Description
Each story in this jubilantly acclaimed collection pays testament to the wisdom and resilience of children, even in the face of the most agonizing circumstances.A family living in a makeshift shanty in urban Kenya scurries to find gifts of any kind for the impending Christmas holiday. A Rwandan girl relates her familyโs struggles to maintain a facade of normalcy amid unspeakable acts. A young brother and sister cope with their uncleโs attempt to sell them into slavery. Aboard a bus filled with refugeesโa microcosm of todayโs Africaโa Muslim boy summons his faith to bear a treacherous ride across Nigeria. Through the eyes of childhood friends the emotional toll of religious conflict in Ethiopia becomes viscerally clear.
Uwem Akpanโs debut signals the arrival of a breathtakingly talented writer who gives a matter-of-fact reality to the most extreme circumstances in stories that are nothing short of transcendent. ISBN:9780316086363
