Dilman Dila
Dilman Dila is a writer and filmmaker. His books include Where Rivers Go To Die, which was a finalist for the Philip K Dick Awards (2024), and The Future God of Love. He was shortlisted for the BSFA Awards (2021), the Nommo Awards for Best Novella (2021), and the Commonwealth Short Story Prize (2013), among many accolades. His short fiction appeared in The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Volume Six, and in The Best of World SF V.2, among many anthologies. His first novel, Dreams of a Yellow Balloon, is coming in 2028. His films have won multiple awards. For more of his life and works, visit www.dilmandila.com
These short stories are set in a futuristic Africa, and lean towards the darker side of stories. A policeman haunted by the spirit of his dead wife, while another, a female detective, hunts for monsters in the streets of a sleepy town; a teenager gets a super weapon to save his brother, while a storyteller confronts ghosts of her past when one of her characters comes to life.
This short novel is a folk history of Shaka Zulu, documenting what ordinary folk were saying on the rise and fall of the legend, about a hundred years after his reign. It is a dark fantasy story.
These short stories are set in a futuristic Africa, and feature refugee aliens from outer space, a rebellious child eager to inherit their father’s reputation as an assassin, an evil scientist stalking a village, and a greedy corporation creating an apocalypses. There are tales of reincarnation and of the walking dead, and alternative worlds whose themes any reader will identify with.
A dark tale about Christmas in a sleepy town of Uganda, where capitalism has influenced people to expect to spend and make merry on that day, though the result is a terrible strain on the mental health of town’s residents.
Nine of the first short screenplays that Dilman Dila wrote, in wide-ranging genres from melodrama to dark comedic thrillers, including the hugely popular What Happened in Room 13.
