Now for book aid

Aids Africa

Following Sir Bob's famous famine-fighting footsteps, an illustrious band of writers have produced an anthology to raise money for aids charities in Africa. Telling Tales, a collection of short stories by Salman Rushdie, Susan Sontag, and Gabriel Garca Mrquez, among others, was launched at the United Nations headquarters in New York by Kofi Annan on November 30, on the eve of World aids Day.

The anthology is the brainchild of South African Nobel prize-winning author Nadine Gordimer. It struck her that writers should take a leaf out of the book of Geldof and crew, whose musically-challenged descendants have rerecorded the 1980s hit single Do They Know It's Christmas, to raise money for famine relief in Sudan. Geldof and his Band Aid cronies rocked Wembley Stadium back in the 1980s, raising thousands of pounds to fight famine. "If musicians can get up and sing, we can get up and write," declares Gordimer, 81.

All profits from sales will go to Treatment Action Campaign, which tackles hiv and aids in southern Africa, the worst-hit region in the world. Telling Tales will be published in ten countries and nine languages.