AUTHOR Zikhona Mbala launched her new book titled My heart deceived me! at the Musgrave Library on Friday. Although Mbala is educated in civil engineering, she says she has always had weakness in fairy tales, fantasy worlds and losing herself in a good book.
“My love for reading and writing started back in 2007 at Khotso Junior Secondary, where I was inspired by Miss Mbuqe who was my English teacher and Mr Makobokobo my Isixhosa teacher. I took part in debate, storytelling, story-writing and in 2010 I moved to Palmerton High School, where I was part of the Friends of the Library,” she said.
Mbala’s book follows a teenager, Zingisa, who will do anything to protect and take care of her younger siblings after their parents are brutally murdered. Because of the lack of job opportunities in our country, she ends up in the arms of a sugar daddy who promises her all the beauties of the world. Unfortunately things do not go as planned instead she ends up infected with HIV and a burden of an unwanted pregnancy. After applying to the university to study law she faced the obstacle of the registration fee. She had to look for a job so that she could put food on the table, but things still did not go well. The following year her luck changed and she was granted a chance to further her studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal with the help of national financial aid scheme.
“I believe people will enjoy this book, because it speaks about a topic we are all familiar with. I am also working on another children’s book which I am planning to publish very soon,” said Mbala.
According to research done by PricewaterhouseCoopers, more South African writers are publishing their books online, with many bypassing the rigorous gatekeeping processes used by traditional publishers. Research revealed that sales grew from R2m in 2011 to R19m in 2016. However, some in the book publishing industry believe that the low sales of books in SA can be attributed to independent authors cutting costs on important publishing processes such as editing and marketing.
Meanwhile, Traditional publisher Via Afrika is throwing its support behind independent writers through its free self-publishing programmes. They offer first-time authors lessons on publishing their e-books on Smashwords. The e-books produced look professional. The authors retain their copyright and the money from book sales. Authors less interested in sales can also choose to offer their e-books free of charge. Via Afrika’s intervention is probably as a result of a worrying 2016 study which showed that only 14% of South Africans read regularly and six out of 10 adults live in households where there isn’t a single book.Via Afrika believes one way to undo this is to help local authors publish their e-books online and these authors can then promote their books to people in their communities and thus increase literacy levels.
If you’re interested in purchasing Zikhona Mbala’s book, contact her directly on 0727477191 or via email zee84655@gmail.com.
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