Book picks similar to
Son of Fate by John Kiriamiti


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Mr. American


George MacDonald Fraser - 1980
    For this riotous Edwardian caper, the author of the bestselling Flashman Papers presents a raucous adventure that brings America's Wild West to London's West End and features arch-cad Harry Flashman.

Martha Quest


Doris Lessing - 1952
    She is a romantic idealistic in revolt against the puritan snobbery of her parents, trying to live to the full with every nerve, emotion, and instinct laid bare to experience. For her, this is a time of solitary reading daydreams, dancing -- and the first disturbing encounters with sex. The first of Doris Lessing's timeless Children of Violence novels, Martha Quest is an endearing masterpiece.

Our Lady of the Nile


Scholastique Mukasonga - 2012
    The book is a prelude to the Rwandan genocide and unfolds behind the closed doors of the school, in the interminable rainy season. Friendships, desires, hatred, political fights, incitation to racial violence, persecutions... The school soon becomes a fascinating existential microcosm of the true 1970s Rwanda.

Black Moses


Alain Mabanckou - 2015
    . . one of the continent's greatest living writers" (The Guardian).It's not easy being Tokumisa Nzambe po Mose yamoyindo abotami namboka ya Bakoko. There's that long name of his for a start, which means, "Let us thank God, the black Moses is born on the lands of the ancestors." Most people just call him Moses. Then there's the orphanage where he lives, run by a malicious political stooge, Dieudonne Ngoulmoumako, and where he's terrorized by two fellow orphans--the twins Songi-Songi and Tala-Tala.But after Moses exacts revenge on the twins by lacing their food with hot pepper, the twins take Moses under their wing, escape the orphanage, and move to the bustling port town of Pointe-Noire, where they form a gang that survives on petty theft. What follows is a funny, moving, larger-than-life tale that chronicles Moses's ultimately tragic journey through the Pointe-Noire underworld and the politically repressive world of Congo-Brazzaville in the 1970s and 80s.Mabanckou's vivid portrayal of Moses's mental collapse echoes the work of Hugo, Dickens, and Brian DePalma's Scarface, confirming Mabanckou's status as one of our great storytellers. Black Moses is a vital new extension of his cycle of Pointe-Noire novels that stand out as one of the grandest, funniest, fictional projects of our time.

The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born


Ayi Kwei Armah - 1968
    The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born is the novel that catapulted Ayi Kwei Armah into the limelight. The novel is generally a satirical attack on the Ghanaian society during Kwame Nkrumah’s regime and the period immediately after independence in the 1960s. It is often claimed to rank with Things Fall Apart as one of the high points of post-colonial African Literature.

Second Class Citizen


Buchi Emecheta - 1974
    A poignant story of a resourceful Nigerian woman who overcomes strict tribal domination of women and countless setbacks to achieve an independent life for herself and her children.

Tram 83


Fiston Mwanza Mujila - 2014
    They have only one desire: to make a fortune by exploiting the mineral wealths of the country. They work during the day in mining concession and, as soon as night falls, they go out to get drunk, dance, eat and abandon themselves in Tram 83, the only night-club of the city, the den of all the outlaws: ex children-soldiers, prostitutes, blank students, unmarried mothers, sorcerers' apprentices …Lucien, a professional writer, fleeing the exactions and the censorship, finds refuge in the city thanks to Requiem, a youth friend. Requiem lives mainly on theft and on swindle while Lucien only thinks of writing and living honestly. Around them gravitate gangsters and young girls, retired or runaway men, profit-seeking tourists and federal agents of a non-existent State.Tram 83 plunges the reader into the atmosphere of a gold rush as cynical as, sometimes, comic and colorfully exotic. It's an observation of human relationships in a world that has become a global village. It could be described as an African-rap or rhapsody novel or puzzle-novel hammered by rhythms of jazz.

Black Mamba Boy


Nadifa Mohamed - 2010
    And home to Jama, a ten year-old boy. But then his mother dies unexpectedly and he finds himself alone in the world.Jama is forced home to his native Somalia, the land of his nomadic ancestors. War is on the horizon and the fascist Italian forces who control parts of East Africa are preparing for battle. Yet Jama cannot rest until he discovers whether his father, who has been absent from his life since he was a baby, is alive somewhere.And so begins an epic journey which will take Jama north through Djibouti, war-torn Eritrea and Sudan, to Egypt. And from there, aboard a ship transporting Jewish refugees just released from German concentration camps, across the seas to Britain and freedom.This story of one boy's long walk to freedom is also the story of how the Second World War affected Africa and its people; a story of displacement and family.

രണ്ടാമൂഴം | Randamoozham


M.T. Vasudevan Nair - 1984
    T. Vasudevan Nair. It was translated into English as Second Turn in 1997. M. T. Vasudevan Nair won Vayalar Award, given for the best literary work in Malayalam, for the novel in 1985. Later, in the year 1995, Mr. Nair was awarded the highest literary award in India, Jnanpith Award, for his overall contribution to Malayalam literature.The novel is set as a retelling of the Indian epic Mahabharata, from the view of Bhima, the second Pandava.

GraceLand


Chris Abani - 2004
    Elvis Oke, a teenage Elvis impersonator spurred on by the triumphs of heroes in the American movies and books he devours, pursues his chosen vocation with ardent single-mindedness. He suffers through hours of practice set to the tinny tunes emanating from the radio in the filthy shack he shares with his alcoholic father, his stepmother and his stepsiblings. He applies thick makeup that turns his black skin white, to make his performances more convincing for American tourists and hopefully net him dollars. But still he finds himself constantly broke. Beset by hopelessness and daunted by the squalor and violence of his daily life, he must finally abandon his dream.With job prospects few and far between. Elvis is tempted to a life of crime by the easy money his friend Redemption tells him is to be had in Lago's underworld. But the King of the Beggars, Elvis's enigmatic yet faithful adviser, intercedes. And so, torn by the frustration of unrealizable dreams and accompanied by an eclectic chorus of voices, Elvis must find a way to a Graceland of his own making.Graceland is the story of a son and his father, and an examination of postcolonial Nigeria, where the trappings of American culture reign supreme.

The Girl at the Border


Leslie Archer - 2019
    Will a shared tragedy help them find their way home—even in the face of imminent danger? Renowned archaeologist Richard Mathis is half a world away on the island of Crete when he learns his daughter, Bella, has gone missing. Within twenty minutes, he’s on his way back to the States. Two days later, he’s dead.Richard’s young assistant, Angela Chase, is devastated by the loss of the man who had become both mentor and friend, and she’s determined to find the missing girl, who seems to have made dangerous connections—and whose lonely childhood so resembles Angela’s own. Born Laurel Springfield, Angela now spends her days digging up the origins of a lost civilization while struggling to keep her own past buried. But will the search for Bella expose Angela’s carefully disguised identity—and will she find Bella before she’s lost forever?

जेल-डायरी: तिहाड़ से काबुल-कंधार तक


Sher Singh Rana - 2012
    Rana is the prime accused in the Phoolan Devi murder case.Summary Of The BookJail Diary: Tihar Se Kabul-Kandahar Tak (Hindi) is Sher Singh Rana’s autobiography. Rana is the prime accused in the murder of the Bandit Queen Phoolan Devi. In this book, he gives a personal account of his life, from events in his childhood to the prison break that occurred many years later.It was in the year 2001 that Phoolan Devi, who had just turned politician, was shot near her residence in New Delhi. Of the three persons accused of committing the crime, one was Sher Singh Rana. He had allegedly surrendered to the police in Dehradun and accepted the charge. He said he murdered Phoolan Devi to avenge the killings of 22 persons who died at her hands at Behmai.After confessing to the crime, Rana was arrested and taken to the largest prison complex in South Asia, Tihar jail. He remained there until one day in 2004, he escaped. He visited the grave of Prithviraj Chauhan, the last of the Hindu rulers, and reclaimed his relics from there. He undertook this arduous journey to Afghanistan through Bangladesh. He has ever since maintained that his act of bringing back Prithviraj Chauhan’s remains was an act of honor.In 2006, he was arrested in Kolkata and sent to Delhi, where he was kept in Rohini Jail. He remains in this jail till date, as the case is still under the ambit of law.Jail Diary: Tihar Se Kabul-Kandahar Tak (Hindi) opens with Rana’s breakout from Tihar. He swings between time frames in narrating his story. His childhood days, the birth of his political aspirations when he was in college, his days in Haridwar selling liquor, his introduction to Phoolan through the Eklavya Sena, and his miraculous breakaway from a very secure prison are among the events in Rana’s life that the readers will discover in this gripping autobiography.About Sher Singh RanaSher Singh Rana is the prime accused in the Phoolan Devi murder case.Rana was one among the three men who allegedly murdered Phoolan Devi. He surrendered to the police in Dehradun and confessed to the crime. He was taken to the Tihar jail, from which he escaped in 2004 and fled to Afghanistan to bring back Prithviraj Chauhan’s remains. This act of his created a roar in the media because it was considered a restoration of India’s pride.

Sandstorm


Michael Asher - 2003
    A plane crashes in the deserts of North Africa.Fourteen-year-old Billy Sterling regains consciousness to find himself alone among the wreckage. He soon finds the body of the pilot, a celebrated war hero, and on it a cryptic map, more like a pirate’s treasure map than a serious navigational tool. But there is no sign of the plane’s co-pilot.Billy is confident someone will come for him. Someone does, but not anyone he expects... Seven years later, a mysterious stranger contacts Billy’s grieving father, George Bridger Sterling, claiming to be the lost co-pilot. Only a few hours later, this sinister informant is found brutally murdered. Armed with the information that Billy’s plane did not go down where he was told it had, Sterling sets out to discover the truth. Why did the plane take a different route? And why was Billy on board at all? Along with an eccentric private investigator, Eric Churchill, Sterling travels into the vast and dangerous desert, forced to rely on strangers for his own survival.But he is not the only one still looking for Billy after all these years...'Sandstorm' is a fast-paced and evocative thriller, full of adventure and betrayal. Praise for the author: ‘Fast-moving, well written, endlessly exciting, The Eye of Ra excellently conjures up the atmosphere of the desert’ RICHARD BUNDY ‘One of the most impressive novels I’ve read in years. The quality of writing, the characterisation, the plot twists are all excellent. But the true brilliance of the novel is the life in the desert. A stunning achievement; a book to buy and read over and over’ DAVID V BARRETT Michael Asher served in the Parachute Regiment and SAS. A fluent Arab speaker, he has lived for years among the Bedouin peoples. He has made expeditions in many countries, always preferring to travel on foot or with animal transport. He is also the author of ‘Shoot to Kill: From 2 Para to the SAS’. Endeavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.

Without a Silver Spoon


Eddie Iroh - 1991
    Ure comes from a poor but honest family, and works as a houseboy to pay his own school fees. Towards the end of his primary school days he is accused of stealing money. He is saved by the well-placed total trust of his parents and his teacher.

God's Bits of Wood


Ousmane Sembène - 1960
    Sembène Ousmane, in this vivid and moving novel, evinces all of the colour, passion and tragedy of those decisive years in the history of West Africa.'Ever since they left Thiès, the women had not stopped singing. As soon as one group allowed the refrain to die, another picked it up, and new verses were born at the hazard of chance or inspiration, one word leading to another and each finding, in its turn, its rhythm and its place. No one was very sure any longer where the song began, or if it had an ending. It rolled out over its own length, like the movement of a serpent. It was as long as a life.'