Dealing with the Dead
Author of International Booker Prize-longlisted Black Moses
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- 9,49 €
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- 9,49 €
Publisher Description
'One of Africa's greatest living writers' Guardian
'Sharp and entertaining' Times Literary Supplement
'Exuberant ... Dealing with the Dead is often damning, frequently hilarious and always compassionate' Financial Times
Abruptly deceased at the age of twenty-four and trapped forever in flared purple trousers, Liwa Ekimakingaï encounters the other residents of Frère Lachaise cemetery, all of whom have their own complex stories of life and death.
Unwilling to relinquish their tender bond, Liwa makes his way back home to Pointe-Noire to see his devoted grandmother one last time, against all spectral advice. But disturbing rumours swirl together with Liwa's jumbled memories of his last night on earth, leading him to pursue the riddle of his own untimely demise. A phantasmagorical tale of ambition, community and forces beyond human control, Dealing with the Dead is a scathing satire on corruption and political violence by one of the foremost chroniclers of modern Central Africa.
'Africa's Samuel Beckett' Economist
Translated from the French by Helen Stevenson
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Congolese writer Mabanckou (Broken Glass) fuses political corruption and the afterlife in his textured 13th novel. It follows the winding path toward vengeance of the recently slain Liwa Ekimakingaï, a Pointe-Noire man who doesn't remember how he died after finding himself buried in a "poor folk's cemetery." There, he's bored by the stories of other dead people such as pretentious bureaucrat Prosper Milandou, who reveals that the city's rich and powerful frequently consult with sorcerers. Liwa then recalls the night of his death, remembering that he was poisoned by Pointe-Noire's influential kleptocrat Augustin Biampandou. Augustin is said to have killed his daughter, Samantha, in a ritual sacrifice in exchange for his wealth and power, and it turns out Liwa met Samantha's ghost shortly before he died. Now, he embarks on a quest for justice. While Mabanckou tests the reader's patience with the many long-winded stories of the dead, he succeeds at evoking the city's folkloric magic and satirizing its corruption. It's not the author's best, but his fans will find plenty to appreciate.
