In a region where loss, resilience, and survival are tightly interwoven, stories such as Rough Silk carry a particular weight. They speak not only to personal journeys, but to collective histories shaped by adversity.

Published barely eleven years after Kenya’s independence, the novel entered a society that was undergoing rapid transformation. Women were beginning to occupy offices, secretarial pools, and professional spaces in greater numbers. Yet with that entry into the workforce came complicated negotiations of power—between ambition and vulnerability, between economic independence and social expectation.

Strangely, William Ruto, a political fox if there was one, missed the lesson. Against advice, he bypassed his Tom Hagen, Prof Kithure Kindiki, for Rigathi Gachagua – a Santino with a fist – as running mate.

If some men were honest about their desire to maintain multiple relationships, would the betrayal wound feel less deeply when discovered? Or would such honesty simply expose how fragile many marriages already are? But then there is an even more complicated question beneath that one. Who are the women who choose to remain in marriages where respect has clearly eroded? Is it love? Shared history? Children? Economic reality? Social expectation? Or is the title of Mrs. so powerful that many would rather remain married than confront the humiliation of walking away?

The goal of the Banda Book Day celebration was to connect pupils with children’s authors, encourage reading for pleasure, and help young people tap into their own creative potential.

It is mind-boggling that hundreds of years after fleeing hostile environments in other parts of Africa, we still flee from droughts, floods and hunger instead of standing our ground to fight. The overcrowding we fled from in the 14th century has caught up with us in our cities.