(Kimani, Peter) Dr. Peter Kimani is a leading African writer of his generation. Born in 1971 in Kenya, he started his career as a journalist and is the author of several works of fiction and poetry. He was one of only three international poets commissioned by National Public Radio to compose and present a poem to mark Barack Obama’s inauguration in January 2009. He is also an award-winning journalist, rising to senior editor at The Standard. His work has also appeared in The Guardian, The New African, Sky News, and the Daily Nation. His latest is a work of historical fiction, Dance of the Jakaranda (Akashic), set in the shadow of Kenya’s independence from Great Britain, the story reimagines the special circumstances that brought black, brown and white men together to lay the railroad that heralded the birth of the nation. New York Times Book Review writes, “I have never read a novel about [Kenya] that’s so funny, so perceptive, so subversive and so sly.”
