Tracey Farren

Agent:  Isobel Dixon
Assistant: Finlay Charlesworth

Biography: TRACEY FARREN lives in False Bay with her partner, some dogs and children of a range of ages. She has a psychology honours degree from UCT. She started out as a freelance journalist, publishing on a range of social issues before turning to fiction. In 2008, she published her first novel, WHIPLASH (Modjaji Books). She won a White Ribbon award from Women Demand Dignity and WHIPLASH was short listed for the Sunday Times Fiction Award. Modjaji Books also published SNAKE in 2011 and Kwela Books and Titan Books published THE BOOK OF MALACHI in 2020.

Tracey adapted WHIPLASH into a film, TESS, which was produced by Boondoggle Films and released in 2016. TESS won multiple major awards at the Durban International Film Festival including Best South African Feature Film, Best Actress, and Best Editing. The film was also awarded Best Actress, Best Editing and Best Cinematography at the Silwerskermfees, the Silver Screen Festival for films with Afrikaans content.

In 2024, the film adaptation of SNAKE - with a script written by Tracey herself - premiered at the Joburg International Film Festival. Modjaji will republish the novel later in the year.

 

THE BOOK OF MALACHI Fiction, 304 pages, Titan Books, October 2020 Malachi Dakwaa is mute and utterly disconnected from human beings when he gets an extraordinary job offer. In exchange for six months as warder on a top-secret organ farming project, Razer Pharmaceuticals will graft a new tongue for him. Malachi takes the deal. Far out to sea, he finds himself among warlords and mass murderers of the kind who maimed him and killed his family. But are the prisoners as evil as Razer says? Do they deserve their fate?

THE BOOK OF MALACHI

Fiction, 304 pages, Titan Books, October 2020

Malachi Dakwaa is mute and utterly disconnected from human beings when he gets an extraordinary job offer. In exchange for six months as warder on a top-secret organ farming project, Razer Pharmaceuticals will graft a new tongue for him. Malachi takes the deal. Far out to sea, he finds himself among warlords and mass murderers of the kind who maimed him and killed his family. But are the prisoners as evil as Razer says? Do they deserve their fate?

SNAKE

Script, 268 pages
Modjaji, September 2011

The stage contains a metal wash tub, a traumatised child and a hard-hearted journalist. The script veers between love and violence, shining a naked bulb on psychosis and the preposterous ways in which people express their shame.

WHIPLASH

Novel, 280 pages
Modjaji, 29th June 2008

Shortlisted for 2009 Sunday Times Literary Awards, South Africa

The brutal, moving tale of Tess, who tells the story of her experiences of prostitution in South Africa through writing to her mother.

Modjaji are publishing a film tie-in edition of WHIPLASH ‎under the title TESS.