Sceptre to publish new novel by Kopano Matlwa

Sceptre is publishing new novel by South African author Kopano Matlwa exploring issues of race, poverty and gender.

Evening Primrose draws on the author’s insight into post-apartheid South Africa’s healthcare to tell the story of Masechaba, a young woman who achieves her childhood dream of becoming a doctor, yet soon faces the stark reality of working in an under-resourced state hospital. After leaving her deeply religious mother, she tries to come to terms with the death of her brother and the suffering she witnesses every day as a medical professional. 

Sceptre will publish the novel in summer 2017. Francine Toon, editor at Sceptre, has acquired world English rights (excluding South Africa, where it was published in November 2016) from Maria Cardona at the Pontas Literary & Film Agency. Italian rights have already been sold to Beatrice Masini at Bompiani.

Toon called it "an important, timely novel", adding: "Evening Primrose deftly tackles themes of xenophobia, poverty and gender, with an urgency, elegance and wit that enthralled me. Drawing on her experience as a doctor, Matlwa explores the limits of human endurance and ultimately shows us that one can find hope in the most adverse circumstances."

Matlwa was named as one of South Africa’s game changers in a recent project, 21 Icons, celebrating young South African talent, inspired by the life of Nelson Mandela. In 2007, aged 21, she won the European Union Literary Award for her bestselling debut novel Coconut and was joint winner of the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa in 2010. She is also winner of the Aspen Ideas Award for medical innovation and is currently reading for a DPhil in Population Health at the University of Oxford, as a Rhodes Scholar.