adesanmi Memorial Award for Excellence in African Writing, for her book, “Such a Lonely, Lovely Road.”
The jury comprising of Sanita Fejzic, Joanne Proulx, Jeff Ross, made this statement about the winning book; “A generous storyteller, Kagiso Lesego Molope plunges us into a first-person narration by Naledi, an adolescent growing up in South Africa in the 90s, obsessed with boys, clothes and the other usual etceteras of teenager life. Told in retrospect, this young adult novel is a racking page-turner; the story and its characters are bound and broken by issues of race and class, filial loyalty and betrayal, innocent friendship and sexual awakening, and the sudden and systemic violence against women in a deeply patriarchal society. A must-read for all ages, “This Book Betrays My Brother” demands that we recognize the price of speaking the truth in a culture of silence.”
