MCA student publishes crime mystery novel "Hunting Rhino"

MALAWI: A third-year student in Business Management and Entrepreneurship at Malawi College of Accountancy ( MCA), Blantyre Campus, Shailene Patmos, has published a crime mystery novel titled Hunting Rhino.

Speaking at the book launch on Friday at Coffee Culture in Blantyre, 21-year-old Shailene explained that Hunting Rhino is a crime mystery novel about an ambitious detective named Jerry Wota who teams up with a female murder convict to track down the untraceable serial killer, Rhino.

“It is a nice novel and worth reading. It is about an ambitious detective named Jerry Wota who teams up with a female murder convict to track down the untraceable serial killer, Rhino. But the closer they get to unveiling the truth, the more predicaments rise, the more deadly the case becomes,” she said.

She said likes to stand out and challenge herself by doing something different from her fellow writers who are writing similar things; hence, coming up with a novel that is quite different from other people's published books.

“I used to be known for writing romance stories and I needed to do something out of my comfort zone, yet still in line with my passion. So I have been a fan of my mysteries for a very long time. I remember, I used to read the seven series by Enid Blyton when I was in Secondary School, and it has been always a dream of my to stories of that kind," she said.

Shailene encouraged her fellow writers to fight for their gifts.

She said a lot of people are reluctant towards pursuing their dreams because they feel like the industry is flooded so that there is no room for them to put out their ideas there, whereas others just feel scared, things she said are not worthy to be followed by writers.

The young writer said to come up with her book she has passed through a lot of heavy challenges, and the one being lack of financial support to host events for her book.

“The challenges were a lot; for instance, we did not have any sponsors to pull off events like this one of the book launch. It was not easy. At the time it was getting emotionally and psychologically stressful because it seemed possible at first. But I thank God for he has been there through it all and we are finally have a launch of the book," she said.

She called on the government and other related stakeholders to continue investing much in the writing industry and take the industry to the top level.

Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Innov8 MW Peter Banda congratulated Shailene for coming up with a nice book that he said will change the lives of many in Malawi and abroad.

“This is amazing that we are today here witnessing the Hunting Rhino book launch by our fellow youth Shailene. This is a very nice book that I believe will change the lives of Malawians and even those who are abroad. Let me tell those who say they cannot achieve things in their industries. Had it been Shailene was thinking like that, she could have never written this amazing book,” Banda said.

Apart from being a writer, Shailene is also an artist, actress, and advocate for financial literacy.

The Hunting Rhino novel is currently being sold at an affordable price of K5,000.