[A] Kenyan writer and LGBT activist who made a revolutionary impact on literature from and about the African continent

Barbed, playful, inventive . . . African literature would never be the same . . . An outsize figure on the literary landscape, his omnivorous brilliance matched by ambition and vision on a continental scale

A collection of brilliant writing - essays, stories, journalism, and even recipes. I admire Wainaina's humour, flamboyance and intelligence and the way he skewers the usual stereotypes about Africa

[An] award-winning Kenyan writer whose humorous, incisive books and essays explored themes of post-colonialism, gender and sexual identity . . . with wit and humour he took apart the paternalism of certain writers who talk of Africa as one country

He was an intellectual . . . Someone who could have become the Edward Said of Africa or the James Baldwin of our time

An uncompromising commentator . . . [Binyavanga Wainaina] shines a light on his continent without cliché

[A] barrier-shattering presence in African literature

Unflagging in his generosity, unflinching and direct in his criticism, [Binyavanga] produced work in his short life that will have impact longer lasting than those whose time here is twice as long

A trail-blazing Kenyan legend

Hilarious, worldly, biting, flippant, and meaningful

[A] Kenyan literary icon . . . [Binyavanga Wainaina's] work continues to challenge stereotypes and prejudices about Africa

[Binyavanga Wainaina's] writing dances beyond the borders of language, lineage, genre, containment . . . [His] imagination hops, skips and jumps, in that space of infinite possibilities and worlds waiting to be made and unmade

Everything that made Binyavanga so great was there on the page - his righteous passion, his biting wit, his eye for hypocrisy, his arch turn of phrase

Cutting and incisive, witty and confrontational, and deeply revealing

Wainaina's sharp wit and penetrating analysis . . . shows off his talent for withering satire

Both an ode and an introduction to one of the continent's most inimitable literary geniuses

Provocative . . . A lively selection of work that well represents the scope of this fine author

How to Write About Africa gathers vivid, powerful essays and fiction by the late Kenyan icon

Glimmering, strobe-lit language . . . a complex, cosmopolitan African experience too rarely depicted in books

[A] standup-and-cheer coming-of-age memoir

Impressively precise in its scientific conjectures, Bewilderment is no less rich or wise in its emotionality.... channels both the cosmic sublime and that of the vast American outdoors, resting confidently in a lineage with Thoreau and Whitman, Dillard and Kerouac... Sorrowing awe is Bewilderment's primary tone, and its many remarkable scenes are controlled with high novelistic intelligence.

It's deftly crafted, packs an emotional punch, and Powers's urgent environmental message, delivered by the Greta Thunberg-like Robin, comes through loud and clear

Powers is extremely good at creating a very specific emotion in the reader: a potent mix of sadness and guilt. He's also a wizard when it comes to telling us about trees, rivers, insects and birds

Bewilderment is a compelling story about love in a dying world

Powers succeeds in engaging both head and heart. And through its central story of bereavement, this novel of parenting and the environment becomes a multifaceted exploration of mortality

It is a thoughtful exploration of individual grief, a study in empathy for the biosphere, a questioning of the medical profession's pathologising of children and a beginner's guide to eco-biology... Bewilderment is both cerebral and heartfelt, a rigorous and damning assessment of the state of the world today. A call to arms for empathy and action

Utterly absorbing

One of our most lavishly gifted writers

Nothing less than brilliant

It's not possible for Powers to write an uninteresting book

With its first few pages, Powers' novel completely captivated us and with its last, it bowled us over. Powers creates a texture and specificity to our future that feels simultaneously sweepingly large and breathtakingly intimate, told through the most relatable point of view: the ferocious love of a parent for his child and his struggle to provide him a better tomorrow.

On The Overstory: It changed how I thought about the Earth and our place in it . . . It changed how I see things and that's always, for me, a mark of a book worth reading.

On The Overstory: Really, just one of the best novels, period

On The Overstory: Monumental . . . breath-taking . . . a gigantic fable of genuine truths

On The Overstory: Exhilarating . . . on almost every page you will find sentences that combine precision and vision

On The Overstory: The best book I've read in ten years. A remarkable piece of literature

On The Overstory: An extraordinary novel . . . an astonishing performance . . . he is incredibly good at turning science into poetry

The success of the story - and a success it is - comes not from the ingenious scientific speculations, nor the shrewd literary connections (on the "emotional telepathy" of a work of art, or Daniel Keyes's Flowers for Algernon), but the human story between father and son, as Theo finds out 'how my brain learns to resemble what it loves

Richard Powers's Booker Prize-shortlisted novel is both brutal and heartwarming, intimate and profound. A masterfully curated story of love, grief and loneliness, quietly building to an inevitable and devastating close

He composes some of the most beautiful sentences I've ever read. I'm in awe of his talent

In Bewilderment, the Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist has crafted a story of great beauty and power