The Harare Review of Books has published its first newsletter of 2026, and if you are not already subscribed, this is your sign to fix that. Run by Jacqueline Nyathi, a Zimbabwean critic and writer whose essay Collective Dreaming: The Schrödinger’s Cat Approach to Framing Futures was longlisted for this year’s BSFA Award. HRB has quietly become one of the most reliable and wide-ranging resources for readers who care about African literature, speculative fiction, and the book world at large.

The first issue of the year is a proper dispatch. It opens with an excerpt from The Mad by Ignatius T. Mabasa, the Zimbabwean author’s celebrated novel translated from the original chiShona by J. Tsitsi Mutiti and co-published by Carnelian Heart Publishing and amaBooks. There is also a guest essay from Dr. Nhlanhla Dube on Richard Wright’s Uncle Tom’s Children, and a string of recent reviews including Tochi Onyebuchi’s Racebook, Howard W. French’s definitive-sounding biography of Kwame Nkrumah, Osvalde Lewat’s The Aquatics (forthcoming from Cassava Republic), and a handful of speculative titles that confirm Nyathi’s range.

Beyond the reviews, the newsletter rounds up everything a reader needs to know right now: prize news including the Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist, the International Booker Prize longlist, and the Prix Ahmadou Kourouma 2026 finalists; upcoming events from Joburg to Cambridge to Rundu; a comprehensive list of open submissions calls for writers; and links to lists, craft essays, and literary oddities from across the internet. It is the kind of newsletter that takes hours to assemble and minutes to make you feel like you’ve been living under a rock.

Read Issue 1 of 2026 here and subscribe while you’re at it.