Barefoot Arts Meander 2026 — Swift (Melinda Ferguson)

Melinda Ferguson is a South African writer and publisher known for her work in memoir, non-fiction, travel and motoring journalism. Raised in Johannesburg, her writing is characterised by its raw honesty, exploring themes of addiction, recovery, and personal transformation.

In 2011 she returned to University to study an Honours degree in Publishing. In 2012 she joined forces with Jacana Media and launched MF Books Joburg. In 2020 she entered a joint venture with NB Publishers under her imprint Melinda Ferguson Books, and has since gone solo.

Melinda will be talking about her book Swift.

Written in the six weeks following the sudden death of Mat, Ferguson's soul mate, Swift is a memoir that unfolds as the narrator moves through shock, fury, unspeakable sorrow, and an almost mythic sense of responsibility to save the life of a Swift she rescued seven days before her beloved left Earth.

She somehow keeps the half-dead swift alive through the blur of grief, but has no real clue what she's doing. Mat was the one who knew all about birds — he was the man with the heart of feathers who identified the rescue bird as a little Swift when she brought it home. He told her many things about the bird: that it never touches the ground, that it eats, sleeps, drinks and mates on the wing, and that it can fly for up to two years without landing.

In the aftermath of his shocking departure, and all its absurd bureaucratic requirements, an unlikely long-distance swift guide appears in Ferguson's DMs on old Twitter — Hannah, a Swift activist from the UK. Ferguson is mesmerised by the Swift Queen's ethereal beauty and the tattoos of Swifts across her back.

Your ticket includes an Iced Coffee or Iced Tea.