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Mau Mau From Below by Greet Kershaw a...
Brief Summary
John Lonsdale says in his introduction:
"This is the oral evidence of the Kikuyu villagers with whom Greet Kershaw lived as an aid worker during the Mau Mau 'Emergency' in the 1950s, and which is now totally irrecoverable in any form save in her own field notes.
"Professor Kershaw has uncovered long local histories of social tension which could have been revealed by no other means than patient enquiry, of both her neighbour's memory and government archives...
"Nobody, whether Kikuyu participant, Kenyan or European scholar, has provided such startlingly authoritative ethnographic insights into the values, fears and expectations of Kikuyu society and thus of the motivation of Kikuyu action...
"Her data suggests, as other scholars have also accepted, that there never was a single such movement and that none of its members, even those who supposed themselves to be its leaders, ever saw it whole, not because they did not have a political aim, but because that agenda was contested within different political circles over which they had no control and of which they may scarcely have had any knowledge.
And why is this finding important? It is because others, including almost all the movement's enemies, did see Mau Mau whole in order to try to comprehend it, a first step towards defeating it."
A Moonless, Starless Sky: Ordinary Wo...
Brief Summary
In A Moonless, Starless Sky Okeowo weaves together four narratives that form a powerful tapestry of modern Africa: a young couple, kidnap victims of Joseph Kony's LRA; a Mauritanian waging a lonely campaign against modern-day slavery; a women's basketball team flourishing amid war-torn Somalia; and a vigilante who takes up arms against the extremist group Boko Haram.
This debut book by one of America's most acclaimed young journalists illuminates the inner lives of ordinary people doing the extraordinary--lives that are too often hidden, underreported, or ignored by the rest of the world.
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Brief Summary
At the dawn of the next world war, a plane crashes on an uncharted island, stranding a group of schoolboys. At first, with no adult supervision, their freedom is something to celebrate; this far from civilization the boys can do anything they want. Anything.
They attempt to forge their own society, failing, however, in the face of terror, sin and evil. And as order collapses, as strange howls echo in the night, as terror begins its reign, the hope of adventure seems as far from reality as the hope of being rescued.
Labeled a parable, an allegory, a myth, a morality tale, a parody, a political treatise, even a vision of the apocalypse, Lord of the Flies is perhaps our most memorable novel about “the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart.”
Think You Can by Ivan Mawanda
Brief Summary
No one stops you to think even though it seems like it is the hardest work, that’s why very few engage in it. No dream is too big, no challenge is too great, and nothing we want for our future is beyond our reach. By thinking, I mean that you stop what you are doing, concentrate on the subject or problem that must be solved and force yourself to come up with a new idea or solution.
I am greatly irritated by some people who have a mantra: “Life is hard”. Often when I hear them say this, I am tempted to ask, “Compared to what?” As the cliche goes, life is what you make it. If you think it’s hard, it is hard. If you think it’s easy, it will be easy. It all begins and ends with your thinking. Everything is possible; your-dreams, your ideas, your inventions, your visions. Never let anyone tell you that you can’t. Think you can and it will be.
Beloved, this book Think you can emphasizes your progress beyond imagination, aggressive but dignified yet frank-filled in nature. This is a noble tool to build and encourage the voice of reason with every opportunity that avails itself so that you can have an excellent tale ending. Read keenly every chapter then you’ll humbly understand when or how to seek knowledge and integrate it with your choices.
This will make you assess life in a constructive way. Think you can or think you can’t; either way you’re right.
We are what we repeatedly do; excellence is therefore not an act but a habit. Never be bullied into silence, never allow yourself to be made a victim; never accept one’s definition of your life, define yourself. “You can’t stop people from talking about you; but you can stop giving them what to talk about”, and the worst thing to being blind is to have sight with no vision.
Make it your ambition to live a quiet life, to mind your own business and work with your own hands. Have a positive mindset,
Learn how to handle fear. It is never too late to start so don’t give up no matter how hard it gets, you have what it takes to be successful? Just go for it and make a difference.
My life experience sometime back when I communicated to some people that I wanted to write this book, not all but some asked me, “Ivan... Why are you so ambitious? Hmmm… and the challenge is you don’t listen, have you any idea how difficult it is?”
Guess why?
To cut the long story short, I silently ignored their critics and kept my cards for myself inclined to work harder since these friends were misleading me with a bad attitude or faulty thinking. I knew none of them was God to predict my ability. All learning begins with a simple phrase, “I don’t know” but some people believe they completed learning the moment they stepped out of school. How mistaken they are?
Without imagining that each person was given the brain to think, we must be good stewards with them and consciously think more every day…”Brain storming”. No matter how you run, you still have yourself to deal with; this could be circumstances or in the mindset. The single most important decision in your life other than regretting is to read this factual inspirational book, with God all things are possible...then happiness will be 100% your responsibility.
We Are All Birds of Uganda by Hafsa Z...
'You can't stop birds from flying, can you, Sameer? They go where they will...'
1960s UGANDA. Hasan struggles to keep his family business afloat following the sudden death of his wife. As he begins to put his shattered life back together piece by piece, a new regime seizes power, and a wave of rising prejudice threatens to sweep away everything he has built.
Present-day LONDON. Sameer, a young high-flying lawyer, senses an emptiness in what he thought was the life of his dreams. Called back to his family home by an unexpected tragedy, Sameer begins to find the missing pieces of himself not in his future plans, but in a heritage he never knew.
Moving between two continents over a troubled century, We Are All Birds of Uganda is an immensely resonant novel that explores racial tensions, generational divides and what it means to belong.
The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna
Sixteen-year-old Deka lives in fear and anticipation of the blood ceremony that will determine whether she will become a member of her village. Already different from everyone else because of her unnatural intuition, Deka prays for red blood so she can finally feel like she belongs.
But on the day of the ceremony, her blood runs gold, the color of impurity--and Deka knows she will face a consequence worse than death.
Then a mysterious woman comes to her with a choice: stay in the village and submit to her fate, or leave to fight for the emperor in an army of girls just like her. They are called alaki--near-immortals with rare gifts. And they are the only ones who can stop the empire's greatest threat.
Knowing the dangers that lie ahead yet yearning for acceptance, Deka decides to leave the only life she's ever known. But as she journeys to the capital to train for the biggest battle of her life, she will discover that the great walled city holds many surprises. Nothing and no one are quite what they seem to be--not even Deka herself.
Field Guides Birds of East Africa Ken...
Brief Summary
This spectacular new edition of the best-selling Helm field guide of all time covers all resident, migrant and vagrant species found in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. Over 1,300 species are illustrated with full details of all the plumages and major races likely to be encountered.
Concise text describes the identification, status, range, habits and voice, with fully updated range maps for each species.
This authoritative book will not only be an indispensable guide to the visiting birder, but also a vital tool for those engaged in work to conserve and study the avifauna of the region - East Africa shelters a remarkable diversity of birds, many seriously endangered with small and vulnerable ranges.
Not yet Uhuru by Jaramogi Oginga Odinga
Not Yet Uhuru gives a vivid and authoritative account of the history of Kenya. In this autobiography, the author counters the Imperial British propaganda machine to distort the history of a nation. From the perspective of a man who was at the centre of the liberation struggle and the making of a new nation, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga deconstructs the fallacious and sloppy historical narratives peddled by propagandists, which are deliberately tailored to vilify the true national heroes and exalt villains.
In this seminal literary work, Jaramogi lets his betrayal by Jomo Kenyatta off his chest. He lays bare his frustration with Kenyatta’s turn against fellow Kapenguria six members such as Bildad Kaggia into his primary casualties and enemies. Jaramogi accuses Kenyatta of becoming an Imperial Master stooge and thus justifies his decision to break ranks with the Kenyatta regime. In light of the nationalism spirit, vision, and mission, Jaramogi considered Kenyatta’s change of heart an unforgivable grand betrayal. Not Yet Uhuru is not an ordinary autobiography.
It is Jaramogi’s historical gift to Kenyans, Africa in general, and historians the world over. This book is filled with prophetic anecdotes and laden with premonitions, which can stir us from our self-induced political stupor. Not Yet Uhuru demystifies the Kenyatta and Odinga families’ political feud, which has played out for over five decades. This book will help you understand why the sons of the two founding fathers of Kenyan continue to strive to outwit each other in the political arena.
Matigari by Ngugi wa Thiongo English ...
Brief Summary
Who is Matigari? Is he young or old; a man or fate; dead or living… or even a resurrection of Jesus Christ? These are the questions asked by the people of this unnamed country, when a man who has survived the war for independence emerges from the mountains and starts making strange claims and demands. Matigari is in search of his family to rebuild his home and start a new and peaceful future.
But his search becomes a quest for truth and justice as he finds the people still dispossessed and the land he loves ruled by corruption, fear, and misery. Rumors spring up that a man with superhuman qualities has risen to renew the freedom struggle.
The novel races toward its climax as Matigari realizes that words alone cannot defeat the enemy. He vows to use the force of arms to achieve his true liberation. Matigari is a satire on the betrayal of human ideals and on the bitter experience of post-independence African society.
Matigari by Ngugi wa Thiongo Kikuyu V...
Brief Summary
Who is Matigari? Is he young or old; a man or fate; dead or living… or even a resurrection of Jesus Christ? These are the questions asked by the people of this unnamed country, when a man who has survived the war for independence emerges from the mountains and starts making strange claims and demands. Matigari is in search of his family to rebuild his home and start a new and peaceful future.
But his search becomes a quest for truth and justice as he finds the people still dispossessed and the land he loves ruled by corruption, fear, and misery. Rumors spring up that a man with superhuman qualities has risen to renew the freedom struggle.
The novel races toward its climax as Matigari realizes that words alone cannot defeat the enemy. He vows to use the force of arms to achieve his true liberation. Matigari is a satire on the betrayal of human ideals and on the bitter experience of post-independence African society.
The perfect nine: the epic of Gikuyu ...
Brief Summary
A dazzling, genre-defying novel in verse, from the author Delia Owens says “tackles the absurdities, injustices, and corruption of a continent”
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s novels and memoirs have received glowing praise from the likes of President Barack Obama, the New Yorker, the New York Times Book Review, The Guardian, and NPR; he has been a finalist for the Man International Booker Prize and is annually tipped to win the Nobel Prize for Literature; and his books have sold tens of thousands of copies around the world.
In his first attempt at the epic form, Ngũgĩ tells the story of the founding of the Gĩkũyũ people of Kenya, from a strongly feminist perspective. A verse narrative, blending folklore, mythology, adventure, and allegory, The Perfect Nine chronicles the efforts the Gĩkũyũ founders make to find partners for their ten beautiful daughters—called “The Perfect Nine” —and the challenges they set for the 99 suitors who seek their hands in marriage. The epic has all the elements of adventure, with suspense, danger, humor, and sacrifice.
Ngũgĩ’s epic is a quest for the beautiful as an ideal of living, as the motive force behind migrations of African peoples. He notes, “The epic came to me one night as a revelation of ideals of quest, courage, perseverance, unity, family; and the sense of the divine, in human struggles with nature and nurture.”
How Democracy Ends by David Runciman
Brief Summary
Since the end of World War II, democracy's sweep across the globe seemed inexorable. Yet today, it seems radically imperiled, even in some of the world's most stable democracies. How bad could things get?
In How Democracy Ends, David Runciman argues that we are trapped in outdated twentieth-century ideas of democratic failure. By fixating on coups and violence, we are focusing on the wrong threats. Our societies are too affluent, too elderly, and too networked to fall apart as they did in the past. We need new ways of thinking the unthinkable -- a twenty-first-century vision of the end of democracy, and whether its collapse might allow us to move forward to something better.
A provocative book by a major political philosopher, How Democracy Ends asks the most trenchant questions that underlie the disturbing patterns of our contemporary political life.
Crude Nation: How Oil Riches Ruined V...
Brief Summary
Beneath Venezuelan soil lies an ocean of crude—the world’s largest reserves—an oil patch that shaped the nature of the global energy business. Unfortunately, a dysfunctional anti-American, leftist government controls this vast resource and has used its wealth to foster voter support, ultimately wreaking economic havoc.
Crude Nation reveals the ways in which this mismanagement has led to Venezuela’s economic ruin and turned the country into a cautionary tale for the world. Raúl Gallegos, a former Caracas-based oil correspondent, paints a picture both vivid and analytical of the country’s economic decline, the government’s foolhardy economic policies, and the wrecked lives of Venezuelans.
Without transparency, the Venezuelan government uses oil money to subsidize life for its citizens in myriad unsustainable ways, while regulating nearly every aspect of day-to-day existence in Venezuela. This has created a paradox in which citizens can fill up the tanks of their SUVs for less than one American dollar while simultaneously enduring nationwide shortages of staples such as milk, sugar, and toilet paper. Gallegos’s insightful analysis shows how mismanagement has ruined Venezuela again and again over the past century and lays out how Venezuelans can begin to fix their country, a nation that can play an important role in the global energy industry.
Maasai: Language and culture dictiona...
The illusion of power by GG Kariuki H...
Brief Summary
The Illusion of Power: Reflections on Fifty Years in Kenya Politics.
Kariki's political participation dates from 1952, when he pledged an oath to the allegiance of the Gikuyu tribe, the Mau Mau movement and the cause of African unity. Post-independence, he gradually progressed to being a political insider, serving in the Kenyan African National Union (KANU) and the Kenyan Government. In 1983 he was expelled from KANU - the only political party.
It is from this outsider-perspective, and in this climate of fear and uncertainty, without the desired freedom of association and access to political colleagues of the period of struggle, that he nevertheless here recounts his experiences of half a century in politics.
He holds the belief that political evolution is inexorable; and that knowledge about, and reflection on the past is the only way of preventing the tragedy of yet another generation repeating that which they condemned in their predecessors.
The River Between by Ngugi wa Thiongo
My Life with a Criminal by John Kiria...
John Kiriamiti's best-selling novel My Life in Crime has become a classic. Here Milly, his girlfriend, tells the poignant story of her life with the bank robber.
They were in love, and he was gentle, kind and considerate. But after she moved in with him, she discovered his double life. She remained devoted, but the stress of his life bore its toll, and finally they parted. This sequel novel is also a bestseller in Kenya.
The Sinister Trophy by John Kiriamiti
Written by the author of the popular Son of Fate, this follow-up story tells of Adams Wamathina, better known as Son of Fate, who is searching for a trophy which other parties will stop at nothing to get.
The action takes place in Nairobi and Tanzania and Son of Fate finds himself involved with car chases and murder as he becomes embroiled in the chase.
My Life in Crime by John Kiriamiti
The late 1960's and early '70s may be remembered as the years of the great bank and other armed robberies in Kenya. This is the true story of one of the participants in some of those robberies, John Kiriamit. In raw and candid language, Kiramiti tells the story of how he dropped out of secondary school when he was only fifteen years old, and for a time became a novice pickpocket, before graduating into crimes like car-breaking and ultimately into violent robbery.
This spell-binding story takes the reader into the underworld of crime, and it depicts graphically the criminal's struggle for survival against the forces of law.
