Binyavanga Wainaina was born in 1972 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where he still lives with his family. He studied at Makerere University, Mombasa University, and Columbia University. His work has been translated into over thirty languages. Winner of the 2007 Commonwealth Writer's Prize for Africa, Wainaina is best known for his memoirs—Fictionville (2001), A Long Way Gone (2004), and Another Day in Paradise (2008)—as well as his novels Like Any Other Morning (1999) and The Old Days (2003)
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Wainaina’s short fiction appears in Granta 111; his story “Punch Drunk” appears in The Times Literary Supplement. His plays have been produced in London (The Old Days), New York (The World's My Oyster), and South Africa (The Serpent King); he has also written extensively on politics in Africa. He is the author of Our Lady of the Nile: A Memoir of Survival in Revolutionary Times (2010) and The Songlines: Journeys Along the Ghost Road of an African Generation (2010).