Bookstore
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A Grain of Wheat
₦2,150Set in the wake of the Mau Mau rebellion and on the cusp of Kenya’s independence from Britain, A Grain of Wheat follows a group of villagers whose lives have been transformed by the 1952–1960 Emergency. At the center of it all is the reticent Mugo, the village’s chosen hero and a man haunted by a terrible secret.
As we learn of the villagers’ tangled histories in a narrative interwoven with myth and peppered with allusions to real-life leaders, including Jomo Kenyatta, a masterly story unfolds in which compromises are forced, friendships are betrayed, and loves are tested.
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A Handful of Dust
₦2,000Stories from the 2013 Farafina Trust Creative Writing Workshop
From the participants of the 2013 Farafina Trust Creative Writing Workshop, this collection aptly portrays the internal conflicts we suffer when the lines dividing opposing sides get blurred.
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A Man of the People
₦1,550As Minister for Culture, the Honourable M. A. Nanga is ‘a man of the people’, as cynical as he is charming, and a roguish opportunist. At first, the contrast between Nanga and Odili, a former pupil who is visiting the ministry, appears huge. But in the ‘eat-and-let-eat’ atmosphere, Odili’s idealism soon collides with his lusts – and the two men’s personal and political tauntings threaten to send their country into chaos.
Published, prophetically, just days before Nigeria’s first attempted coup in 1966, A Man of the People is an essential part of his body of work dealing with modern African history.
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A Memory This Size and Other Stories
₦2,100The Caine Prize for African Writing is Africa’s leading literary prize. It has helped launch the careers of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Segun Afolabi, Leila Aboulela, Brian Chikwava, Binyavanga Wainaina, and many others. The 2013 collection includes the five shortlisted stories and the stories written at the Caine Prize Writers’ Workshop.
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A Platter of Gold
₦10,000Over the course of fifty-four years till the eve of independence, eight colonial pro-consuls governors for the British Empire pitched wit, passion and guile against under-celebrated, sometimes everyday Nigerians – Ahmadu Attahiru I, the Sokoto Caliph and his cavalry, who violently resisted British ouster and occupation; Eleko and the Lagos Chieftains, who first claimed they would “rather die than pay tax”… This is a story of Nigeria’s history as well as the history of Nigeria’s story. The other story!
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A Stranger’s Pose
₦2,500A Stranger’s Pose: A mesmerising collection of striking travel snapshots.
Stories remembered and imagined, and images by acclaimed photographers. Also a Stranger’s Pose draws the reader into a world of encounters, in more than a dozen African towns. Iduma blends memoir, travelogue and storytelling in these fragments of a traveller’s journey across several African cities.
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A Time For New Dreams
₦4,500by Ben Okri
Booker Prize-winning novelist, and one of Britain’s foremost poets, Ben Okri is a passionate advocate of the written word.
In A Time for New Dreams he breaks new ground in an unusual collection of linked essays, which address such diverse themes as childhood, self-censorship, the role of beauty, the importance of education and the real significance of the recent economic meltdown.
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A Woman Alone: Autobiographical Writings
₦1,000by Bessie Head
Journalistic sketches, essays and personal notes form a biographical study of South African born Bessie Head’s complex existence.
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A Woman’s Body is a Country
₦2,000by Dami Ajayi
Dami Ajayi’s second volume of poems, A Woman’s Body is a Country, interrogates the ramifications of affection. A work of impressive artistry, these are poems of life turned inside out, where time cheats on writers, and the people and things at the brunt end of our oppressive pleasures come back to haunt us. Here is the poetry of the quotidian, a philosophic and profound interrogation of relationships, of words, of bodies and their burdens, of times and time.
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Abduction Chronicles
₦3,000by Folarin Omotade Banigbe
Kidnapping in the Niger Delta has been an ongoing phenomenon since around 2008. Starting from the kidnapping of expatriate oil workers by the militants, the scourge of kidnapping had progressively unravelled till it has now become so common place that anyone potentially is a target for the assortment of kidnapping groups that have since plagued the region.
The author was kidnapped on the 1st of May 2016 from his home in Port Harcourt in very interesting circumstances. Gunmen stormed his home in the Rumuomasi area of Port Harcourt in the middle of the night, shot their way in to the house and after robbing them clean of valuables, proceeded to make away with the head of the house.
This began a journey into the hinterlands of the Niger Delta creeks as he was held for ransom for 4 days and 4 nights in the most excruciating conditions.
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Afonja – The Rise
₦5,000Afonja The Rise is the story of how the clashes of these two men and the intrigue of the others around them transformed what was a slow decline into a race of the empire towards its collapse. In Afonja – The Rise, we tell their stories first as what they were – men and women living their lives, warring, scheming and loving in ways that will be familiar to the reader – beyond their roles as actors in the epic history of the great Oyo Empire
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Africa 39
₦5,000Africa39 is a collaborative project initiated by the Hay Festival in partnership with Rainbow Book Club, celebrating Port Harcourt: UNESCO World Book Capital 2014 by identifying 39 of the most promising writers under the age of 40 with the potential and talent to define trends in the development of literature from Sub-Saharan Africa and the diaspora. Africa39 follows the success of two previous Hay Festival initiatives linked to World Book Capital cities, Bogotá39 (2007) and Beirut39 (2009).
The judges for Africa39 were Margaret Busby, Osonye Tess Onwueme and Elechi Amadi, selecting from submissions researched by Binyavanga Wainaina. The writers’ names were announced at the London Book Fair on 8 April 2014. An anthology entitled Africa39: New Writing from Africa South of the Sahara, featuring work by the 39 writers was published by Bloomsbury in October 2014, edited by Ellah Allfrey and with a preface by Wole Soyinka.(From Wikipedia)
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African Violet and Other Stories
₦3,000The Caine Prize for African Writing is Africa’s leading literary prize. It has helped launch the careers of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Segun Afolabi, Leila Aboulela, Brian Chikwava, Binyavanga Wainaina, and many others. The 2013 collection includes the five shortlisted stories and the stories written at the Caine Prize Writers’ Workshop.
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Aké: The Years of Childhood
₦4,000by Wole Soyinka
Aké: The Years of Childhood gives us the story of Soyinka’s boyhood before and during World War II in a Yoruba village in western Nigeria called Aké. A relentlessly curious child who loved books and getting into trouble, Soyinka grew up on a parsonage compound, raised by Christian parents and by a grandfather who introduced him to Yoruba spiritual traditions. His vivid evocation of the colorful sights, sounds, and aromas of the world that shaped him is both lyrically beautiful and laced with humor and the sheer delight of a child’s-eye view.
A classic of African autobiography, Aké is also a transcendantly timeless portrait of the mysteries of childhood.
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Americanah
₦2,000Ifemelu and Obinze are young and in love when they depart military-ruled Nigeria for the West. Beautiful, self-assured Ifemelu heads for America, where despite her academic success, she is forced to grapple with what it means to be black for the first time. Quiet, thoughtful Obinze had hoped to join her, but with post-9/11 America closed to him, he instead plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.
Fifteen years later, they reunite in a newly democratic Nigeria, and reignite their passion—for each other and for their homeland.
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An Abundance of Scorpions
₦3,500by Hadiza Isma El-Rufai
Following a horrific tragedy, Tambaya leaves Kano for Accra to live with her brother, Aminu. Sadly, her dream of a new beginning is dashed when she can no longer endure the indignity she suffers at the hands of her brother’s new wife.
Tambaya returns to northern Nigeria and soon finds work as a matron in an orphanage, under the watchful eye of the ruthless Miss Scholastica. Just when she begins to settle into her new life, an unexpected visit threatens to destroy everything she has worked so hard to build. Tambaya faces moral dilemmas on all sides, but she must stop her life from unravelling once again.
Vulnerable, and surrounded by malice, corruption and greed, Tambaya struggles to shape her destiny. An Abundance of Scorpions charts one woman’s journey through grief and uncertainty to a road that leads to self-discovery, redemption and love.
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And After Many Days
₦2,500by Jowhor Ile
During the rainy season of 1995, in the bustling town of Port Harcourt, Nigeria, one family’s life is disrupted by the sudden disappearance of seventeen-year-old Paul Utu, beloved brother and son. As they grapple with the sudden loss of their darling boy, they embark on a painful and moving journey of immense power which changes their lives forever and shatters the fragile ecosystem of their once ordered family.
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Anike Eleko
₦1,500Written by Sandra Joubead and illustrated by Àlàbá Ònájìn, ÀNÍKÉ ELÉKO tells a colourful story
of one girl’s courage in the face of opposition to her dreams. -
Anowa
₦1,000This book, in addition to The Dilemma Of A Ghost, are two witty and perceptive social dramas are sympathetic and honest explorations of the conflicts between the individualism of westernised culture and the social traditions of Africa.
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Anthills of the Savannah
₦1,500Chris, Ikem and Beatrice are like-minded friends working under the military regime of His Excellency, the Sandhurst-educated President of Kangan. In the pressurized atmosphere of oppression and intimidation they are simply trying to live and love – and remain friends. But in a world where each day brings a new betrayal, hope is hard to cling on to.
Anthills of the Savannah, Achebe’s candid vision of contemporary African politics, is a powerful fusion of angry voices. It continues the journey that Achebe began with his earlier novels, tracing the history of modern Africa through colonialism and beyond, and is a work ultimately filled with hope.
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Are You Not A Nigerian?
₦3,500ARE YOU NOT A NIGERIAN? by Bayo Olupohunda
Are you not a Nigerian? chronicles a country’s fourth attempt at democratic governance after many years of military dictatorship. Through his personal experiences and observations, Báyọ̀ Olúpohùndà captures the reality of Nigeria’s socio-political environment at the turn of the millennium, the collapse of dignity in service, and the ubiquitous “Nigerian factor” that creates entitlement. Are You Not A Nigerian? examines the lost opportunities, the disappointment of successive administrations, and the dilemma of a nation at a crossroads.
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Arrow of God (The African Trilogy, #3)
₦1,000Ezeulu, the headstrong chief priest of the god Ulu, is worshipped by the six villages of Umuaro. But his authority is increasingly under threat—from rivals within his tribe, from functionaries of the colonial government, and even from his own family members. Yet he believes himself to be untouchable: surely he is an arrow in the bow of his God? Armed with this belief, he is prepared to lead his people, even if it is towards their own destruction. But his people will not be dominated so easily.
Spare and powerful, Arrow of God is an unforgettable portrayal of the loss of faith, and the downfall of a man in a society forever altered by colonialism.
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Arrows of Rain
₦1,000by Okey Ndibe
In the country of Madia (based in part on Ndibe’s native Nigeria) a young prostitute runs into the sea and drowns. The last man who spoke to her, the “madman” Bukuru, is asked to account for her last moments. When his testimony implicates the Madian armed forces, Bukuru is arrested and charged with her death. At the first day of trial, Bukuru, acting as his own attorney, counters these charges with allegations of his own, speaking not only of government complicity in a series of violent assaults and killings, but telling the court that the president of Madia himself is guilty of rape and murder. The incident is hushed up, and Bukuru is sent back to prison, where he will likely meet his end. But a young journalist manages to visit him, and together they journey through decades of history that illuminate Bukuru’s life, and that of the entire nation.
A brave and powerful work of fiction, Arrows of Rain is a brilliant dramatization of the complex factors behind the near-collapse of a nation from one of the most exciting novelists writing today.
