Read Around Africa Challenge

Read at least one book by an author from each country in Africa.

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Recommended Challenge Books (450)
21.

A General Theory of Oblivion by Jose Eduardo Agualusa EN

Rating: 4     2 Votes
Country: Africa / Angola flag Angola
Description:
WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD 2017 A finalist for the Man Booker International Prize 2016 The brilliant new novel from the winner of the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize. On the eve of Angolan independence, Ludo bricks herself into her apartment, where she will remain for the next thirty years. She lives off vegetables and pigeons, burns her furniture and books to stay alive and keeps herself busy by writing her story on the walls of her home. The outside world slowly seeps into Ludo’s life through snippets on the radio, voices from next door, glimpses of a man fleeing his... continue

22.

Good morning comrades : a novel by Ondjaki EN

Rating: 5     1 Vote
Country: Africa / Angola flag Angola
Description:
Told in a charming and original voice, Good Morning Comrades is the story of a group of friends who create a perfect childhood in a revolutionary socialist country fighting a bitter war. An internationally acclaimed novel, already published in half a dozen countries, Good Morning Comrades is an unforgettable book by one of Africa's most exciting young writers.


24.

My Father's Wives by José Eduardo Agualusa EN

Rating: 3.5     2 Votes
Country: Africa / Angola flag Angola
Description:
Celebrated Angolan musician Faustino Manso has just died, leaving seven wives and eighteen children scattered across southern Africa. His youngest daughter, Laurentina, arrives in Angola from her home in Portugal to trace the story of the father she never knew. My Father's Wives is the story of Laurentina's journey, but this fiction also runs in parallel with Jose Eduardo Agualusa's story of the novel's genesis, as writer and characters travel the southern African coast, from Angola, through Namibia and South Africa, to Mozambique, meeting extraordinary people and discovering Faustino's secret... continue

25.

The Book of Chameleons by José Eduardo Agualusa EN

Rating: 4     2 Votes
Country: Africa / Angola flag Angola
Description:
This unusual novel about the landscape of memory and its inconsistencies follows Felix Ventura as he trades in a curious commodity—he sells people different pasts. He can create entirely new pasts full of better memories and complete with new lineage or augment existing pasts as needed. Narrated by an exceptionally articulate and rather friendly lizard that lives on Felix’s living-room wall, this richly detailed story explores how people can remember things that never happened—and with extraordinary vividness—even as they forget things that did in fact occur.
Genre

26.

A Practical Guide to Levitation : Stories by Jose Eduardo Agualusa EN

Rating: 4     1 Vote
Country: Africa / Angola flag Angola
Description:
A luminous collection of dryly humorous stories that revel in the surreal and fantastic, from the pen of José Eduardo Agualusa, winner of the International Dublin Literary Award Perfect for readers of Haruki Murakami, Julio Cortázar, and Namwali Serpell’s The Old Drift Vividly translated into English for the first time by long-time Agualusa collaborator Daniel Hahn, the jewel-like tales gathered in this collection are an exuberant celebration of story-telling in all its various forms. On the sands of Itamaracá, an old fisherman dreams of fish: shad in the morning, when the water’s smooth and s... continue

27.

El vendedor de pasados by José Eduardo Agualusa ES

Rating: 4     1 Vote
Country: Africa / Angola flag Angola
Description:
Félix Ventura es un personaje peculiar. Además de ser albino, ha escogido un extraño oficio: vendedor de pasados falsos. Después de años de guerra, sus clientes –prósperos empresarios, políticos, generales y la emergente burguesía angoleña– tienen un futuro prometedor. Así que sólo les falta un pasado presentable. Félix les fabrica una genealogía de lujo, memorias felices, e incluso les procura los inevitables retratos de ancestros ilustres. Una noche llega un misterioso extranjero solicitando sus servicios y, de pronto, el pasado irrumpe en el presente en una trama que es también una original... continue
Genre

28.

Autobiography of the Lower East Side : A Novel in Short Stories by Rashidah Ismaili EN

0 Ratings
Country: Africa / Benin flag Benin
Description:
"This well established poet makes a brilliant debut in fiction with these complex, poetically detailed, interrelated stories of Blacks from Africa, the Caribbean and the USA who converge and form an artistic community in the early 1960s in the most easterly regions of Alphabet City ." -David Henderson, author of 'Scuse Me While I Kiss the Sky "Ismaili charts the lower East side just prior to the turbulent, revolutionary Sixties, when the influence of Leroi Jones and the Black Arts Movement signaled a cultural sea-change. Her characters persevere through desertion, loss, abandonment and betraya... continue

29.

Historical Dictionary of Benin by Mathurin C. Houngnikpo, Samuel Decalo EN

0 Ratings
Country: Africa / Benin flag Benin
Description:
Benin is now perceived of as a model of democracy in Africa because it has successfully established a democratic political system based on consensus and regular and fair elections, and it continues to improve its electoral and parliamentary systems. Since its democracy it has taken important steps towards laying the foundation for the rule of law by establishing stable political institutions that can withstand the test of time. It has also engaged in an important legal, institutional, and regulatory reform to establish a more favorable environment for private initiative. The fourth edition of ... continue
Genre

30.

Snares Without End by Olympe Bhêly-Quénum EN

Rating: 3     1 Vote
Country: Africa / Benin flag Benin
Description:
A novel, also a philosophical tale in which destiny entraps the innocent protagonist and holds him fast. Some readers have found an affinity in it with Camus' notion of the absurd, while others have preferred to dwell on its evocation of country life in northern Dahomey and the importance of music in the farmers' daily life. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR