Goretti Kyomuhendo is one of Uganda’s leading novelists. She holds an MA in creative writing from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Her début novel, The First Daughter, was published in 1996, followed by Secrets No More in 1999, which won the Uganda National Literary Award for Best Novel in the same year. In 2002, she published a novella, Whispers from Vera. Her third novel, Waiting, was published by The Feminist Press in New York in 2007. In 2014, she published the Essential Handbook for African Creative Writers. She has also written short stories and children’s books.
Goretti is a founding member of FEMRITE – Uganda Women Writers’ Association and Publishing House – and worked as its first Director for ten years. In 2009, she founded and is now Director of the African Writers Trust, an organisation that aims to bridge the divide between African writers and publishing professionals living in the Diaspora and on the continent, bringing them together in order to promote synergies between the groups.
Goretti was the first Ugandan woman to receive an International Writing Program fellowship at the University of Iowa, and has since participated in many literary events internationally. Goretti was one of the five international judges for the 2013 Commonwealth Book Prize. She lives in London and Uganda.