Ken Hom eats, drinks and cooks his way across China

In his new BBC2 series, Ken Hom will be teaming up with culinary friend and colleague Ching-He Huang for an epic gastronomic road trip across China. Though neither were born on Chinese soil, their ancestry has always informed their work in the kitchen. The pair will rediscover the cultural roots of their cooking and, through food, open up a new side of this diverse, evolving and greatly important nation for British audiences.

Their 5000 mile journey will take them from the bustling capital Beijing, along the rural outposts of the Great Wall, through China's spicy Sichuan heartland, before exploring the influence and cuisine of minority cultures in Yunnan and finally sampling the dishes of the mystical Northern city of Kashgar, at the end of the ancient Silk Road.

Ken said 'This series has been a voyage of discovery for me. It has deepened my love of Chinese food and it has given me great hope for the future of this ancient cuisine. I want to share my experience with the world! It was a coming home for me and my Chinese heritage.'

The 4x60 minute series was commissioned by BBC2 controller Janice Hadlow and is produced by Paula Trafford's KEO Films. Paula added 'China is set to become the most powerful country on earth so what better way to understand a culture than through its cuisine - especially for a nation where food is absolutely at its heart.'

Blake Friedmann Authors at the Franschhoek Literary Festival 2012

The 6th Franschhoek Literary Festival kicks off on Friday 11th May, with many Blake Friedmann authors on the bill. The Sunday Times Fiction Prize and the Alan Paton Award for Non-Fiction shortlists will be announced at a reception on Saturday night.

Blake Friedmann authors Deon Meyer, Michiel Heyns, Margie Orford, Tracey Farren, Sarah Lotz, Henrietta Rose-Innes, Imraan Coovadia, Finuala Dowling  and Ivan Vladislavic are among the authors featured on the programme. More details here.

The Sunday Times Fiction Prize and the Alan Paton Award for Non-Fiction shortlists will be announced at a reception on Saturday night.

Michiel Heyns's Parisian novel INVISIBLE FURIES will also be launched by Jonathan Ball at the Festival.

Manu Joseph’s THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE sold around the world

John Murray, WW Norton, HarperCollins Canada and HarperCollins India, who published Manu Joseph's award-winning debut novel SERIOUS MEN have all signed up for his new novel THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE. Podium in Holland have also bought rights.

THE ILLICIT HAPPINESS OF OTHER PEOPLE is set in Madras in the 1990s, where every adolescent male is preparing for the toughest exam in the world. Seventeen-year-old Unni has done something terrible and the only clue to his actions lies in a comic strip he has drawn, which has fallen into the hands of his father Ousep - an alcoholic journalist with a wife who is fantasizing about his early death, and a younger son, Thoma, puzzled by the world he is growing into. Ousep begins investigating Unni's extraordinary life, but as he circles closer and closer to the truth, he unravels a secret that shakes his family to the core.
 
John Murray will publish this powerful, darkly comic story in August 2012 and Manu Joseph will be in the UK for the launch. Manu is the editor of the Indian newsweekly, OPEN, and a columnist with The International Herald Tribune, the global edition of The New York Times.

Prizes and Praise for SERIOUS MEN:

Winner of the Hindu Best Fiction Award 2010
Shortlisted for Man Asian Literary Prize 2010
Shortlisted for Commonwealth Prize South Asia & Europe Best First Book 2011
Shortlisted for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize 2011
Listed as one of Huffington Post's Best Books 2010; A New York Times 'Editor's Choice'
Chosen by The Telegraph as one of their 2010 'First Novels to Savour'
Listed in the Independent's Pick of 2010: The Best Books for Christmas

'The finest comic novelists know that a small world can illuminate a culture and an age. With this funny-sad debut, Joseph does just that for surging, fractious India.' -- Boyd Tonkin, Independent
 
'Manu Joseph shows how petty jealousies in India can motivate and divide as surely as major societal differences. His skills as a writer are tremendous - he invests even the most ordinary interactions with keenly observed human quirks, and almost every sentence is a joy to read for its ingeniously constructed language. This is a compellingly entertaining novel - witty, subversive, extraordinarily perceptive, deliciously wicked.' -- Manil Suri, author of THE DEATH OF VISHNU
 
'This ambitious debut cleverly weaves diverging plots of love, knowledge, class, and ambition…Joseph's finely portrayed characters exude wit and warmth in this engaging and introspective tale.'-- Leah Strauss, Booklist

ALL FOR YOU at No. 10 in paperback bestsellers list after only 3 days sale

With paperback publication only a few days ago, Sheila O'Flanagan's ALL FOR YOU is already at No.10 in the UK BookScan paperback chart. ALL FOR YOU will be Book of the Week in W H Smiths shops from Thursday 3 May.

ALL FOR YOU went straight to No. 1 in trade paperback in Ireland and won the publicly nominated Eason's Popular Fiction Book of the Year Award 2011.

Praise for ALL FOR YOU:

'A moving read.' -- Star Magazine

'It's written from the heart and, as usual, Sheila O'Flanagan leaves you eager to know about the characters at every turn of a page.' -- Essentials

THE DANCING AND THE DEATH ON LEMON STREET shortlisted for Commonwealth Book Prize 2012

THE DANCING AND THE DEATH ON LEMON STREET by Denis Hirson is one of several writers from around the world shortlisted for the prize. Regional winners will be announced on 22 May with the overall prize awarded at Hay Festival on 8 June.

A regional winner for each prize will be awarded in five regions: Africa, Asia, Canada and Europe, Caribbean, and the Pacific.

For the full 2012 shortlist, click here and more info here.

THE DANCING AND THE DEATH ON LEMON STREET is published in South Africa by Jacana.

Praise for THE DANCING AND THE DEATH ON LEMON STREET:

'Lyrical, layered and mesmerising.' -- Troy Blacklaws, The Argus

'A perfectly focused snapshot of the early months of 1960.' -- Aly Verban, Cape Times

'An elegant bittersweet novel that leaves its readers sore and admiring altogether.' -- The Times

'The minutiae of life are beautifully captured…Hirson writes beautifully, and the story sweeps the reader along…More of a sour lemon-tinged microscope than rose-tinted spectacles. And all the better for it.' -- Margaret Von Klemperer, Witness

'Hirson...delivers a taut, well-told tale, tightly constructed and yet apparently following the random rhythms of human interaction...' -- Michiel Heyns, Sunday Times