Media

• Longlisted: Best Novel in the British Science Fiction Association Awards
  (January 2023)

• Catch up on these excellent South African reads from the past year
  Daily Maverick (7 January 2023)

• Books of the Year: Start 2023 with these 2022 recommendations
  Sunday Times (2 January 2023)

• Brittle Paper’s “100 Notable African Books of 2022”
  (December 2022)

• Mail & Guardian’s “Top 50 African Books of 2022”
  (December 2022)

• Climate crisis & compassion in the digital age – with Alistair Mackay & Akil Kumarasamy
  The Empty Chair / PEN South Africa podcast (S6E2; 1 December 2022)

• “‘It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way’ — a must-read fiction about the very real climate crisis”
  Daily Maverick (4 October 2022)

• “A poetic, resonant nightmare about LGBT rights and climate change.”
  Mail & Guardian (22 August 2022)

• “Climate Dystopia, Homophobia and Capitalism: An Interview with Alistair Mackay“
  Gay Pages (Winter 2022)

• “Dystopian novel like a slap on the head” (review is in Afrikaans)
  Vrye Weekblad (29 July 2022)

• “It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way: An Exploration of Apocalyptic Cape Town”
  Cape{Town}Etc (27 July 2022)

• “5 Unscripted with Stephanie Be: The inaugural Book Club”
  Interview with Stephanie Be on 5fm (20 June 2022)

• “Review: It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way”
  Culture Review Magazine (9 June 2022)

• “The apocalypse after the apocalypse”
  New Frame (23 May 2022)

• “Five Books to Snuggle Up With This Weekend”
  Sunday Times Lifestyle (20 May 2022)

• “Interview: Alistair Mackay about his debut novel It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way”
  Scaffold: For Queer Creators & Culture (13 May 2022)

• “Interview: Alistair Mackay on his dazzling debut novel”
  MambaOnline (11 May 2022)

• “Review: Ready or not, change is upon us – Alistair Mackay’s debut is a brutal and brilliant dystopian novel in its commentary on the possibility of our collective future”
  Sunday Times (8 May 2022)

• “Present Dystopia“
  Podcast of Present Dystopia panel with Edgar Pieterse, Alistair Mackay, Kelly-Eve Koopman and Keely Shinners at Open Book Festival 2022 in Cape Town (21 April 2022)

• “Review: It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way – The future is up to us”
  Mother City News (4 April 2022)

• “Book Club: It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way by Alistair Mackay”
  Lunch with Pippa Hudson, Cape Talk 567AM (18 March 2022)

• “Review: Queer characters walk the future streets of Cape Town in this dystopian tale“
  News 24 (9 March 2022)

• “Alistair Mackay publishes his first novel entitled ‘It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way'”
  Interview on SABC Morning Live (20 February 2022):

• “‘A dark, vast emptiness within, as boundless as the universe outside’ – Read an excerpt from Alistair Mackay’s debut novel It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way”
  Johannesburg Review of Books (17 February 2022)

• “Eg Suid-Afrikaanse leesavonture“
  Rapport (5 February 2022)

• “Books to look out for this year”
  Sunday Times (24 January 2022)

• “Currently in your feeds by The Reading List“
  Daily Maverick (20 November 2021)

• “Alumnus Alistair Mackay ’18 to publish debut novel with Kwela”
  Columbia University School of the Arts (5 April 2021)

• “Winner and shortlist of Corona Fiction Competition announced”
  News 24 (16 July 2020)

• “Who are the 36 longlisted entries for the First Pages Prize 2020?“
  First Pages Prize (1 May 2020)