Motlogelwa Publishes The Cabal
Nnasaretha Kgamanyane | Tuesday November 9, 2021 06:00
His latest book was launched a fortnight ago. In an interview, the young author said The Cabal was a fiction thriller novella set in the future, 2029. He said that was a period of General Elections, filled with uncertainties and doubts as to where the pendulum of power will swing. The main character is Advocate Tholo, who happens to be the Vice President of Botswana. During all this chaos, he is working on a research on the ‘history of diamonds’ in Botswana with the Permanent Secretary to the President. “One evening, he receives a shocking call that left him devastated.
The caller announced the death of his research partner. He is then involved in a complex investigation of his partner’s death, and he stumbles on information that could shake the historical foundation of his country. Our African and national issues that we talk about every day inspired me to write this book. “There are too many angry people about something everyday. It is very difficult to have civil debates on issues that affect all of us without offending someone. I figured I should explore some of these issues in a fictional work.
Hopefully people will have an appreciation for them when they are being dealt with by fictitious personas. We have been seeing many young local authors writing books of different genres such as comic, fiction, motivational and spiritual books. He said his first book was a non-fiction work adding that he wanted to explore fiction besides the reason that he wanted to expand his audience. Motlogelwa also explained that it was an open secret that we all love stories! His target audience includes everyone who loves reading.
He said people from different age groups were already reading the book. He said if he had limited copies, he would probably favour students in basic education even though his target was everyone. The book has 221 pages and 37 chapters. He explained that there were numerous themes, ranging from culture, history and politics. He said the primary message it carries is to show the possible horrific situation that our country can find itself in if we do not put the nation first all the time. Furthermore, he explained that there were numerous challenges he faced when writing the book; some were physical, economical and majority of them were emotional.
He added that the process of publishing was very expensive. His primary achievement was writing his book to completion and him being an African Honouree Authors Award recipient for the year 2020; the awards that are held every year in South Africa. It was a self-published book. During his publishing journey, friends who did not mind reading his manuscript as and when he asked them to supported him. He said they gave him a substantive and helpful feedback all the time. “All I can say to them is that, I shall forever be indebted to them. Also, my editors from Mafoko Manuscript Services have contributed immensely in my book to make it a success.
They gave me invaluable advices on writing. My advice to fellow young people who are keen to start writing is that, as long as libraries are full of people and bookshops are still running, then it means there is a space for you. “A general advice to upcoming writers and those in any kind of creative arts is that we shouldn’t do it only for money, but also for the love of it. Write or perform to change people's lives, and their outlook of life. If all that rewards you in the process, it is a cherry on top! The sad reality is that few people will come knocking at our doors looking for our signed copies; so we must take proactive actions to establish ourselves as successful authors. ‘Author-preneurship’ is not such a wild dream, let’s all go for it and see what comes out of it,’ he ended.