AWARD-WINNING Bulawayo author Bryony Rheam has launched her third book titled Whatever Happened to Rick Ashley, a collection of 16 short stories, which highlight life in Zimbabwe over the last 20 years.
The launch was held at Still Haven in Bulawayo recently.
"The book highlights the struggles and challenges faced by ordinary people," Rheam said.
"However, it is also about hope and the need to change if we are to go forward.
“The daily routines and the greater fate of ordinary Zimbabweans are represented with a deft, compassionate touch and flashes of humour."
The book has received positive feedback from readers, including from the award-winning writer Siphiwe Ndlovu.
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“Whatever Happened to Rick Astley? Bryony Rheam’s wonderful collection of short stories, deals with loss — loss of identity, loss of memory, loss of country, loss of someone you love," she said.
“While the theme seems to be a heavy one, the stories capture the beauty and the magic of the ordinary.
"There is nostalgia here for what once was, but there is also a lot of hope for what could be.
"Anything that can give us hope in today’s day and age is truly amazing, and that is what this collection is.”
Karen Jennings, who was short-listed for the Booker Prize for her novel, An Island, is also full of praise for the collection.
“Bryony Rheam’s short stories are skilled, perfectly formed, and compelling; the characters are largely outsiders — whether geographically, culturally or emotionally — and completely realised, inhabiting detailed and believable worlds," Jennings said.
"In all, Whatever Happened to Rick Astley? is a deeply satisfying collection.”
Zimbabwean writer Ian Holding, whose novel Unfeeling was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas prize, added: “This varied and eclectic collection from Bryony Rheam sizzles with the undercurrent of a continent always on the very edge of chaos and disorder, and yet there is such warmth, strength and humility to the lives of her many eccentric characters. In turn these stories are funny, poignant, at times shocking, but always deeply moving.”
Rheam’s two novels have both won awards in Zimbabwe; This September Sun won Best First Book at the Zimbabwe Book Publishers Association Awards, before going on to topping the UK Amazon charts as an ebook, and All Come to Dust won the Outstanding Literary Fiction awards at both the Bulawayo Arts Awards and the National Arts Merit Awards.