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A Conspiracy of Ravens by Othuke Omin...
In the Niger Delta creeks of Southern Nigeria, nine expatriates are being held hostage by militants fighting for control over the resources from their land. At the same time, a series of seemingly unconnected events rock the country.
Alex Randa, an agent of the Department of State Services, a celebrated hostage negotiator with a compelling record of successes is tasked by the president to secure the release of the hostages; and to also uncover the sponsors behind the militants. With nothing to go on but a phrase which she stumbles upon: ‘Operation Raven’, her instincts, and three unlikely allies, Alex quickly learns that there are forces at play determined to tear down the fabric of the country’s unity. They must race against time to save not just the hostages but a nation on the brink of a bloody Civil War.
‘A Conspiracy of Ravens’ is a deftly woven tale of vengeance, filled with intrigue . . . A tour de force.
If You Want to Make God Laugh by Bian...
In a squatter camp on the outskirts of Johannesburg, seventeen-year-old Zodwa lives in desperate poverty, under the shadowy threat of a civil war and a growing AIDS epidemic. Eight months pregnant, Zodwa carefully guards secrets that jeopardize her life.
Across the country, wealthy socialite Ruth appears to have everything her heart desires, but it's what she can't have that leads to her breakdown. Meanwhile, in Zaire, a disgraced former nun, Delilah, grapples with a past that refuses to stay buried. When these personal crises send both middle-aged women back to their rural hometown to lick their wounds, the discovery of an abandoned newborn baby upends everything, challenging their lifelong beliefs about race, motherhood, and the power of the past.
As the mystery surrounding the infant grows, the complicated lives of Zodwa, Ruth, and Delilah become inextricably linked. What follows is a mesmerizing look at family and identity that asks: How far will the human heart go to protect itself and the ones it loves?
The Wrong End of the Telescope by Rab...
Mina Simpson, a Lebanese doctor, arrives at the infamous Moria refugee camp on Lesbos, Greece, after being urgently summoned for help by her friend who runs an NGO there. Alienated from her family except for her beloved brother, Mina has avoided being so close to her homeland for decades. But with a week off work and apart from her wife of thirty years, Mina hopes to accomplish something meaningful, among the abundance of Western volunteers who pose for selfies with beached dinghies and the camp's children. Soon, a boat crosses bringing Sumaiya, a fiercely resolute Syrian matriarch with terminal liver cancer.
Determined to protect her children and husband at all costs, Sumaiya refuses to alert her family to her diagnosis. Bonded together by Sumaiya's secret, a deep connection sparks between the two women, and as Mina prepares a course of treatment with the limited resources on hand, she confronts the circumstances of the migrants' displacement, as well as her own constraints in helping them.
Not since the inimitable Aaliya of An Unnecessary Woman has Rabih Alameddine conjured such a winsome heroine to lead us to one of the most wrenching conflicts of our time. Cunningly weaving in stories of other refugees into Mina's singular own, The Wrong End of the Telescope is a bedazzling tapestry of both tragic and amusing portraits of indomitable spirits facing a humanitarian crisis.
The Power of Strangers: The Benefits ...
In our cities, we stand in silence at the pharmacy and in check-out lines at the grocery store, distracted by our phones, barely acknowledging one another, even as rates of loneliness skyrocket. Online, we retreat into ideological silos reinforced by algorithms designed to serve us only familiar ideas and like-minded users. In our politics, we are increasingly consumed by a fear of people we’ve never met. But what if strangers—so often blamed for our most pressing political, social, and personal problems—are actually the solution?
In The Power of Strangers, Joe Keohane sets out on a journey to discover what happens when we bridge the distance between us and people we don’t know. He learns that while we’re wired to sometimes fear, distrust, and even hate strangers, people and societies that have learned to connect with strangers benefit immensely. Digging into a growing body of cutting-edge research on the surprising social and psychological benefits that come from talking to strangers, Keohane finds that even passing interactions can enhance empathy, happiness, and cognitive development, ease loneliness and isolation, and root us in the world, deepening our sense of belonging. And all the while, Keohane gathers practical tips from experts on how to talk to strangers, and tries them out himself in the wild, to awkward, entertaining, and frequently poignant effect.
Warm, witty, erudite, and profound, equal parts sweeping history and self-help journey, this deeply researched book will inspire readers to see everything—from major geopolitical shifts to trips to the corner store—in an entirely new light, showing them that talking to strangers isn’t just a way to live; it’s a way to survive.
Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins...
Carrie Soto is fierce, and her determination to win at any cost has not made her popular. But by the time she retires from tennis, she is the best player the world has ever seen. She has shattered every record and claimed twenty Grand Slam titles. And if you ask Carrie, she is entitled to every one. She sacrificed nearly everything to become the best, with her father, Javier, as her coach. A former champion himself, Javier has trained her since the age of two.
But six years after her retirement, Carrie finds herself sitting in the stands of the 1994 US Open, watching her record be taken from her by a brutal, stunning player named Nicki Chan.
At thirty-seven years old, Carrie makes the monumental decision to come out of retirement and be coached by her father for one last year in an attempt to reclaim her record. Even if the sports media says that they never liked “the Battle-Axe” anyway. Even if her body doesn’t move as fast as it did. And even if it means swallowing her pride to train with a man she once almost opened her heart to: Bowe Huntley. Like her, he has something to prove before he gives up the game forever.
In spite of it all, Carrie Soto is back, for one epic final season. In this riveting and unforgettable novel, Taylor Jenkins Reid tells her most vulnerable, emotional story yet.
The Psychology of Stupidity by Jean F...
Stupidity is all around us. But in order to vanquish it, we must first understand it. In The Psychology of Stupidity, some of the world's leading psychologists and thinkers--including a Nobel Prize winner and bestselling authors--discuss in articles, essays and interviews
- why smart people sometimes believe in utter nonsense;
- how our lazy brains cause us to make the wrong decisions;
- why trying to debate fools is a trap;
- how media manipulation and Internet overstimulation make us dumber;
- why the stupidest people don't think they're stupid.
After troy by Taban lo Liyong
after troy, Taban lo Liyong's booklength poem, is an expansive and engaging elaboration of two classical Greek texts, Homer's Odyssey and Aeschylus's Oresteia. Its focus is the homecoming from the Trojan war of two hero-kings, Odysseus and Agamemnon.
Lo Liyong recreates their thoughts and speech, adding dialogue from other characters, most of them women, who are not given a voice in the original stories.
after troy is also a philosophical enquiry into retribution and justice.
Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo
The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave
Before Owen Michaels disappears, he manages to smuggle a note to his beloved wife of one year: Protect her. Despite her confusion and fear, Hannah Hall knows exactly to whom the note refers: Owen’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey. Bailey, who lost her mother tragically as a child. Bailey, who wants absolutely nothing to do with her new stepmother.
As Hannah’s increasingly desperate calls to Owen go unanswered; as the FBI arrests Owen’s boss; as a US Marshal and FBI agents arrive at her Sausalito home unannounced, Hannah quickly realizes her husband isn’t who he said he was. And that Bailey just may hold the key to figuring out Owen’s true identity—and why he really disappeared.
Hannah and Bailey set out to discover the truth, together. But as they start putting together the pieces of Owen’s past, they soon realize they are also building a new future. One neither Hannah nor Bailey could have anticipated.
The Queen of Nothing by Holly Black
He will be destruction of the crown and the ruination of the throne.
Power is much easier to acquire than it is to hold onto. Jude learned this lesson when she released her control over the wicked king, Cardan, in exchange for immeasurable power.
Now as the exiled mortal Queen of Faerie, Jude is powerless and left reeling from Cardan’s betrayal. She bides her time determined to reclaim everything he took from her. Opportunity arrives in the form of her deceptive twin sister, Taryn, whose mortal life is in peril.
Jude must risk venturing back into the treacherous Faerie Court, and confront her lingering feelings for Cardan, if she wishes to save her sister. But Elfhame is not as she left it. War is brewing. As Jude slips deep within enemy lines she becomes ensnared in the conflict’s bloody politics.
And, when a dormant yet powerful curse is unleashed, panic spreads throughout the land, forcing her to choose between her ambition and her humanity…
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Holly Black, comes the highly anticipated and jaw-dropping finale to The Folk of the Air trilogy.
The Wicked King by Holly Black
You must be strong enough to strike and strike and strike again without tiring.
The first lesson is to make yourself strong.
After the jaw-dropping revelation that Oak is the heir to Faerie, Jude must keep her brother safe. To do so, she has bound the wicked king, Cardan, to her, and made herself the power behind the throne. Navigating the constantly shifting political alliances of Faerie would be difficult enough if Cardan were easy to control. But he does everything in his power to humiliate and undermine her even as his fascination with her remains undiminished.
When it becomes all too clear that someone close to Jude means to betray her, threatening her own life and the lives of everyone she loves, Jude must uncover the traitor and fight her own complicated feelings for Cardan to maintain control as a mortal in a Faerie world.
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black
Jude was seven when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King.
To win a place at the Court, she must defy him–and face the consequences.
As Jude becomes more deeply embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, she discovers her own capacity for trickery and bloodshed. But as betrayal threatens to drown the Courts of Faerie in violence, Jude will need to risk her life in a dangerous alliance to save her sisters, and Faerie itself.
Bandits on the Border: The Last Front...
Bandits on the Border: The Last Frontier in the Search for Somali Unity - By Nene Mburu.
In the early 1990s, Somalia was in the spotlight for factionalism as Warlords, clans, and sub-clans doggedly wrenched their fiefdoms from the Polyglot State through bloody civil wars. In contrast, thirty years earlier the Somali were pre-occupied with the struggle for stitching together the five Somali-inhabited enclaves of the Horn of Africa into one Greater Somalia.
Bandits on the Border revisits pan-Somalia nationalism of the 1960s when Kenyan Somalis attempted to secede and join the Somalia State which had been created after the merger of the former British Somaliland with the Italian Trusteeship.
This book is the first insiders analysis of the so-called Shifta secessionist war of the early 1960s and its degeneration into apolitical banditry that continues in the former Northern Frontier Districts of Kenya (NFD). The author argues that in the late 1950s Britain's crumbling colonial empire was beyond salvage and, having just fought the Mau Mau, the colonial power could not risk another protracted war in Kenya.
It therefore procrastinated a resolution of the Somali questions until it handed over political power to Jomo Kenyattas government. Nevertheless, having neglected and insulated the Somali community/region from the mainstream Kenyan society for sixty years, Britain bequeathed Kenyatta an advanced security problem that required time and long-term economic investment to eradicate collective disaffection and secessionism.
The book also explores the dynamics of the Shifta insurrection in its geopolitical context to illustrate why Somalia's irredentist foreign policy was unsustainable. It details how the Shifta war was affected by, and correspondingly affected, the realpolitik of the prevailing Cold War. It also gives a detailed comparative analysis with other secessionist wars taking place in Africa.
Lastly, the book explores the symmetrical connexion between insecurity in the NFD, the collapsed Somali State, and Americas war on international terrorism particularly after the bombing of the US embassies in eastern Africa and the attacks in USA of 11 September 2001.
Geological Highlights of East Africa&...
The national parks and reserves of East Africa are widely known for their rich and abundant wildlife. This book presents a new and exciting angle – the geological highlights of the region’s intriguing landscape. East Africa’s cataclysmic volcanic legacy, caused by rifting of the landmass, has resulted in a rich source of geological wonders. These range from the seemingly endless, peaceful plains of the Serengeti to the stark skyscraper walls of extinct calderas and the boiling magma cauldrons and belching vents of the Nyiragongo Volcano.
This handy guide escorts users around all the major – and some minor – parks of Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda, as well as the Virunga Mountains in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Descriptions of each park and its wildlife offerings, both fauna and flora, preface discussion of the geological origins, influences and current conditions. Key geosites in the parks, and how to access them, are indicated. Maps, satellite images and diagrams, along with vivid photography, help explain the dramatic landforms, both close up and from above.
For anyone planning a safari to the legendary East African game parks and reserves, this book adds an exciting new dimension.
When the Circus Leaves Town: What Hap...
What happens when a football club ups sticks and leaves its traditional home for pastures new? What replaces the terraces, stands and floodlights that tower above old town centres and terraced streets? How does football relate to the new landscapes that the clubs head to? What happens when football leaves home? When the Circus Leaves Town explores the impact of the ruptures created when clubs and supporters wave goodbye to their homes.
It examines disruption to matchday routines, erasure of geographic memories and the difficulties in repairing these, and considers whether such moves have been for better or worse. Writer Dave Proudlove walks the streets of towns and cities across the country visiting housing estates, retail parks and shiny new stadiums.
He talks to those involved with the relocation of football clubs - club officials, developers, politicians, fans - to understand the reasons behind the upheaval, and to bring us the full story of what happens when football leaves home.
Descent From Cherangany Hills: Memoir...
The life story of B. E. Kipkorir (1939-2015) is a stunning account told with the grace and ease of a seamless symphony; in captivating literary language, complete with rhetorical flashes of gripping phrases and simple sentences mortised to astonishing tightness. It is a story about the ultimate triumph of a man who beat great odds to scale the highest heights he possibly could.
A singular raconteur, the author weaves a tapestry – spanning many years – in quick rapid fire, both vivid and compelling. It’s a story to make you laugh, a story to make you cry, to build your faith to maximize your potential, for it is a story about possibilities.
We read fascination as the quintessential Marakwet village boy, with almost frightful upbringing turns into a consummate academic (albeit reluctantly), as he makes an epic journey through GAS Tambach, Alliance High School, Makerere University and finally, to Cambridge University, England.
Kipkorir, an amazing figure of pure will, took his burning ambition to equally deadly and fierce combat zones of war: study, the corporate world and public service; working, as a Deputy Clerk of the Sirikwa County Council, a lecturer at the University of Nairobi, Executive Chairman of the Kenya Commercial Bank and later, as Kenya’s Ambassador to Washington.
Then, in a cruel twist of fate, disaster struck the Kipkorir’s closely-knit family, with the force of a hurricane - and the family was shaken to a jolt - when Kipkorir’s wife, Lea, was diagnosed with cancer. The author nostalgically relieves his last days with Lea, in a language that is heartbreaking, poetic and haunting; he recounts joys past and envisions what could have been.
Despite the passionately penetrating, often unflattering accounts of his personal and family life, these memoirs are a work of history. Of no less relevance are his accounts of the incredibly amateurish approaches of European missionaries to the social engineering of African societies and their culture, aided in so small measure by colonial administrators, employing Africans’ own resources for the purpose! These memoirs are the history of his people, both local and national, in his time and circumstances. They inform and challenge. They are intended to inspire others to contribute further to the illumination of our time.
Strategic Litigation and the Struggle...
There has been a rise in the use of strategic litigation related to seeking equality for lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) persons. Such developments are taking place against the backdrop of active homophobia in Africa. The law and the general public should, argues the author, treat LGB persons in the same way that heterosexuals are treated.
In the past two decades,30 strategic cases have been led by LGB activists in the Common Law African countries, namely in Botswana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Uganda. While the majority of the cases have been successful, they have not resulted in significant social change in any of the countries. On the contrary, there have been active backlashes, counter-mobilisations, and violence against LGB persons, as well as the further criminalisation of same-sex relations and constitutional prohibitions on same-sex marriages in some of the jurisdictions.
The author argues that activists in Common Law Africa have to design LGB strategic litigation in such a way as to the actual social and political conditions in their countries if strategic litigation is to spur social change.
Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Mur...
Convenience Store Woman is the heartwarming and surprising story of thirty-six-year-old Tokyo resident Keiko Furukura. Keiko has never fit in, neither in her family, nor in school, but when at the age of eighteen she begins working at the Hiiromachi branch of “Smile Mart,” she finds peace and purpose in her life. In the store, unlike anywhere else, she understands the rules of social interaction ― many are laid out line by line in the store’s manual ― and she does her best to copy the dress, mannerisms, and speech of her colleagues, playing the part of a “normal” person excellently, more or less.
Managers come and go, but Keiko stays at the store for eighteen years. It’s almost hard to tell where the store ends and she begins. Keiko is very happy, but the people close to her, from her family to her coworkers, increasingly pressure her to find a husband, and to start a proper career, prompting her to take desperate action…
A brilliant depiction of an unusual psyche and a world hidden from view, Convenience Store Woman is an ironic and sharp-eyed look at contemporary work culture and the pressures to conform, as well as a charming and completely fresh portrait of an unforgettable heroine.
Saint Mazie: Roman by Jami Attenberg
Meet Mazie Phillips: big-hearted and bawdy, she's the truth-telling proprietress of The Venice, the famed New York City movie theater. It's the Jazz Age, with romance and booze aplenty--even when Prohibition kicks in--and Mazie never turns down a night on the town. But her high spirits mask a childhood rooted in poverty, and her diary, always close at hand, holds her dearest secrets.
When the Great Depression hits, Mazie's life is on the brink of transformation. Addicts and bums roam the Bowery; homelessness is rampant. If Mazie won't help them, then who? When she opens the doors of The Venice to those in need, this ticket-taking, fun-time girl becomes the beating heart of the Lower East Side, and in defining one neighborhood helps define the city.
Then, more than ninety years after Mazie began her diary, it's discovered by a documentarian in search of a good story. Who was Mazie Phillips, really? A chorus of voices from the past and present fill in some of the mysterious blanks of her adventurous life.
Inspired by the life of a woman who was profiled in Joseph Mitchell's classic Up in the Old Hotel, Saint Mazie is infused with Jami Attenberg's signature wit, bravery, and heart. Mazie's rise to "sainthood"--and her irrepressible spirit--is unforgettable.