Popular African Historical Fiction Books

Find historical fiction books written by authors from Africa for the next part of the Read Around The World Challenge. (81)

11.

Bones by Chenjerai Hove EN

0 Ratings
Country: Africa / Zimbabwe flag Zimbabwe
Description:
Bones is a powerful, heart-rending novel that provides a sensitive evocation of Marita, a farm worker, whose only son joined the freedom fighters in Zimbabwes war of liberation. He does not return after the war and Marita is determined to find him or find out what happened to him. This is perhaps a single clear theme in a landscape where women, particularly the poor and the marginalised, suffer many layers of oppression. Maritas courage and endurance are reconstructed through the memories of those who knew her in a language steep in poetry and Shona idiom. Bones, which won the Noma Award in 19... continue

12.

Broken Glass by Alain Mabanckou EN

Rating: 2 (1 vote)
Country: Africa / Congo flag Congo
Description:
Set in a Congolese bar called Credit Gone West, tells the story of a former teacher who is charged with documenting the stories of the bar's partrons.

13.
Butterfly Burning

Butterfly Burning by Yvonne Vera EN

0 Ratings
Country: Africa / Zimbabwe flag Zimbabwe
Description:
Butterfly Burning brings the brilliantly poetic voice of Zimbabwean writer Yvonne Vera to American readers for the first time. Set in Makokoba, a black township, in the late l940s, the novel is an intensely bittersweet love story.

14.

Chiquinho : A Novel of Cabo Verde by Baltasar Lopes da Silva EN

Rating: 3 (1 vote)
Country: Africa / Cape Verde flag Cape Verde
Description:
Originally published in Portuguese in 1947, Baltazar Lopes's Chiquinho offers a rich and compelling exploration of Cabo Verde's unique identity. Tracing the arc of its young protagonist's life as he approaches adulthood, the novel follows Chiquinho as he leaves his village, journeys to São Vicente Island to further his education, returns home as drought and famine strike the archipelago, and makes the difficult decision to join his father in New Bedford, Massachusetts. Reflecting the challenges faced by the Creole intellectuals of the so-called Claridade generation, this long-overdue English t... continue

15.

Condiciones nerviosas by Tsitsi Dangarembga ES

Rating: 3 (1 vote)
Country: Africa / Zimbabwe flag Zimbabwe
Description:
Condiciones nerviosas es una de las obras maestras de la literatura africana contemporánea. Tambu, una campesina pobre de Zimbabue, pertenece, como la autora misma, a la generación que, entre la infancia y la primera juventud, asistió al tramo final de las luchas contra el régimen de la minoría blanca que culminan, en 1980, con la formación del primer gobierno negro. La lucha de Tambu por acceder a una buena educación simboliza la trayectoria de una colectividad nacional que conoce cambios profundos en la transición entre las incertidumbres de la lucha contra el colonialismo y las incertidumbr... continue

16.

Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton EN

Rating: 4 (5 votes)
Description:
The heroine in this actor's tour-de-force is an ordinary middle class English housewife. As she prepares egg and chips for dinner, she ruminates on her life and tells the wall about her husband, her children, her past, and an invitation from a girlfriend to join her on holiday in Greece to search for romance and adventure. Ultimately, Shirley does escape to Greece, has an "adventure" with a local fisherman and decides to stay. This hilariously engaging play was a hit in London and New York, performed by Pauline Collins, who later recreated her role on film garnering an Oscar nomination.

17.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese EN

Rating: 5 (7 votes)
Country: Africa / Ethiopia flag Ethiopia
Description:
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • Marion and Shiva Stone are twin brothers born of a secret union between a beautiful Indian nun and a brash British surgeon. Orphaned by their mother’s death 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. Moving from Addis Ababa to New York City and back again, Cutting for Stone is an unforgettable story of love and betrayal, medicine and ordinary miracles—and two brothers whose fates are forever intertwined. This sweeping, emotionall... continue

18.

Der Schattenkönig by Maaza Mengiste DE

Rating: 3 (1 vote)
Country: Africa / Ethiopia flag Ethiopia
Description:
Ein Buch über den Wiedestand der Frauen in Äthiopien während des Einfalls Italiens 1935


20.

Dust by Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor EN

0 Ratings
Country: Africa / Kenya flag Kenya
Description:
An audacious and beautiful novel that is both a unique family saga and a spellbinding story of the country of Kenya