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The Fate of Sudan The Origins and Con...
Brief Summary
The Fate of Sudan: The Origins and Consequences of a Flawed Peace Process.
In 2005, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) ended one of Africa's most devastating civil wars and set the stage for the partition of Sudan, Africa's largest country. One of the most important peace agreements in African history, it has had decisive consequences for the entire Horn of Africa.
Yet to date there has been little rigorous analysis as to why the parties signed the CPA, what strategies they adopted having signed the agreement, and the political consequences of state partition actually are.
In The Fate of Sudan, John Young argues forcefully that the birth of the independent state of Southern Sudan and the threat of further dismemberment of a rump northern Sudan are due to the failure of the approaches and ideologies of the main Sudanese parties, as well as a deeply flawed US-backed peace process that excludes civil society and rebel groups.
Written by an insider directly involved in the Sudanese election and referendum processes, and featuring a wealth of first-hand evidence, this is a crucial examination of a topic of intense political and media interest.
ISBN:9781780323251
Author:John Young
Wrestling with the Devil A Prison Mem...
Brief Summary
Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s powerful prison memoir begins half an hour before his release on 12 December 1978. A year earlier, he recalls, armed police arrived at his home and took him to Kenya’s Kamiti Maximum Security Prison.
There, Ngugi lives in a block alongside other political prisoners, but he refuses to give in to the humiliation. He decides to write a novel in secret, on toilet paper – it is a book that will become his classic, Devil on the Cross.
Wrestling with the Devil is Ngugi’s unforgettable account of the drama and challenges of living under twenty-four-hour surveillance. He captures not only the pain caused by his isolation from his family, but also the spirit of defiance and the imaginative endeavors that allowed him to survive.
ISBN:9781784702243
Author:Ngugi wa Thiongo
The Palm Wine Drinkard
Brief Summary
When Amos Tutuola's first novel, The Palm-Wine Drinkard, appeared in 1952, it aroused exceptional worldwide interest. Drawing on the West African (Nigeria) Yoruba oral folktale tradition, Tutuola described the odyssey of a devoted palm-wine drinker through a nightmare of fantastic adventure.
Since then, The Palm-Wine Drinkard has been translated into more than 15 languages and has come to be regarded as a masterwork of one of Africa's most influential writers.
ISBN:9780571049967
Author:Amos Tutuola
In the Name of the Mother Reflections...
Renowned worldwide, as novelist and dramatist, Ngugi wa Thiongo's contributions to the body of critical writing on African literature, politics and society have been highly significant. His best known critical work is Decolonizing the Mind, which since publication in 1986 has profoundly influenced other writers, critics, scholars and students.
These latest essays reflect Ngugi's continuing interests and enthusiasms. His choice of writers is original. He makes us look again at their novels to address his lifelong concerns with the ways to independence, the meanings of colonialism and the takeover by neo-colonialism, and the functions of literature in political as well as literary terms.
They will appeal not only to his international band of supporters. They will also introduce his views to young people discovering African and Caribbean literature. Ngugi wa Thiong'o is Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of California, Irvine.
Ngugi is renowned for his essays, including the seminal Decolonizing the Mind (James Currey 1986); his plays, which led to his detention in Kenya; his novels - the most recent works being The Wizard of the Crow (2007, translated into English from Gikuyu) and his memoirs Dreams in a Time of War and In the House of the Interpreter.
The Blessed Girl by Angela Makholwa
When you are accustomed to the finer things in life – designer shoes, champagne, VIP lounges, exotic holidays abroad, a luxury penthouse, and expensive wheels – what independent young woman in her right mind would want to let them go? Certainly not the beautiful, ambitious and super-street smart Bontle Tau, the girl who has used her good looks and winning charm all her life to get exactly what she wants.
The lifestyle doesn’t come cheap, though, nor does maintaining the body that allows it (just ask Dr Heinz at the beauty clinic). Luckily, Bontle has a degree in MENcology, and there is no shortage of blessers at her penthouse door, eager to give her all the love and (financial) support she needs. Papa Jeff might be overweight and getting on a bit, and receiving some unwanted attention from the Hawks; and Teddy might not have fully come through for her on that messed-up tender business; but Mr Emmanuel, the Nigerian businessman with deep pockets and the possibility of conferring second wife status … could that be love?
Keeping all her boyfriend’s happy and living a fabulous life is not without its challenges. With so many people clamouring for Bontle’s attention – from her shebeen queen mother Gladys in Mamelodi, who is taking strain bringing up her teenaged brother, Golokile, on her own; to her girlfriends, Iris and Tsholo; not to mention her soon-to-be ex-husband, the ever-patient, ever-loving Ntokozo, Bontle barely has time to post on Instagram these days. Sooner or later something’s got to give.
The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill
Abducted from her West African village at the age of eleven and sold as a slave in the American South, Aminata Diallo thinks only of freedom - and of finding her way home again. After escaping the plantation, torn from her husband and child, she passes through Manhattan in the chaos of the Revolutionary War, is shipped to Nova Scotia, and then joins a group of freed slaves on a harrowing return odyssey to Africa.
Based on a true story, Lawrence Hill's epic novel spans three continents and six decades to bring to life a dark and shameful chapter in our history through the story of one brave and resourceful woman.
Letter to My Daughter by Maya Angelou
Dedicated to the daughter she never had but sees all around her, Letter to my Daughter reveals Maya Angelou's path to living well and living a life with meaning. Told in her own inimitable style, this book transcends genres and categories: its part guidebook, part memoir, part poetry - and pure delight.
Here in short essays are glimpses of the tumultuous life that led Angelou to an exalted place in American letters and taught her lessons about compassion and fortitude. Whether she is recalling lost friends, extolling honesty or simply singing the praises of a meal of red rice, Maya Angelou writes from the heart to millions of women.
Like the rest of her remarkable work, Letter to My Daughter entertains and teaches. It is a book to cherish, savor, reread and share.
Tropical Fish by Doreen Baingana
Tropical Fish is a collection of linked short stories that explore the coming of age of three African sisters. Introspective and personal, the stories reveal the unexpected ambiguities of the young women's lives. The setting is the lush beauty of Uganda and the background is the aftermath of Idi Amin's dictatorship. But even in such trying circumstances, the stories show that people everywhere face the same basic human struggle to understand themselves, their world, and their place in it.
Each story develops the theme of exploration and discovery as the sisters mature and their interior and exterior lives expand. The youngest sister, Christine, becomes aware at an early age of the bittersweet dynamics of family love and later grapples with romantic and erotic, if problematic, love. Her explorations lead her across racial lines, when she has an affair with a British expatriate in the title story. What is initially an act of curiosity brings forth questions of racial and gender identity. Eager to stitch together a new pattern for her life, Christina ventures to another continent, North America, where she attempts to create a new home and a new self.
In another story, Christina's sister Patti writes in her diary about the vicissitudes of daily experience at a typical Ugandan girls' boarding school and the impact of class and religion on her relationships with fellow students. Other stories are written in the voice of the oldest sister, Rosa, who as a precocious teenager tries to decipher the mysteries of sex. Unfortunately, her promising future is harshly disrupted.
In the final story, Christine returns to Uganda and finds her perspective irrevocably altered. She is more acutely aware of her home's natural beauty, but its physical vibrancy is in stark contrast to the social and political conditions she encounters. Her journey of self-discovery comes full circle, but without any tidy resolutions. Ambiguities and uncertainties remain. What is clear, however, is that this book marks the arrival of a remarkably gifted writer.
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.
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 Hairdresser of Harare by Tendai H...
Brief summary
Voted an Observer Top Ten Contemporary African Book 2012 and nominated for The Guardian's Not the Booker Prize 2011. Vimbai is the star hairdresser of her salon, the smartest in Harare, Zimbabwe, until the enigmatic Dumisani appears.
Losing many of her best customers to this good-looking, smooth-talking young man, Vimbai fears for her job, vital if she's to provide for her young child. But in a remarkable reversal the two becomes allies, Dumi renting a room from Vimbai, then inviting her to a family wedding, where to her surprise, he introduces her to his rich parents as his 'girlfriend'.
Soon they are running their own Harare salon, attracting the wealthiest and most powerful clients in the city. But disaster is near, as Vimbai soon uncovers Dumi's secret, a discovery that will result in brutality and tragedy, testing their relationship to the very limit. The Hairdresser of Harare is a stylish, funny and sophisticated first-hand account of life today in Zimbabwe's capital city, confounding stereotypes and challenging injustice with equal fearlessness.
This is an upbeat, charming, but at times heart breaking, story of friendship, prejudice and forgiveness from the heart of contemporary Africa.
The Kingdon Field Guide to African Ma...
Brief summary
This is a complete guide to the mammal fauna of Africa. Covering all known species (around 460), this guide will enable identification of all land mammals likely to be seen anywhere in Africa.
Detailed accounts, with colour illustrations, are provided for most species, but some complex small mammal groups are summarized by general.
The colour illustrations show both sexes in sexually dimorphic species, and there are also a wealth of line drawings illustrating typical behaviours, the function of camouflaged or disruptive markings and the details of interspecific variation among closely allied species. Distribution maps show the ranges of most species covered.
The Pirates of Somalia
Brief summary
The Pirates of Somalia: Inside Their Hidden World
The first close-up look at the hidden world of Somali pirates by a young journalist who dared to make his way into their remote havens and spent a year infiltrating their lives.
For centuries, stories of pirates have captured imaginations around the world. The recent ragtag bands of pirates off the coast of Somalia, hijacking multimillion-dollar tankers owned by international shipping conglomerates, have brought the scourge of piracy into the modern era.
Jay Bahadur’s riveting narrative exposé—the first of its kind—looks at who these men are, how they live, the forces that created piracy in Somalia, how the pirates spend the ransom money, how they deal with their hostages, among much, much more. It is a revelation of a dangerous world at the epicenter of political and natural disaster.
ISBN:9780307379061
Author:Jay Bahadur
Shake Hands with the Devil The Failur...
Overview
On the 10th anniversary of when UN peacekeepers landed in Rwanda, Random House Canada proudly publishes the unforgettable 1st-hand account of the genocide by the leader of the mission. Digging deep into shattering memories, Dallaire has written a powerful story of betrayal, naïveté, racism & international politics. His message is simple, undeniable: Never again.
When Lt-Gen. Roméo Dallaire was called to serve as force commander of the UN intervention in Rwanda in '93, he thought he was heading off on a straightforward peacekeeping mission. Thirteen months later he flew home from Africa, broken, disillusioned & suicidal, having witnessed the slaughter of 800,000 Rwandans in 100 days.
In Shake Hands with the Devil, he takes readers with him on a return voyage into hell, vividly recreating the events the international community turned its back on. This book is an unsparing eyewitness account of the failure by humanity to stop the genocide, despite timely warnings. Woven thru the story of this disastrous mission is his own journey from confident Cold Warrior, to devastated UN commander, to retired general engaged in a painful struggle to find a measure of peace, hope & reconciliation.
This book is a personal account of his conversion from a man certain of his worth & secure in his assumptions to one conscious of his own weaknesses & failures & critical of the institutions he'd relied on. It might not sit easily with standard ideas of military leadership, but understanding what happened to him & his mission to Rwanda is crucial to understanding the moral minefields peacekeepers are forced to negotiate when we ask them to step into dirty wars.
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ISBN:9780786715107
Author:Roméo Dallaire
Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese
A sweeping, emotionally riveting first novel — an enthralling family saga of Africa and America, doctors and patients, exile and home.Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon at a mission hospital in Addis Ababa.
Orphaned by their mother’s death in childbirth and their father's disappearance, bound together by a preternatural connection and a shared fascination with medicine, the twins come of age as Ethiopia hovers on the brink of revolution.
Yet it will be love, not politics — their passion for the same woman—that will tear them apart and force Marion, fresh out of medical school, to flee his homeland. He makes his way to America, finding refuge in his work as an intern at an underfunded, overcrowded New York City hospital.
When the past catches up to him — nearly destroying him — Marion must entrust his life to the two men he thought he trusted least in the world: the surgeon father who abandoned him and the brother who betrayed him. An unforgettable journey into one man's remarkable life, and an epic story about the power, intimacy, and curious beauty of the work of healing others.
White Mischief by James Fox
Brief Summary
Just before 3am on January 24th, 1941, when Britain was preoccupied with surviving the Blitz, the body of Josslyn Hay, Earl of Erroll, was discovered lying on the floor of his Buick, at a road intersection some miles outside Nairobi, with a bullet in his head.
A leading figure in Kenya's colonial community, he had recently been appointed Military Secretary, but he was primarily a seducer of other men's wives. Sir Henry Delves Broughton, whose wife was Erroll's current conquest, had an obvious motive for the murder, but no one was ever convicted and the question of who killed him became a classic mystery, a scandel and cause celebre.
Among those who became fascinated with the Erroll case was Cyril Connolly. He joined up with James Fox for a major investigation of the case in 1969 for the SUNDAY TIMES magazine. After his death James Fox inherited the obsession and a commitment to continue in pursuit of the story both in England and Kenya in the late 1970s.
One day, on a veranda overlooking the Indian Ocean, Fox came across a piece of evidence that seemed to bring all the fragments and pieces together and convinced him that he saw a complete picture.
Ivory Apes and Peacocks
Brief Summary
Alan Root is one of the great wildlife pioneers. His unmatched experience of East African wildlife and his appetite for risk have made him a world-class naturalist and film-maker.
Ivory, Apes & Peacocks tells the story of his life’s work, from his arrival in Kenya as a young boy to the making of his game-changing films. From a hot-air balloon Alan was the first to track the wildebeest migration; then he flew it over Kilimanjaro. He filmed inside a termite mound and dived with hippos and crocodiles.
In this extraordinary memoir we look at Africa’s wonders through the eyes of a visionary, live through hair-raising adventure and personal sorrow, and also bear witness to a natural world now largely lost from view.
ISBN:978-0099555889
Author:Alan Root
We the People by Rev Timothy Njoya
Timothy Murere Njoya makes a decision to convert to Christianity. He is met with threats of a beating. The year is 1956. The Mau Mau had taken to the forest determined to win back the land stolen from them by British settlers.
Now, Njoya has an all-consuming purpose. Based on his newfound sovereignty, he dedicates his life to restoring the people’s humanity and the country’s nationhood.
His pursuit sees him thrice defrocked and, thrice left for dead, but he is thrice reinstated and thrice rises again, surviving against the odds to see the beginning of the realization of his dream—a Constitution based on the sovereignty of We the People.
Lords of Poverty by Graham Hancock
Brief Summary
Lords of Poverty is a case study in betrayals of a public trust. The shortcomings of aid are numerous, and serious enough to raise questions about the viability of the practice at its most fundamental levels.
Hancock’s report is thorough, deeply shocking, and certain to cause critical reevaluation—of the government’s motives in giving foreign aid, and of the true needs of our intended beneficiaries.
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ISBN:9780871134691
Author:Graham Hancock
Green Hills of Africa
Green Hills of Africa is Ernest Hemingway's lyrical journal of a month on safari in the great game country of East Africa, where he and his wife Pauline journeyed in December 1933.
Hemingway's well-known interest in - and fascination with - big-game hunting is magnificently captured in this evocative account of his trip.
It is an examination of the lure of the hunt and an impassioned portrait of the glory of the African landscape and of the beauty of a wilderness that was, even then, being threatened by the incursions of man.
ISBN:2147483647
Author:Ernest Hemingway