Minister Faust

Malcolm Azania (born 1969), is a Kenyan-Canadian novelist, teacher, writer, and journalist.

He is primarily known by his pen name, Minister Faust.

In addition to writing science fiction, he is a playwright, journalist, teacher, and poet.

He has also written video games.

Azania's first published work was his science fiction play, The Undiscovered Country (1986), for Montreal's Creations Etc.

He is the current writer in residence at the University of Alberta.

Writing in the science fiction and fantasy genres, he refers to his subgenre of writing as Imhotep-hop.

Imhotep-hop is an Africentric subgenre that draws inspiration from numerous ancient African civilizations and focuses on a future in which people struggle for justice.

Most of his works deal with political themes in some way, with the most notable works being the ongoing War & Mir series.

Azania's debut novel, The Coyote Kings, Book One: Space Age Bachelor Pad (2004), was a finalist for the Philip K. Dick award, The Locus Best First Novel Award, and The Compton-Cook Award.

The novel follows Sherem, an Ethiopian savant, and Hamza and Yehat through a story filled with action, pop culture and Africentric themes.

His second book, From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain (2007), was the winner of the Carl Brandon Society Kindred Award and the runner-up for the Philip K. Dick Prize.

The story explores around six fictional super heroes in therapy and their revelations of the difficulties of being a celebrity.

The Alchemists of Kush (2011) follows the paths of two Sudanese boys as they attempt to change the world.

The Alchemists of Kush is a Science Fiction Afrofuturist novel written under Malcom Azania’s pen name: Minister Faust.

This novel is broken up into four sections each containing their own collection of chapters.

The chapters in this novel switch back and forth from “The Book of Then” and “The Book of Now.” There is a third book called “The Book of the Golden Falcon,” which can be found at the end of the novel before the Falconic Glossary and map of Ancient and Modern Kush.

In “The Book of Then,” The Alchemists of Kush’s setting is in the Savage Lands and the Blacklands of Africa.

“The Book of Now” takes place in Canada.

The Alchemists of Kush was published in July 2011.

Each one of the three books contains 10 chapters.

In the Author’s Note, Minister Faust gives some suggestions on how to read his work.

Minister Faust writes “certainly, feel free to read the novel in the path that it’s printed… But you could also read all the “Then’’s as a group, followed by “Now’’s together, ending with “The Book of the Golden Falcon”… or read the first chapters of every “Falcon,” “Then,” and “Now,” all the way through to each one’s tenth chapter.”

Minister Faust incorporates the ancient practice of Alchemy, and Egyptian hieroglyphics, numerology, and mythology within The Alchemists of Kush.

Minister Faust puts a heavy emphasis on past lives and reincarnation as well as following those karmic patterns within each spirit.

In his own words, Minister Faust, in a YouTube interview, introduces the Alchemical system as “a mystical system; a knowledge system.” Faust fused “Ancient Egyptian history” and “modern African realities” together to create The Alchemists of Kush, an Africentric novel.

The setting for The Alchemists of Kush “The Book of Now” is in Kush located in E-Town (Edmonton), Canada.

In his YouTube book trailer, Minister Faust describes E-Town as a “Somali, Ethiopian, Eritrean, and Sudanese district.” “The Book of Then” takes place in Africa, in the Savage lands and the Blacklands over seven thoughts and years before “The Book of Now” (modern day time) takes place.

He was writer in residence at the University of Alberta, 2014-2015.

Born in Edmonton, Alberta, Malcolm Azania is the son of a Kenyan and a Canadian.

He attended local schools and started writing from an early age, showing an interest in science fiction.

For the 2017 published version of The Alchemists of Kush, the summary on the back of the novel reads “two Sudanese “Lost Boys.” Both fathers murdered during civil war.

Both mothers forced into exile through lands where the only law was violence.

To survive, they became ruthless loners and child soldiers.

Before finding mystic mentors who transformed them to achieve their destinies.

Separated by seven thousand years, and connected by immortal truth… One, known to the streets as Supreme Raptor: the other, known to the Greeks as Horus, son of Osiris.

Both born in fire.

Both baptized with blood.

Both brutalized by the wicked.

Both sworn to transform the world and themselves by the power… of Alchemy.”