Special Collections
PEN Open Book Award
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Gun Dealers' Daughter
by Gina ApostolWinner of the PEN/Open Book Award
At university in Manila, young, bookish Soledad Soliman falls in with radical friends, defying her wealthy parents and their society crowd. Drawn in by two romantic young rebels, Sol initiates a conspiracy that quickly spirals out of control. Years later, far from her homeland, Sol reconstructs her fractured memories, writing a confession she hopes will be her salvation. Illuminating the dramatic history of the Marcos-era Philippines, this story of youthful passion is a tour de force.
Say You're One of Them
by Uwem AkpanUwem Akpan's stunning stories humanize the perils of poverty and violence so piercingly that few readers will feel they've ever encountered Africa so immediately. The eight-year-old narrator of "An Ex-Mas Feast" needs only enough money to buy books and pay fees in order to attend school. Even when his twelve-year-old sister takes to the streets to raise these meager funds, his dream can't be granted. Food comes first. His family lives in a street shanty in Nairobi, Kenya, but their way of both loving and taking advantage of each other strikes a universal chord.
In the second of his stories published in a New Yorker special fiction issue, Akpan takes us far beyond what we thought we knew about the tribal conflict in Rwanda. The story is told by a young girl, who, with her little brother, witnesses the worst possible scenario between parents. They are asked to do the previously unimaginable in order to protect their children. This singular collection will also take the reader inside Nigeria, Benin, and Ethiopia, revealing in beautiful prose the harsh consequences for children of life in Africa.
Half of a Yellow Sun
by null Chimamanda Ngozi AdichieNATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • From the award-winning, bestselling author of Americanah and We Should All Be Feminists—a haunting story of love and war. • Recipient of the Women&’s Prize for Fiction &“Winner of Winners&” award.With effortless grace, celebrated author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie illuminates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra's impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in southeastern Nigeria during the late 1960s. We experience this tumultuous decade alongside five unforgettable characters: Ugwu, a thirteen-year-old houseboy who works for Odenigbo, a university professor full of revolutionary zeal; Olanna, the professor&’s beautiful young mistress who has abandoned her life in Lagos for a dusty town and her lover&’s charm; and Richard, a shy young Englishman infatuated with Olanna&’s willful twin sister Kainene. Half of a Yellow Sun is a tremendously evocative novel of the promise, hope, and disappointment of the Biafran war.
Song for Night
by Chris Abani&“A devastating portrait of a boy holding onto the shreds of his innocence during a war that deliberately, remorselessly works to yank it away.&”—Los Angeles Times Part Inferno, part Paradise Lost, part Sunjata epic, Song for Night is the story of a West African boy soldier&’s terrifying yet oddly beautiful journey through a nightmare landscape of brutal war in search of his lost platoon. The mute protagonist—his vocal cords cut to lower the risk of detection by the enemy—writes in a ghostly voice about his fellow minesweepers, the things he&’s witnessed, and the things he&’s done, each chapter headed by a line of the sign language these children invented. This &“immersive and dreamlike&” novella (Publishers Weekly, starred review) by a PEN/Hemingway Award winner is unlike anything else written about an African war. &“Not since Jerzy Kosinski&’s The Painted Bird or Agota Kristof&’s Notebook Trilogy has there been such a harrowing novel about what it&’s like to be a young person in a war. That Chris Abani is able to find humanity, mercy, and even, yes, forgiveness, amid such devastation is something of a miracle.&”—Rebecca Brown, author of The End of Youth &“Impressive and fast-paced…narrated with such dry and lucid precision that it brings to mind Babel, Hemingway, McCarthy.&”—Esquire