Tag Archives: New Africa Books

I won a gold Pendoring Award!

Yay, Mpumi’s Magic Beads!

The Pendoring Advertising Awards were held on Friday, 13 November 2020. Unfortunately, we are still enduring a pandemic so one couldn’t get dressed up and enjoy the ceremony in real time – like we did this time last year at a different event! My book, Mpumi’s Magic Beads was nominated in the “Publication Design – Whole Publication” category. According to the website, this is what the awards are about:

The Pendoring advertising awards are 25 years old this year – a truly unique initiative that celebrates the 10 indigenous languages of our country – quite simply, at Pendoring, we speak South African. Originally created in 1995 to promote and stimulate the use of Afrikaans in advertising, Pendoring has gone through a number of changes to celebrate all our indigenous languages.

Pendoring Awards’ background.

My favourite thing was seeing that all nominations adhere to advertising conventions so I was credited as the Chief Creative Officer, Masego Morulane as the Art Director and Dusanka Stojakovic as the Content Strategist. Dusanka, Vanessa, Solly and team from David Philip continue to make my journey as an author so remarkable and full of wonder! I was honestly so nervous about these awards but, wow, we actually won! We now have a gold Pendoring Award to add to the three awards that we already have for this book.

From the Pendoring Awards’ nominations list for 2020

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Thank you, Pendoring Awards’ judges and amazing adults who keep buying this book for your babies!

A beautiful handmade Mpumi doll

My books and my special Mpumi doll

A few weeks ago, I came across a blog by a mom named Nondumiso who mentions how Mpumi’s Magic Beads is among some of her daughter’s favourite books. While browsing, I discovered that she creates handmade dolls so naturally, I wanted to support her work too! I really love my custom Mpumi doll by Imibongo kaMakhulu. I don’t think you can order this exact doll but maybe you can have her create something based on your own little girl or boy? I think that would be such an amazing gift, especially with Christmas around the corner! Here are her details below.

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Support an amazing artist today!

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Thank you for your beautiful work, Nondumiso!

Mpumi and Jabu’s Magical Day

Currently available in English, isiZulu, Setswana, Sesotho, isiNdebele and Xitsonga. More translations coming soon!

MJMD - Endpaper

There’s magic in the air

as Mpumi and Jabu play.

They sign and laugh,

as they become friends.

“Oh what fun!” they say.

The sequel to Mpumi’s Magic Beads is here! The story follows the the adventure that unfolds when Mpumi, a hearing girl, and Jabu, a Deaf boy, meet for the first time. They learn that even though we are all different, we are also the same in many ways. We love playing and reading, we love smiling and helping our family and friends. Everything about us makes us special.
A portion of the proceeds will be donated to Hi Hopes, an early intervention partner for families of deaf and hard-of-hearing babies.
About the co-author

Claudine Storbeck has a PhD in Education Linguistics and has been working in the field of Deaf Education and Deaf Studies for over 27 years. She is a fluent signer and was honoured to be the South African Sign Language (SASL) interpreter for the inaugurations of both Presidents Mandela and Mbeki. Claudine has over 150 academic presentations and publications in almost 20 countries and has recently starting publishing children’s literature. She was named a world specialist in Deaf Education by the World Federation of the Deaf (WFD) and is the Director and Associate Professor of the Centre for Deaf Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Stockists:

Bargain Books (physical purchase)

Book Circle Capital, Melville (online & physical purchase)

Ethnikids (online purchase)

Love Books, Melville (physical purchase)

New Africa Books (online purchase)

Reader’s Warehouse (online purchase)

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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

And the category is…

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Wow. Mpumi’s Magic Beads has been shortlisted for a South African Literary Award in the Children’s Literature category. Just the nomination alone is such a wonderful piece of recognition and I am honoured. My day has been made. A big congratulations to all of the nominees for this year. Let us all pray, hold thumbs and cross fingers for the 7th of November, which is four days after my birthday.

 

‘Mpumi’s Magic Beads’ has a new publisher.

Do you see this image? Mpumi’s Magic Beads is being translated into all of our South African languages and it will become widely available from August, September and October. You’re welcome to pre-order: here.

Even this moment starts with a story and I have to tell it because I have been smiling to myself when I think about how all of this came to be. It was a hot Saturday in December. My friend Lisa had invited me to her other friend’s house in Morningside for a day party. It was fabulous. Our hosts, some lovely Ghanaian men, prepared West African food in the kitchen while we women sipped on bubbles and shared good conversation. Later that evening, Shaka, whose acquaintance I had made before, arrived and we got to talking about my children’s book. He told me that his family owned a publishing house and that he’d put me in contact with them. I was still quite set in my desire to continue to self-publish but I also believe in the importance of allowing opportunity in, so I thanked him.

Thank goodness for that. Self-publishing has been an interesting journey. Would you believe me if I told you that producing the book is the easy part? The challenge comes when other people become involved and your expectation for common decency to be common is sorely disappointed. (When the legal proceedings are done, remind me to tell you about how unethical your fave is.)

I love everything I do as a baby Anthropologist and poet and a student and I would never want my literary and imaginative work to suffer because business admin in this particular path is sucking the joy out of me. So, after a good run with Thank You Books that had me taking the steps to conquer my doubts and do what truly makes me happy, I am ready to hand my baby off to David Philip Publishers/ New Africa Books! I’m excited to see how this dream will be nurtured by capable hands who have been giving worlds to children for much longer than I have.

I appreciate all of the support you have given me throughout this time. I hope you all go over to www.newafricabooks.com to place your orders and keep this dream growing and glowing for me but, most importantly, for little readers everywhere.

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Thank you, Lisa. Thank you, Shaka. Thank you, Dusanka.