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The Weekenders
Brief Summary
The Weekenders: Travels in the Heart of Africa
What would happen if you took some of Britain's best writing talent, put them on a plane and flew them to one of the most extraordinary and inaccessible places on the planet?
What would happen if you took Irvine Welsh from the streets of Edinburgh and showed him a remote, dangerous village in Africa? Or if you flew Alex Garland into one of the world's most hazardous war zones?
And how would Tony Hawks react if you dragged him away from his tennis and asked him to write a song with a Sudanese tribesman? With Victoria Glendinning, Andrew O'Hagan, Giles Foden and WF Deedes, these writers have experienced for themselves one of the most beautiful and yet troubled lands in the world - Sudan.
This remarkable collection of short stories and evocative travel writing is their response - as diverse and unpredictable as the country itself.
ISBN:9780091881801
Author:W.F. Deedes,Sue Ryan,Alex Garland,Tony Hawks, Andrew O'Hagan,Irvine Welsh,Giles Foden and Victoria Glendinning
Welcome to Lagos by Chibundu Onuzo
Deep in the Niger Delta, Officer Chike Ameobi deserts the army and sets out on the road to Lagos. He is soon joined by a wayward private, a naive militant, a vulnerable young woman and a runaway middle-class wife. The shared goals of this unlikely group: freedom and new life.
As they strive to find their places in the city, they become embroiled in a political scandal. Ahmed Bakare, editor of the failing Nigerian Journal, is determined to report the truth. Yet government minister Chief Sandayo will do anything to maintain his position. Trapped between the two, they are forced to make a life-changing decision.
Full of shimmering detail, Welcome to Lagos is a stunning portrayal of an extraordinary city, and of seven lives that intersect in a breathless story of courage and survival.
Rules of the Wild by Francesca Marciano
Brief Summary
A mesmerizing novel of love and nostalgia set in the vast spaces of contemporary East Africa.
Romantic, often resonantly ironic, moving and wise, Rules of the Wild transports us to a landscape of unsurpassed beauty even as it gives us a sharp-eyed portrait of a closely knit tribe of cultural outsiders: the expatriates living in Kenya today.
Challenged by race, by class, and by a longing for home, here are "safari boys" and Samaritans, reporters bent on their own fame, travelers who care deeply about elephants but not at all about the people of Africa. They all know each other. They meet at dinner parties, they sleep with each other, they argue about politics and the best way to negotiate their existence in a place where they don't really belong.
At the center is Esmé, a beautiful young woman of dazzling ironies and introspections, who tells us her story in a voice both passionate and self-deprecating. Against a paradoxical backdrop of limitless physical freedom and escalating civil unrest, Esmé struggles to make sense of her own place in Africa and of her feelings for the two men there whom she loves--Adam, a second-generation Kenyan who is the first to show her the wonders of her adopted land, and Hunter, a British journalist sickened by its horrors.
Rules of the Wild evokes the worlds of Isak Dinesen, Beryl Markham, and Ernest Hemingway. It explores unforgettably our infinite desire for a perfect elsewhere, for love and a place to call home. It is an astonishing literary debut.
War and Conflict in Africa
Brief Summary
After the Cold War, Africa earned the dubious distinction of being the world's most bloody continent. But how can we explain this proliferation of armed conflicts? What caused them and what were their main characteristics? And what did the world's governments do to stop them?
In this fully revised and updated second edition of his popular text, Paul Williams offers an in-depth and wide-ranging assessment of more than six hundred armed conflicts which took place in Africa from 1990 to the present day - from the continental catastrophe in the Great Lakes region to the sprawling conflicts across the Sahel and the web of wars in the Horn of Africa.
Taking a broad comparative approach to examine the political contexts in which these wars occurred, he explores the major patterns of organized violence, the key ingredients that provoked them and the major international responses undertaken to deliver lasting peace.
Part I, Contexts provides an overview of the most important attempts to measure the number, scale and location of Africa's armed conflicts and provides a conceptual and political sketch of the terrain of struggle upon which these wars were waged.
Part II, Ingredients analyses the role of five widely debated features of Africa's wars: the dynamics of neo-patrimonial systems of governance; the construction and manipulation of ethnic identities; questions of sovereignty and self-determination; as well as the impact of natural resources and religion.
Part III, Responses, discusses four major international reactions to Africa's wars: attempts to build a new institutional architecture to help promote peace and security on the continent; this architecture's two main policy instruments, peacemaking initiatives and peace operations; and efforts to develop the continent.
War and Conflict in Africa will be essential reading for all students of international peace and security studies as well as Africa's international relations.
ISBN:9781509509058
Author:Paul D. Williams
Valley of the Casbahs
Brief Summary
Valley of the Casbahs: A Journey across the Moroccan Sahara
The four-hundred-and-fifty-mile long Draa River Valley in the Moroccan Sahara contains some of the most sumptuous oases and searing desert of the Arab world, starting in the moonscape gorges of the Anti-Atlas Mountains through to a green sea of date palms over which rise the many-towered casbahs of ochre coloured clay, medieval in aspect and sheltering a life medieval in character.
It is a region richer historically and ethnically than anywhere else in North Africa. The river stretches to the mosaic of dunes and parched land known as hammada - the domain of Bedouin and Blue Men and isolated Berber tribes - and pours through the desert into the Atlantic, where it ends its course. Jeffrey Tayler follows the Draa by foot and on camel, recounting stays in casbah homes, weddings, visits to mosques and marabouts and nights in hashish dens.
It is a journey marked with extremes - of weather, as Tayler survives intense heat and sandstorms and potentially lethal local tribesmen - and one which he only narrowly escapes to tell this tale.
ISBN:9780349115368
Author:Jeffrey Tayler
When the Sun Goes Down
Brief Summary
When the Sun Goes Down and other stories from Africa and beyond
This title When the Sun Goes Down and other stories from Africa and Beyond is an anthology of sixteen short stories by Emilia Ilieva and Waveney Olembo. 16 stories by international writers.
The sixteen short stories gathered in this anthology come from various corners of Africa and the rest of the world. Written over the last half a century – right up to the present day – by both renowned authors and those whose fame is now in the making, some published before, others appearing here for the first time, they represent fascinating examples of this widely beloved genre.
In the wisdom and beauty of their narrative worlds, the readers discover reality in new and stirring ways, and are memorably reminded of what a great gift it is to live – with pain, struggle, learning, love, joy, and all. The carefully selected stories on HIV/AIDS, corruption, gender issues, environmental concerns, dehumanizing and selfish acts of those perpetrating violence, provide the reader with a platform to debate and discuss them, and to positively influence change towards a better world.
These fascinating stories from many parts of the world bring into focus the need to appreciate diverse cultures and embrace the uniqueness that makes us one. Emilia Ilieva is currently an Associate Professor of Literature at Egerton University, Njoro. Her scholarly work has appeared in publications world-wide. Waveney Olembo is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Literature at Kenyatta University. Her publications are in the areas of poetry, and Caribbean and African Literature.
ISBN:9789966364531
Author:Emilia Ilieva and Waveney Olembo
Who Will Catch Us As We Fall by Iman ...
Haunted by a past that has kept her from Nairobi for over three years, Leena returns home to discover her family unchanged: her father is still a staunch patriot dreaming of a better country; her mother is still unwilling or unable to let go of the past; and her brother spends his days provoking the establishment as a political activist.
When Leena meets a local Kikuyu artist whose past is linked to her own, the two begin a secret affair—one that forces Leena to again question her place in a country she once called home.
Interlinked with Leena’s story is that of Jeffery: a corrupt policeman burdened with his own angers and regrets, and whose questionable actions have unexpected and catastrophic consequences for those closest to him. Who Will Catch Us as We Fall is an epic look at the politics and people of Kenya.
Zulu
Brief Summary
Zulu: The Heroism and Tragedy of the Zulu War of 1879.
Saul David's Zulu: The Heroism and Tragedy of the Zulu War of 1879 is a fascinating look at the most controversial and brutal British imperial conflict of the nineteenth century.
The real story of the Anglo-Zulu war was one of deception, dishonour, incompetence and dereliction of duty by Lord Chelmsford who invaded Zululand without the knowledge of the British Government. But it did not go to plan and there were many political repercussions. Using new material from archives in Britain and South Africa, Saul David blows the lid on this most sordid of imperial wars and comes to a number of startling new conclusions.
'Saul David's brilliant and magisterial account must now be regarded as the definitive history of the Zulu War' Frank McLynn, Literary Review
'This meticulously detailed book...give[s] a fully rounded and judicious account of this dismal conflict Guardian
'Fascinating, thrilling, convincing... reads like a novel' Economist
Saul David is Professor of War Studies at the University of Buckingham and the author of several critically acclaimed history books, including The Indian Mutiny: 1857 (shortlisted for the Westminster Medal for Military Literature), Zulu: The Heroism and Tragedy of the Zulu War of 1879 (a Waterstone's Military History Book of the Year) and, most recently, Victoria's Wars: The Rise of Empire.
ISBN:9780141015699
Author:Saul David
Sugar Daddys Lover
Brief Summary
Aggy, an eighteen-year old schoolgirl, in her first burst of passion marries a rich man of 40, who unknown to her has had several unsuccessful marriages. The first few months of married life offer contentment and bliss—before her husband, Abed, seems to undergo a sudden change and begins to subject Aggy first to neglect and then to brutality.
Before long Aggy, imma-ture and inexperienced, is caught up in a net of domestic terror. Then she rediscovers Tony, her former lover, the man, so it now seems, she should have married in the first place. Torn between a brutal husband with a questionable past and a young handsome lover with an unknown future, she has to fight hard to deliver both herself and her man from the wreck of her marriage.
A human story of a young girl's immature entry into marriage and her struggles to change the pain and problems of married life into mature fulfilment.
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ISBN:B001O9X0GC
Author:Rosemarie Owino
The Lunatic Express by Charles Miller
The Lunatic Express: An Entertainment in Imperialism.
The Lunatic Express is the saga of the turbulent international race for the mastery and development of an immense region of East Africa that all but visionaries thought worthless. It is the narrative of the building of the Mombasa-Nairobi-Lake Victoria Railway itself - the colossal six-year enterprise that was to cost #5,000,000 and countless lives, from derailments, collisions, disease, tribal raids and the assaults of wild animals.
It is a diorama of an earlier Africa of slave and ivory empires, of sultans and tribal monarchs and the vast lands that they ruled. Above all, it is the story of the white intruders whose combination of avarice, honour and tenacious courage made them a breed apart.
The Last Train to Zona Verde
Brief Summary
The Last Train to Zona Verde: My Ultimate African Safari
Following the success of the acclaimed Ghost Train to the Eastern Star and The Great Railway Bazaar, The Last Train to Zona Verde is an ode to the last African journey of the world's most celebrated travel writer.
"Happy again, back in the kingdom of light,” writes Paul Theroux as he sets out on a new journey through the continent he knows and loves best. Theroux first came to Africa as a twenty-two-year-old Peace Corps volunteer, and the pull of the vast land never left him. Now he returns, after fifty years on the road, to explore the little-traveled territory of western Africa and to take stock both of the place and of himself.
His odyssey takes him northward from Cape Town, through South Africa and Namibia, then on into Angola, wishing to head farther still until he reaches the end of the line. Journeying alone through the greenest continent, Theroux encounters a world increasingly removed from both the itineraries of tourists and the hopes of postcolonial independence movements.
Leaving the Cape Town townships, traversing the Namibian bush, passing the browsing cattle of the great sunbaked heartland of the savanna, Theroux crosses "the Red Line” into a different Africa: "the improvised, slapped-together Africa of tumbled fences and cooking fires, of mud and thatch,” of heat and poverty, and of roadblocks, mobs, and anarchy. After 2,500 arduous miles, he comes to the end of his journey in more ways than one, a decision he chronicles with typically unsparing honesty in a chapter called "What Am I Doing Here?”
Vivid, witty, and beautifully evocative, The Last Train to Zona Verde is a fitting final African adventure from the writer whose gimlet eye and effortless prose have brought the world to generations of readers.
ISBN:9780618839339
Author:Paul Theroux
No Turning Back A Novel of South Africa
Brief Summary
Escaping from his violent stepfather, twelve-year-old Sipho heads for Johannesburg, where he has heard that gangs of children live on the streets. Surviving hunger and bitter-cold winter nights is hard ‘but learning when to trust in the ‘new' South Africa proves even more difficult.
No Turning Back appeared on the short list of both the Guardian and Smarties book prizes on the United Kingdom.
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ISBN:9780064407496
Author:Beverley Naidoo
The Double Comfort Safari Club
Brief Summary
Readers will agree that this touching and dramatic new installment in Alexander McCall Smith’s beloved and best-selling series is the finest yet. In this story, Precious Ramotswe deals with issues of mistaken identity and great fortune against the beautiful backdrop of Botswana’s remote and striking Okavango Delta.
Mma Ramotswe and Mma Makutsi head to a safari camp to carry out a delicate mission on behalf of a former guest who has left one of the guides a large sum of money. But once they find their man, Precious begins to sense that something is not right. To make matters worse, shortly before their departure Mma Makutsi’s fiancé, Phuti Radiphuti, suffers a debilitating accident, and when his aunt moves in to take care of him, she also pushes Mma Makutsi out of the picture.
Could she be trying to break up the relationship? Finally, a local priest and his wife independently approach Mma Ramotswe with concerns of infidelity, creating a rather unusual and tricky situation. Nevertheless, precious is confident that with a little patience, kindness and good sense things will work out for the best, something that will delight her many fans.
ISBN:9780375424502
Author:Alexander McCall Smith
Of Beasts and Beings
Brief Summary
In this searing and timely novel, reminiscent of the work of J.M. Coetzee and Cormac McCarthy, the devastating effects of a country's economic and moral collapse provide the backdrop for a story about individual fortitude and conscience.
In an unnamed and post-apocalyptic African republic, militiamen seize a scavenger as he is digging for roots, or anything that will nourish him and keep him alive. He is traded and ransomed and ends up in the hands of another group, whose members include a pregnant woman whom he is forced to carry in a wheelbarrow on a nightmarish and seemingly endless overland journey.
This story alternates with the diary entries of a white schoolteacher who, embittered by the horrific state of his country, is preparing to leave. Before he can do so, however, he must confront his own demons and personal failings. Both narrators are in danger and both are apparently helpless to control their fates. When these two plotlines brilliantly and surprisingly unite the result is electrifying, shocking, and brilliant.
With sparse and heartbreaking prose Ian Holding asks vital questions about personal responsibility, choice, and truth.
ISBN:9781609450540
Author:Ian Holding
The Kalahari Typing School for Men
Brief Summary
Life is never without its problems. Will Precious Ramotswe’s delightfully cunning and profoundly moral methods save the day? Find out in this, the fourth volume in the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series featuring Botswana's first and only lady detective.
Now that The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency (the only detective agency for ladies and others in Botswana) is established, its founder, Precious Ramotswe, can look upon her life with pride: she’s reached her late thirties ("the finest age to be"), has a house, two children, a good fiancé -- Mr. J. L. B. Matekoni -- and many satisfied customers.
But life is never without its problems. It turns out that her adopted son is responsible for the dead hoopoe bird in the garden; her assistant, Mma Makutsi, wants a husband and needs help with her idea to open the Kalahari Typing School for Men; yet Mma Ramotswe’s sexist rival has no trouble opening his Satisfaction Guaranteed Detective Agency across town. Will Precious Ramotswe’s delightfully cunning and profoundly moral methods save the day? Follow the continuing story of Botswana’s first lady detective in the irresistible The Kalahari Typing School for Men.
ISBN:9780349117041
Author:Alexander McCall Smith
The Girl Was Mine by David Karanja
In The Girl Was Mine, Douglas Kamau struggles to keep Nancy Wanja his girlfriend, but the prevailing forces almost cost him his life.
Whether or not Douglas emerges victorious is the ultimate question.
The world favors rich tycoons like Tim Matthews and makes them confident that they can have anything they want, even the love of an unwilling young woman. Nancy's father Waihenya will do anything for money and position.
Unyielding Hope the Life and times
Brief Summary
A biography of Koitaleel Somoei, the leader of the Nandi people of Kenya who headed the resistance to the British invasion of Kenya at the end of the nineteenth century. Worldreader proudly presents this story in a new series of children’s and young adult books from the developing world.
Worldreader is a non-profit organization committed to delivering digital books to children and families in the developing world using e-book technology.
By purchasing this book you directly contribute to this effort by helping fund school literacy programs, and promote the writing and publication of great books from local authors everywhere.
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ISBN:2030301004002
Author: Kipchoge Araap Chomu
The Lower River
Brief Summary
Ellis Hock never believed that he would return to Africa. He runs an old-fashioned menswear store in a small town in Massachusetts but still dreams of his Eden, the four years he spent in Malawi with the Peace Corps, cut short when he had to return to take over the family business.
When his wife leaves him, taking the family home, he realizes that there is one place for him to go: back to Malawi on the remote Lower River, where he can be happy again. Arriving at the dusty village, he finds it transformed: the school he built is a ruin, the church and clinic are gone, and poverty and apathy have set in among the people.
They remember him — the White Man with no fear of snakes — and welcome him. But is his new life, his journey back, an escape or a trap? Interweaving memory and desire, hope and despair, salvation and damnation, this is a hypnotic, compelling, and brilliant return to a terrain no one has ever written better about than Theroux.
ISBN:9780241957745
Author:Paul Theroux
Beneath the Lions Gaze by Maaza Mengiste
An epic tale of a father and two sons, of betrayals and loyalties, of a family unraveling in the wake of Ethiopia’s revolution.
This memorable, heartbreaking story opens in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 1974, on the eve of a revolution. Yonas kneels in his mother’s prayer room, pleading to his god for an end to the violence that has wracked his family and country.
His father, Hailu, a prominent doctor, has been ordered to report to jail after helping a victim of state-sanctioned torture to die. And Dawit, Hailu’s youngest son, has joined an underground resistance movement—a choice that will lead to more upheaval and bloodshed across a ravaged Ethiopia.
Beneath the Lion’s Gaze tells a gripping story of family, of the bonds of love and friendship set in a time and place that has rarely been explored in fiction. It is a story about the lengths human beings will go in pursuit of freedom and the human price of a national revolution. Emotionally gripping, poetic, and indelibly tragic, Beneath the Lion’s Gaze is a transcendent and powerful debut.
The Book of Memory by Petina Gappah
Brief Summary
Memory is an albino woman languishing in Chikurubi Maximum Security Prison in Harare, Zimbabwe, where she has been convicted of murder. As part of her appeal, her lawyer insists that she write down what happened as she remembers it.
As her story unfolds, Memory reveals that she has been tried and convicted for the murder of Lloyd Hendricks, her adopted father. But who was Lloyd Hendricks? Why does Memory feel no remorse for his death? And did everything happen exactly as she remembers?
In The Book of Memory, Petina Gappah has created a uniquely slippery narrator: forthright, acerbically funny, and with a complicated relationship to the truth. Moving between the townships of the poor and the suburbs of the rich, and between the past and the present, Gappah weaves a compelling tale of love, obsession, the relentlessness of fate, and the treachery of memory.
