‘Polygamist’ Author Sue Nyathi Visits Kenya as Book Becomes Netflix Series

Zimbabwean author Sue Nyathi is in Nairobi as her novel The Polygamist reaches a wider audience through its Netflix adaptation.

The South African drama series, based on Nyathi’s 2012 novel, marks the latest stage in a 25-year creative journey that included publisher rejections, financial risk and two unsuccessful attempts to bring the story to the screen. Nyathi is visiting Kenya for the first time as interest in the series grows among local audiences. The production has taken a book that initially struggled to find readers and given it an international audience.

The story began in Harare in 2001, when Nyathi was in her twenties and working in corporate finance. Her professional environment exposed her to relationships that differed from the values she had grown up with.

Nyathi was raised in a conservative Catholic family where marriage was presented as a lifelong partnership between two people. Polygamy was also familiar on her maternal side, although it was generally open and acknowledged.

What interested her was the contrast between these experiences and the relationships she encountered in corporate circles. She met men who appeared to be conventionally married while maintaining undisclosed relationships and, in some cases, separate families.

The contrast became the basis for The Polygamist. Nyathi began developing a story about a woman who discovers that the husband she believed was exclusively hers has another wife elsewhere. The idea remained with her for several years. After moving to South Africa, she returned to the story and completed the manuscript in 2010.

Two years later, after failing to secure a conventional publishing deal, Nyathi decided to publish the book herself. She paid for editing, typesetting, printing, distribution and promotion, using her own income and money borrowed from a friend.

The decision carried considerable financial risk. She printed 500 copies, but sales were initially slow. On one occasion, a bookshop told her that only eight copies had been sold.

Nyathi had already spent 2011 approaching publishers, with about 10 companies rejecting the manuscript. Their main concern was whether there was a sufficiently large market for the story.

She did not consider those decisions a final judgement on the quality of her work. In her view, literature is subjective, and an editor's assessment cannot determine whether readers will connect with a particular story.

That proved significant in the years that followed. While publishers had questioned the book's commercial potential, readers gradually began to create demand for it.
A turning point came in 2016, four years after the book was published, when Nyathi was invited to the Time of the Writer literary festival in Durban.

She appeared on a programme with fellow Zimbabwean novelist NoViolet Bulawayo, whose debut novel had already received significant attention. The festival introduced Nyathi and her work to a wider audience. Sales increased, distribution expanded and book clubs began reading the novel. She also received more invitations to literary events.

For Nyathi, the experience showed that early sales and publishing decisions do not necessarily determine a book's long-term prospects. A work can remain relatively unknown before an opportunity brings it to a wider audience.

By 2018, the growing momentum had contributed to another major decision in Nyathi's career. After securing a traditional publishing agreement with Pan Macmillan for her second novel, The Gold Diggers, she left her corporate career at the age of 40.

The move allowed her to make writing her main profession after years of balancing it with salaried employment. The path from novel to television series, however, remained uncertain.

The first attempt to adapt The Polygamist for film came in 2013, when a South African actress approached Nyathi about the project. It did not progress.
A second attempt followed in 2015 after a director acquired the rights, but that project also stalled.

When production company Stained Glass approached Nyathi in 2022, she was cautious about the possibility of another adaptation. The two previous attempts had created expectations before ultimately failing to move forward.
This time, the project progressed.

The television adaptation also brought a new challenge. A team of 10 writers worked on the scripts, leaving Nyathi concerned about whether the screen version would retain the character and momentum of her novel.

Those concerns eased when she read the completed scripts. She recognised the pace and narrative drive of the original story and felt that its central qualities had been retained.

Netflix acquired the series in 2024. Production began in 2025 and filming concluded in August that year. Nyathi then waited through post-production before the release date was confirmed.

When she was finally able to watch the completed production, she did so over two days. Afterwards, she returned to her novel, revisiting the original story that had been adapted for television.

The Netflix release has brought Nyathi to Nairobi, where she is meeting Kenyan readers and viewers who have followed the series and discussed it online. She said conversations on social media, particularly TikTok, encouraged her to visit Kenya and see the response to the story for herself.

The visit comes as Nyathi continues to expand her work as an author. She now has four published books, including An Angel's Demise, released in 2024, and has moved beyond contemporary relationship fiction into historical fiction.

The journey of The Polygamist has taken the novel from independent publication to a major international streaming platform. A manuscript rejected by several publishers became a book that gradually built an audience, while two stalled adaptation projects preceded the production that eventually reached Netflix.

Nyathi's experience demonstrates the uncertain path a book can take after publication. Early rejection, modest sales and failed adaptation attempts did not prevent the story from finding new audiences.

What began with an observation made by a young finance professional in Harare has travelled through independent publishing, literary festivals and years of stalled development before becoming a Netflix series. Her first visit to Kenya marks another stage in that journey.