Earlier this year, award-winning memoirist and publisher Melinda Ferguson joined NB Publishers just in time to deliver not one, but TWO short story collections about life in the time of coronavirus.

Published within one month of each other, Lockdown: The Corona Chronicles and Lockdown Extended feature short stories from South Africa’s most celebrated writers.

In this article from Sunday Times, Melinda Ferguson shares how the second installment came together. “I jotted down a list of dream authors and decided to take my chances to see whether any one of them would agree to go on this mad venture with me…I hoped a few of them would say ‘yes’. Turns out all 30 of them did.”

Lockdown: The Corona Chronicles features short stories by 17 writers: Pumla Gqola, Eva Mazza, Lindiwe Hani, Ben Trovato, Ismail Lagardien, Sara-Jayne Makwala King, Helena Kriel, Tracy Going, Kelly Eve-Koopman, Steven Boykey Sidley, Sam Cowen, Gabi Lowe, Letshego Zulu, Christy Chilimigras, Dave Muller, Robert Hamblin, and Melinda Ferguson.

Lockdown Extended features stories by 30 writers: Sisonke Msimang, Lebo Mashile, Fred Khumalo, Khaya Dlanga, Marianne Thamm, Pumla Dineo Gqola, Ben Trovato, Ferial Haffajee, Jonathan Ancer, Tracy Going, Phumlani Pikoli, Rahla Xenopolous, Everjoice J. Win, Chris Roper, Helen Moffett, Rofhiwa Maneta, Rachelle Greeff, Barbara Boswell, Hagen Engler, Siya Khumalo, Chris du Plessis, An Wentzel, Sara-Jayne Makwala-King, Dave Muller, Ismail Lagardien, Steven Sidley, Dudu Busani-Dube, Melusi Tshabalala, Haji Mohamed Dawjee, and Melinda Ferguson.

Below is the book trailer for the first installment, Lockdown: The Corona Chronicles, promoted by NB Publishers as “the eBook we’ve all been isolating for.”

Lockdown: The Corona Chronicles and Lockdown Extended are available as eBooks at Kobo and Amazon.