🥤Would you read a self-help book?

Issue 10

👋 Good afternoon! As we round up the year, it’s the ideal time to reflect on how much you’ve learnt and the books you read. It can all feel hazy, even uncertain, because of how fast life moves. But that’s why you have me: Do. Some. Introspection.

Here’s the menu for today so it’s easier to scroll; happy reading!

Currently Reading: Five Self-Help Books
Backlist Gem
New Release Round-Up
Quote of the Week
A Poll

Currently Reading

Five self-help books to help you feel grounded

As we get older, we start thinking more deeply about life and about the people who came before us. We want real stories we can hold on to. I think that’s when many of us start reaching for self-help books. At least, that’s what happened to me.

Honestly, “self-help” doesn’t feel like the right term for these books. It sounds a bit stereotypical, even unreal. But it’s the only term we’ve got. So here are five books that have helped people, written by people in their own words.

Ego Is the Enemy - Ryan Holiday

This book was a needed reminder that ego doesn't just show up when you're successful; it can get in your way long before that. I found myself thinking about how easy it is to focus on looking capable instead of actually becoming capable.

One idea that stuck with me is that success is rarely one giant breakthrough. It's usually a collection of small, boring, consistent steps. And even when you finally "make it," that's when humility matters most. The chapter on failure also hit home: setbacks aren't the end. Often, it's simply your response that determines what happens next.

The Diary of a CEO - Steven Bartlett

I expected another business book. What I got was something that felt more like a collection of life lessons from someone who's made mistakes, learned from them, and isn't pretending to have all the answers.

Bartlett breaks everything into simple laws that touch on mindset, storytelling, leadership, and relationships. I liked that he mixed personal experiences with research instead of relying on motivation alone. It left me thinking less about building a business and more about becoming the kind of person who can actually sustain one.

The Art of Seduction - Robert Greene

This is probably one of Robert Greene's most misunderstood books. It isn't really about romance as much as it is about psychology and influence. What fascinated me most were the different seducer archetypes and how people naturally draw others in without even realising it.

Greene also explains attraction almost like a strategy game, showing how curiosity, mystery, emotion, and timing shape human behaviour. Whether or not you agree with every idea, it's one of those books that makes you pay closer attention to why people connect with certain personalities and not others.

Perennial Seller - Ryan Holiday
This is our top recommended book for this week. Why do some books, songs, and products fade within weeks while others keep selling for decades? In Perennial Seller, Ryan Holiday, the marketer and bestselling author of The Obstacle Is the Way, breaks down what it takes to create work that lasts.

I really enjoyed his practical examples from music, film, literature, and business; he argues that great marketing starts long before launch day, with the work itself. It’s a practical, eye-opening read for any creator who wants to build something people will still be talking about years from now.

The Alchemist - Paulo Coelho
Santiago, a young shepherd in Andalusia, keeps having the same dream about treasure hidden near the pyramids of Egypt. So he leaves everything behind to find it. Along the way, he meets a king, a crystal merchant, an Englishman, and a mysterious alchemist, each teaching him something about listening to his heart and following his “Personal Legend”.

First published in 1988, Paulo Coelho’s fable has become one of the best-selling books of all time. It’s a short, timeless reminder that the journey often teaches us more than the destination.

Backlist Gem

This week’s gem is Sugar Girl, popularly known as Ralia the Sugar Girl, a 1964 children's novel by Nigerian author Kola Onadipe, published by African Universities Press with illustrations by Bruce Onobrakpeya.

It became one of the children's books widely read in Nigerian primary schools in the ‘90s and early 2000s, and many readers still remember it as their first heartbreak on the page.

Context: Born Nathaniel Kolawole Onadipe (14 July 1922 – 4 December 1988), Onadipe was a Nigerian author best known for his children's books.

He was born in Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State, and he gave back to his local community through philanthropy and by supporting students in their studies. His other well-known works include The Boy Slave, Magic Land of the Shadows, and Koku Baboni.

Origin: Ralia is a thoroughly good child, loved by everyone in her village, which earns her the nickname "Sugar Girl". Her home life is already hard: her mother is blind, and her father has a broken back.

Then misfortune strikes when she unwittingly follows a bird into the forest and cannot find her way back.

Why Read: Beneath its fairytale terror, Sugar Girl is a story about kindness as a form of survival. Unlike many Western survival stories that centre the lone individual, it ties Ralia's survival and happiness to the kindness she gives and receives.

Revisiting it as an adult, you'll find a reminder that community, not just courage, is what carries us through the forest.

New Release Round-Up

📌 Ugandan writer Ber Anena releases her debut memoir, The Lies We Tell for America
Anena is a writer from Gulu, Uganda, whose poetry collection A Nation in Labour won the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa in 2018.

Her new memoir, published by Flatiron Books, is out today, 10 November 2026. It traces what happened after she opened an email in 2019 to find she had been accepted into Columbia University's MFA writing programme.

📌 Chibundu Onuzo’s next novel, The Great Shaking, is on the way
The Sankofa author is back with a bold turn into speculative fiction. Flatiron has acquired North American rights to the novel, set in a dystopian future where African countries sit atop a new world order.

At its heart is a family in what used to be England trying to immigrate to Nigeria, a premise that flips familiar migration stories on their head. Will they find a place in a world that no longer revolves around them?

📌 Sefi Atta’s new novel, The Gèlè Gang, arrives in February 2027
The Soyinka Prize-winning author has announced a new novel from Interlink Books, inspired by the Nigerian weddings she attended. It follows a group of spirited fifty-something Nigerian American women in Atlanta, narrated by Yinka, the friend who considers herself the sensible one.

The women set out to matchmake their twenty-something daughters. It doesn’t go to plan, but they end up learning more about their daughters and one another.

📌 Parrésia Publishers win the CANEX Prize for Publishing in Africa 2026
Parrésia’s title South Side by Akin Adeṣọkan took the prize, announced in Lagos on 6 November 2026. The award honours the publisher of the best African fiction or non-fiction title and is a project of Afreximbank’s CANEX Book Factory and Narrative Landscape Press.

The publishers take home a US$20,000 cash prize. This year, the prize also opened up to writing from the diaspora, inviting publishers from CARICOM member states.

📌 Aké Festival returns to Lagos with the theme “Native Intelligence”
The 14th edition of the Aké Arts & Book Festival runs from 19 to 21 November 2026. It is held at the Silkwood Hotel, Ikeja, and the ₦20,000 ticket covers all events, the festival guide and the 2026 Aké Review.

Instead of asking what artificial intelligence can do, this year’s festival asks what human intelligence must keep protecting. Nnedi Okorafor, Wole Talabi and Chika Unigwe are among the guests.

Quote of the Week

“Things outlast us, they know more about us than we know about them: they carry the experience they have had with us inside them and are—in fact—the book of our history opened before us.”

Excerpt from Known and Strange Things

Teju Cole

Drop your favourite quote, line, or passage from a recent read: reply to this email or click here. We'll feature it in the next issue!