The 2022 Novel
The novel you’ll write in 2022 is the novel you’ve never seen, a novel you’ve dreamed about. It’s the novel that does not look like a Bollywood movie, a Hollywood movie or a Nollywood movie. It will be a novel without murder and FBI agents.
It’s a novel that will make your readers smile, sigh and swear because they recognize a thought, a feeling, a place and certain people. You’ve come across such books in your reading life but they are not more than ten fingers.
The novel you’ll publish in 2022 also has things and places you’ve never imagined. I was fortunate to come across such a book. I bought it in 2020, a painful and historic year for humanity. The COVID-19 pandemic.
Courier companies made profits as wide as sand on a secluded beach. Why? Because we were on lockdown and we bought things such as books and breakfast, from the internet.
The book in question has a married couple. The man works for a courier company. The woman is a hair stylist and she was born to shop. One day he sees a parcel addressed to someone with a name like hers. So what? There are millions of people called Jean-Pierre Bardot, Joe Smith, Anne Jones, Mary Cross, Sergio Perez, Femi Owolowo or Sipho Zulu.
The character in the book smiles that someone has a name like his beautiful and difficult wife but, to courier delivery guys, the address is the most important thing, right?
He double checks the address on the delivery computer. It looks familiar. In fact, it is his sister-in-law’s address. His wife now shops online and clothes are delivered to her sister’s home.
Do we write original books or cut and paste old stories?
By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.
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