Novelist Lou Drofenik, who won the National Book Prize for best novel in 2017 with The Confectioner’s Daughter (published by Horizons), will be the special guest of the 2018 Malta Book Festival.
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Drofenik grew up in Malta and now lives in Victoria, Australia. Her award-winning novels explore different aspects of Maltese society and culture. Founded on extensive historical research, Lou’s fiction focuses on the migrant experience, specifically in a Maltese-Australian context.
Her work is notable for its engagement with questions of Maltese and migrant identity, and has been praised for its engagement with female perspectives and experiences in distinction to the ‘predominantly patriarchal outlook’ of much of the Maltese literary tradition. Lou broke barriers by winning the National Book Prize in a category that has traditionally been dominated by male writers.
The Confectioner’s Daughter, a novel of love, lost innocence and struggle, is a celebration of Maltese women’s lives, their resilience and their intense familial relationships, following a generational format, where the fortunes and misfortunes of six generations of a family are recounted.
Drofenik focuses entirely on the women in the family, “generation after generation bearing the responsibility for running things and surviving” (The Maltese Reader). When giving voice to her characters and to women in the Maltese society, the author is contributing to shape the new local intellectual and literary scene.
Her novel Love at the Time of the Inquisition has been shortlisted for this year’s edition of the National Book Prize. The story of a woman piecing together the story of her beginnings taking her back to 16th-century Malta, this is as meticulously researched as all of Drofenik’s previous work, and a beautifully-written novel about journeys, memory and the healing power of love.
During her dedicated author’s event, the public will also get to know about her latest work, The Reluctant Healer. In this deeply-touching story, Drofenik uses a wealth of knowledge to draw us into the hidden world of Gozitan women – a world of domesticity, where industry and forbearance abound and where the bonds of friendship are long lasting.
Lou Drofenik will be interviewed by Ramona Depares next Sunday at 7pm (Activity area: Sacra Infermeria Hall) in an event co-hosted by the NBC and Horizons, to celebrate the author and her works. She will also be representing Malta during the conference ‘Literature in the Diaspora’ on Wednesday at 7.15pm (Activity area: Sacra Infermeria Hall), where she will be part of a panel (led by Teodor Reljić) together with international speakers Nikola Petković, Vera Duarte and Philip Ò Ceallaigh.
The Malta Book Festival takes place at the Mediterranean Conference Centre, Valletta, between Wednesday and next Sunday. The programme of events is being delivered in printed form to all households.
http://ktieb.org.mt/the-programme-of-events-for-the-malta-book-festival-2018-is-out