Popular African Cultural Books
Find cultural books written by authors from Africa for the next part of the Read Around The World Challenge. (63)
21.
Hum If You Don't Know the Words by Bianca Marais EN
Country: Africa / 
South Africa
South Africa
Description:
Perfect for readers of The Secret Life of Bees and The Help, a perceptive and searing look at Apartheid-era South Africa, told through one unique family brought together by tragedy. Life under Apartheid has created a secure future for Robin Conrad, a ten-year-old white girl living with her parents in 1970s Johannesburg. In the same nation but worlds apart, Beauty Mbali, a Xhosa woman in a rural village in the Bantu homeland of the Transkei, struggles to raise her children alone after her husband's death. Both lives have been built upon the division of race, and their meeting should never have ... continue
22.
If You Want to Make God Laugh by Bianca Marais EN
Country: Africa / South Africa
South Africa
Description:
A rich, unforgettable story of three unique women in post-Apartheid South Africa who are brought together in their darkest time and discover the ways that love can transcend the strictest of boundaries. In a squatter camp on the outskirts of Johannesburg, seventeen-year-old Zodwa lives in desperate poverty, under the shadowy threat of a civil war and a growing AIDS epidemic. Eight months pregnant, Zodwa carefully guards secrets that jeopardize her life. Across the country, wealthy socialite Ruth appears to have everything her heart desires, but it's what she can't have that leads to her breakd... continue
Egypt24.
Kibogo by Scholastique Mukasonga EN
RwandaDescription:
A new masterwork of satire, lore and living memory from the leading voice of French Rwandan literature.
25.
BurundiDescription:
»Bevor all das geschah, von dem ich hier erzählen werde, gab es nur das Glück, das nicht erklärt werden musste. Wenn man mich fragte, wie geht es dir, habe ich geantwortet: gut.« Damals traf sich Gabriel mit seinen Freunden auf der Straße, erlebte seine Kindheit wie in einem paradiesischen Kokon. Bis seine Familie zerbrach und fast zur selben Zeit sein kleines Land, Burundi, unvorstellbare Grausamkeiten erdulden musste. Und seine Mutter den Verstand verlor. Zwanzig Jahre später erst, nach der Flucht mit seiner Schwester in ein fernes, fremdes Frankreich, kehrt Gabriel in eine Welt zurück, die... continue
Senegal27.
Nigeria28.
Maps by Nuruddin Farah EN
SomaliaDescription:
A Somali youth is torn between duty to family and country. On the one hand Askar, an orphan, should look after his foster mother, on the other he wants to be a man and emulate his father who died fighting the Ethiopians. By an English-speaking Somali writer, author of Secrets.
29.
Memoirs of a Porcupine by Alain Mabanckou EN
CongoDescription:
After an ancient initiation, a young Congolese boy is given an animal double in the form of a porcupine and the pair begin an inexplicable streak of murders until the porcupine quits and decides to pen a literary confession. Original.
30.
Memory of Departure by Abdulrazak Gurnah EN
TanzaniaDescription:
The debut novel by the winner of the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature Vehement, comic and shrewd, Abdulrazak Gurnah's first novel is an unwavering contemplation of East African coastal life Poverty and depravity wreak havoc on Hassan Omar's family. Amid great hardship he decides to escape. The arrival of independence brings new upheavals as well as the betrayal of the promise of freedom. The new government, fearful of an exodus of its most able men, discourages young people from travelling abroad and refuses to release examination results. Deprived of a scholarship, Hassan travels to Nairobi to ... continue