A K Jenkins

A K (Kate) Jenkins is an Australian who is currently living in Hobart, Tasmania. She is author of the 'Marius' series, crime novels set in the city of Lomé in Togo, West Africa. Twice No One Dies was published in 2015 and A Certain Kind of Justice in 2018.

As an international educator, Kate lived for eight years in West Africa, including several years in Lomé.

Kate has a keen interest in jazz, and while in Lomé she established a jazz 'spot' and produced an album of local jazz musicians playing a synthesis of jazz and traditional African influences. Not everything went smoothly with the jazz bar and it closed after a year or so, but Kate has used her West African experiences as material for crime novels with a strong emphasis on setting and character.

The protagonist, Marius, is one of a small number of West African fictional crime fighters.

Togo is a very small country sandwiched between Ghana on the west and Benin (and then Nigeria) on the east. Located on the Gulf of Guinea, Lomé has a coastal feel, and a wide sandy beach stretches the length of the city. In the 1980s it was a popular tourist destination in West Africa until the political situation worsened in the 1990's and investment and embassies were withdrawn. Twice No One Dies is set in 2004, when Africa's longest serving ruler, President Eyadéma, was in his 38th year. A Certain Kind of Justice is set the year after, when there were major political upheavals following Eyadéma's death in 2005.