And After Many Days
A Novel
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4.5 • 2 Ratings
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- $4.99
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
An unforgettable debut novel about a boy who goes missing, a family that is torn apart, and a nation on the brink
During the rainy season of 1995, in the bustling town of Port Harcourt, Nigeria, one family's life is disrupted by the sudden disappearance of seventeen-year-old Paul Utu, beloved brother and son. As they grapple with the sudden loss of their darling boy, they embark on a painful and moving journey of immense power which changes their lives forever and shatters the fragile ecosystem of their once ordered family. Ajie, the youngest sibling, is burdened with the guilt of having seen Paul last and convinced that his vanished brother was betrayed long ago. But his search for the truth uncovers hidden family secrets and reawakens old, long forgotten ghosts as rumours of police brutality, oil shortages, and frenzied student protests serve as a backdrop to his pursuit.
In a tale that moves seamlessly back and forth through time, Ajie relives a trip to the family's ancestral village where, together, he and his family listen to the myths of how their people settled there, while the villagers argue over the mysterious Company, who found oil on their land and will do anything to guarantee support. As the story builds towards its stunning conclusion, it becomes clear that only once past and present come to a crossroads will Ajie and his family finally find the answers they have been searching for.
And After Many Days introduces Ile's spellbinding ability to tightly weave together personal and political loss until, inevitably, the two threads become nearly indistinguishable. It is a masterful story of childhood, of the delicate, complex balance between the powerful and the powerless, and a searing portrait of a community as the old order gives way to the new.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in southern Nigeria, Ile's debut novel pits the personal against the political in a slow-burning family drama. The year is 1995: university students take to the streets to agitate for better funding; NEPA, the country's electric utility, can't keep the grid juiced; the military government hangs nine dissidents. Yet in the swirl of postcolonial struggle, the Utu family has built a stable life of bourgeois respectability in metropolitan Port Harcourt, while keeping close ties to their ancestral village of Ogibah. One day, 17-year-old Paul Utu disappears. The novel rewinds to Ajie's childhood, eventually finishing in the present day. It is through precocious Ajie, the youngest sibling, that we learn the Utu family history, from their tribe's origin story and grandfather's Christianization through the horrors of the Biafran War and into the mid-'90s. As quick-tempered Ajie comes of age, the novel depicts the contradictions of his mother's Christianity, his father's indefatigable liberalism, and their family bonds all of which, already stretched thin between the old world and the new, are further strained by Paul's disappearance. Though he occasionally burdens young Ajie with adult concerns that seem implausibly heavy, Ile hits the emotional register of childhood experiences, like the all-or-nothing satisfaction of following older kids in climbing a tree, or the searing heat of school humiliations.
