One of The Observer's fiction picks for 2022 and winner of a PEN Heim award.

To deter me, my uncle spoke to me about roots. A line of argument that I found absurd. Even plants are intelligent enough to grow around stones, seeking the best soil for their roots underground.

Jeanphi, a young man from the fictional West African city Ouabany, has one obsession that will determine the fate of his life - migration. He scrapes together money to take the illegal route across the Sahara, making it as far as Morocco before being repatriated. Increasingly desperate, Jeanphi meets an elegant French widower who for his part is despairing at the insurmountable bureaucratic hurdles for his charitable endeavour in Jeanphi's country. A window opens to opportunity - but it will also bring tragedy.

Burkinabe author Monique Ilboudo's novel offers a compelling and complex portrait of migration, one of the defining global concerns of the twenty-first century, and a sharp critique of both the NGO-isation of African countries and the currents of shame that divide communities and families. Yarri Kamara has rendered Ilboudo's text in an idiom that conveys the sharp humour, lucid descriptions and urgency of the original.

A compelling and complex portrait of migration and a sharp critique of the NGO-isation of African countries

About the Author
Monique Ilboudo is an author and human rights activist from Burkina Faso, the first woman to publish a novel in her country, and a major figure in Francophone African literature. is an emerging translator from Sierra Leone and Uganda who now lives in Burkina Faso. This will be her first book-length translation into English.

Awards
Short-listed for ALTA National Translation Award 2023.



Book Information
ISBN 9781911284802
Author Monique Ilboudo
Format Paperback
Page Count 119
Imprint Tilted Axis Press
Publisher Tilted Axis Press