Walking on Cowrie Shells Walking on Cowrie Shells

Walking on Cowrie Shells

Stories

    • 4.0 • 1 Rating
    • $9.99

Publisher Description

A “boisterous and high-spirited debut” (Kirkus starred review)“that enthralls the reader through their every twist and turn” (Publishers Weekly starred review), named one of the Most Anticipated Books for Brittle Paper, The Millions, and The Rumpus, penned by a finalist for the AKO Caine Prize

In her powerful, genre-bending debut story collection, Nana Nkweti’s virtuosity is on full display as she mixes deft realism with clever inversions of genre. In the Caine Prize finalist story “It Takes a Village, Some Say,” Nkweti skewers racial prejudice and the practice of international adoption, delivering a sly tale about a teenage girl who leverages her adoptive parents to fast-track her fortunes. In “The Devil Is a Liar,” a pregnant pastor’s wife struggles with the collision of western Christianity and her mother’s traditional Cameroonian belief system as she worries about her unborn child.

In other stories, Nkweti vaults past realism, upending genre expectations in a satirical romp about a jaded PR professional trying to spin a zombie outbreak in West Africa, and in a mermaid tale about a Mami Wata who forgoes her power by remaining faithful to a fisherman she loves. In between these two ends of the spectrum there’s everything from an aspiring graphic novelist at a comic con to a murder investigation driven by statistics to a story organized by the changing hairstyles of the main character.

Pulling from mystery, horror, realism, myth, and graphic novels, Nkweti showcases the complexity and vibrance of characters whose lives span Cameroonian and American cultures. A dazzling, inventive debut, Walking on Cowrie Shells announces the arrival of a superlative new voice.

GENRE
Fiction & Literature
RELEASED
2021
June 1
LANGUAGE
EN
English
LENGTH
176
Pages
PUBLISHER
Graywolf Press
SELLER
Macmillan
SIZE
9
MB
Refuge Refuge
2018
Everything Here Is Beautiful Everything Here Is Beautiful
2018
This Is Not Chick Lit This Is Not Chick Lit
2006
Body Shocks Body Shocks
2021
The Rabbit Hutch The Rabbit Hutch
2022
January Buzz Books Monthly January Buzz Books Monthly
2017
Afterparties Afterparties
2021
The Lying Life of Adults The Lying Life of Adults
2020
Interior Chinatown Interior Chinatown
2020
A Visit from the Goon Squad A Visit from the Goon Squad
2010
Monogamy Monogamy
2020
Shuggie Bain Shuggie Bain
2020