Angela Makholwa

"Living in South Africa, crime is something that is always with us, in our conscious and subconscious minds"

"Flashiness is off-putting, but it is something that we live with amongst the black middle class – with people who made a lot of money very quickly. I understand the temptation to say, I started at the bottom, now I’m here, and I want everyone to see. But at the same time, it just puts a lot of unnecessary pressure on people. That’s why, right now, mental health issues are such a big thing in society – it’s not the only reason, but it is one of them"

"Dont allow anyone or anything to make yo feel like you cannot fulfill whatever it is that your heart says youre here to fulfill."

"We can have the policies and constitution in the world, but if were not working on these issues at home and school, then were never going to get it right."

"If you re not surprised, how do you expect the reader to be surprised?"

"There is always that question: is this who we are as a society? How do we question our value system and what that means for the society we are raising"

"It was tricky trying to find the balance between the producers’ instincts on what works on screen versus the creator’s instincts for what their character would or would not do in a certain situation"

"As much as my writing is diverse and sometimes straddles different categories, it’s clear that placing any of my books under a section marked “chick lit” is patently sexist"

"In a country that has as many inequalities as ours, volunteering should be second nature"

"If all African writers only wrote about race (for instance), which is a major factor that contributes to the inequalities faced by black people across the world, we would miss the opportunity to bring out the other human aspects of our people"

"I just think women are so much more than that, we have so much more to offer than our beauty and body."

"The fear from an author normally stems from having to let go of something that you have birthed and nurtured."