The new memoir reveals a remarkable life shaped by adoption, dance, identity, motherhood and unexpected turns

Woking, Surry, United Kingdom, 18th Aug 2026 – About The Book:  From Mud Hut to STAR WARS and Beyond is the 2026 memoir of Femi Taylor, born 8 April 1961 in a rural village in southern Nigeria. The book recounts her early life beginning in tragedy: her birth mother died during the delivery of twins, and the babies were left at an orphanage in Ibadan after their father could no longer care for them. Adopted by British couple Richard and Allegra Taylor, she was raised in England and later became a British citizen.

The narrative follows her development as a dancer from childhood ballet classes through professional training and a career on stage and screen. It covers her experiences in the original London production of the musical Cats, her casting as the Twi’lek dancer Oola in the 1983 film Return of the Jedi (a role she later revisited for the 1997 Special Edition). But the memoir goes far beyond these best-known credits, including her subsequent work in television and film, among many other professional and personal milestones.

Taylor addresses themes of adoption, racial identity in a predominantly white environment, family relationships, personal loss, and the gradual process of coming to terms with her dual heritage and authentic self. The account includes reflections on international travel, convention appearances, and private life as a mother. The book presents these events in a straightforward chronological and reflective style drawn from the author’s own experiences.

Key Highlights:
•    Details the author’s survival as a premature twin left at a Catholic orphanage in Ibadan after her mother’s death in childbirth in 1961.
•    Documents her adoption by a British family working in Nigeria and subsequent move to England.
•    Chronicles her early dance training and professional breakthroughs in London’s West End, including the original production of Cats.
•    Describes her casting and performance as Oola in Return of the Jedi and the unique return for additional scenes in the 1997 Special Edition.
•    Examines the challenges of navigating racial identity, family dynamics, and personal growth while building a career in the performing arts.
•    Reflects on later life experiences, including motherhood, international conventions, and the decision to write the memoir as a means of understanding her own story.

About the Author: 

Femi Taylor is a writer and performer whose life journey has taken her from a remote village in southern Nigeria to the stages of London’s West End and the universe of Star Wars and beyond. This book grew out of a need to understand and give shape to her own story.
 

Author: Femi Taylor
Contact Name: Femi Taylor 
Website: www.femitaylor.com 
Availability: Available in print and kindle formats through major online retailers including Amazon.

Media Contact

Organization: London Publisher UK

Contact Person: London Publisher

Website: https://londonpublisher.co.uk/

Email: Send Email

Contact Number: +447575831895

Address:Balmoral Drive, Woking GU228EY

City: Woking

State: surry

Country:United Kingdom

Release id:48219

The post Star Wars Actress Femi Taylor Publishes Memoir Tracing Path from Nigerian Village to West End and Beyond appeared first on King Newswire. This content is provided by a third-party source.. King Newswire makes no warranties or representations in connection with it. King Newswire is a press release distribution agency and does not endorse or verify the claims made in this release. If you have any complaints or copyright concerns related to this article, please contact the company listed in the ‘Media Contact’ section

BurnesSEO, a South African digital growth studio based in Highbury, Meyerton, today announced the launch of a dedicated Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) service.

Meyerton, Gauteng, South Africa, 18th Aug 2026 — BurnesSEO, a South African digital growth studio based in Highbury, Meyerton, today announced the launch of a dedicated Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) service, designed to help local businesses become visible inside the AI-generated answers produced by ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Gemini rather than only in traditional blue-link search results.

The new offering responds to a rapid shift in how South African consumers discover service providers. According to Google’s own guidance on AI features in search, “AEO” (Answer Engine Optimisation) and “GEO” (Generative Engine Optimisation) describe the practice of preparing content so AI-powered engines can surface, cite and synthesise it within their responses (Google Search Central). HubSpot’s recent GEO dataset reports that ChatGPT now reaches roughly 900 million weekly active users, that 60 percent of Google searches end without a click, and that AI-referred traffic has climbed 600 percent since January 2025 (HubSpot Marketing Blog).

“Most South African service businesses have spent the last fifteen years learning how to win the blue links. The next fifteen years will be about winning the AI answer,” said Bibi Burness, Founder and Director of BurnesSEO. “Generative Engine Optimisation is not a replacement for search engine optimisation; it is the next layer of it. The companies that get cited inside ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews in the next twelve months will own the next decade of discovery, and most local competitors have not even started measuring their AI visibility yet.”

GEO is the practice of optimising digital content — including structured data, entity references, citation signals, factual clarity and author authority — so that large language models identify, trust and reference a brand inside AI-generated answers, rather than treating that brand as invisible beneath a generic response (Semrush). As the Geo Guide 2026 notes, GEO “adds a discoverability layer” rather than replacing traditional SEO (LLMrefs).

BurnesSEO’s GEO service is delivered as a standalone engagement or as an add-on to the studio’s existing local SEO, national SEO and AI marketing automation bundles, which start at R10,000 per month. The studio is also offering a free AI Visibility Score tool that benchmarks where a business currently appears — or fails to appear — across the four leading AI search engines.

The launch reinforces BurnesSEO’s positioning as an AI-first specialist studio for South African service businesses. Founded and led by Bibi Burness, the team includes Shané Van Staden (Digital Marketing Specialist) and Caitlyn Martin (Web Designer and Digital Marketer). The studio operates from Meyerton and serves clients across Gauteng with remote delivery nationwide.

“Local service businesses are the most exposed to this shift,” Burness added. “When a homeowner in Johannesburg asks an AI which plumber to call, the answer comes from the model, not from the directory. If a business is not cited, it does not exist in that conversation. The studio’s job is to make sure its clients are cited accurately, in the right towns, and in front of the right buyers.”

About BurnesSEO

BurnesSEO is a specialist digital growth studio based in Highbury, Meyerton, Gauteng, South Africa. The studio builds SEO, GEO and AI-powered marketing strategies for South African service businesses, designed to make its clients “impossible to ignore.” Service offerings include local SEO, national SEO, Google Ads management, Generative Engine Optimisation, AI marketing automation and website design. Packages start at R10,000 per month. The team is led by Bibi Burness and built around a tight in-house roster that serves clients across Gauteng and beyond. For a free benchmark, request the AI Visibility Score

Media Contact

Organization: Burnesseo Seo consultating

Contact Person: Bibi Burness

Website: https://burnesseo.co.za/

Email: Send Email

Contact Number: +27729850426

Address:19 Kransvalk Rd, Highbury, Meyerton, 1961

Address 2: henley on klip

City: Meyerton

State: Gauteng

Country:South Africa

Release id:48218

The post BurnesSEO Launches Generative Engine Optimisation Service for South African Businesses appeared first on King Newswire. This content is provided by a third-party source.. King Newswire makes no warranties or representations in connection with it. King Newswire is a press release distribution agency and does not endorse or verify the claims made in this release. If you have any complaints or copyright concerns related to this article, please contact the company listed in the ‘Media Contact’ section

San Jose, California, United States, 18th Aug 2026 – Comu, a productivity technology company, recently announced the launch of Comu Action Pro, a dedicated AI-powered hardware device designed to bridge the gap between spoken conversation and actionable work. Moving beyond traditional AI note-taking, Comu Action Pro acts as a tool that automatically transforms interviews, meetings, and brainstorming sessions into immediate, practical outputs like follow-up emails, presentation outlines, and prioritized action lists.

As professional environments become increasingly fast-paced, the struggle to manage post-meeting workflows remains a major productivity bottleneck. While recording technology has improved, the manual burden of processing those conversations—transcribing, summarizing, and assigning tasks—remains time-consuming and prone to error.

The current AI experience often creates additional work by requiring users to learn complex prompts and navigate multiple tools. In contrast, Comu Action Pro is built on the principle that AI should adapt to the user. It goes beyond simply capturing words to capture actual intent, turning it into measurable progress as soon as the conversation ends. 

Post-Meeting Processing

A key feature of Comu Action Pro lies in its ability to streamline post-conversation processing. Rather than leaving users with a raw transcript, the device’s software analyzes conversation context to generate structured deliverables:

• Actionable Intelligence: Automatically extracts decisions, deadlines, and responsibilities.
• Drafting Capabilities: Instantly creates structured follow-up emails and presentation outlines based on meeting discussions.
• Structured Organization: Produces high-level summaries that are ready to share, organize, and reference immediately.

Engineering for the Real World

Designed to function in challenging acoustic environments—from bustling airports to crowded conference halls—Comu Action Pro integrates specialized hardware with intelligent software. Key features include:

• Advanced Audio Capture: A six-microphone array optimized for group dynamics and noise reduction.
• Extended Performance: Up to 70 hours of continuous recording capability.
• Intuitive Interaction: A dedicated AI button allows users to initiate tasks naturally, without the need for manual prompt engineering or complex workflow builders.

Security-First Design

Recognizing that professional conversations often involve sensitive information, Comu Action Pro is built with a robust security architecture that aligns with GDPR, HIPAA, and SOC 2 standards, ensuring that productivity does not come at the expense of data privacy.

Availability and Pricing

Comu Action Pro is now available for purchase on Comu’s official store.

For more information please visit Comu Action Pro’s official store.

About Comu

Comu is a productivity technology company dedicated to building productivity tools. The company is redefining how professionals interact with technology by combining dedicated hardware with intelligent workflows. Comu’s mission is to reduce the complexity of the modern digital workspace, allowing users to spend less time processing information and more time moving ideas forward.

Media Contact

Organization: Comu

Contact Person: Arya Chen

Website: https://store.comu.com/

Email:
arya@comulytic.ai

City: San Jose

State: California

Country:United States

Release id:48088

The post Comu Launches Action Pro: An AI-Powered Hardware Device for Professional Meeting Workflows appeared first on King Newswire. This content is provided by a third-party source.. King Newswire makes no warranties or representations in connection with it. King Newswire is a press release distribution agency and does not endorse or verify the claims made in this release. If you have any complaints or copyright concerns related to this article, please contact the company listed in the ‘Media Contact’ section