New York & Boston: Little Brown, (2008). SIGNED hardcover first edition - Nigerian author's prize winning first book - a collection of five short stories, each set in a different country in Africa, and each a testament to the incredible resilience of children. From a family living in a makeshift shanty in urban Kenya in "Ex-Mas Feast" to a a Rwandan girl who relates her family's struggles to maintain a facade of normalcy amid unspeakable acts, and a young brother and sister coping with their uncle's attempt to sell them into slavery, the toll of poverty and religious conflict becomes clear. Louise Erdrich called this book "A beautiful, bitter, compelling read. The savagely strange juxtapositions in these stories are…
New York & Boston: Little Brown, (2008). SIGNED hardcover first edition - Nigerian author's prize winning first book - a collection of five short stories, each set in a different country in Africa, and each a testament to the incredible resilience of children. From a family living in a makeshift shanty in urban Kenya in "Ex-Mas Feast" to a a Rwandan girl who relates her family's struggles to maintain a facade of normalcy amid unspeakable acts, and a young brother and sister coping with their uncle's attempt to sell them into slavery, the toll of poverty and religious conflict becomes clear. Louise Erdrich called this book "A beautiful, bitter, compelling read. The savagely strange juxtapositions in these stories are grounded by the loving relationships between brothers and sisters forced to survive in a world of dreamlike horror. Open the book at any page, as in divination, and a stunning sentence will leap out. Newspaper facts are molded by Akpan's sure touch into fictional works of great power." SIGNED on the title page. Winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best First Book (Africa Region) 2009 and PEN/Beyond Margins Award 2009, and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction among other honors. The author's first novel, "New York, My Village", was published in November 2021 to excellent reviews. Map frontispiece. 358 pp. ISBN: 978-0316113786.
New York & Boston: Little Brown, (2008). First edition - Nigerian author's prize winning first book - a collection of five short stories, each set in a different country in Africa, and each a testament to the incredible resilience of children. From a family living in a makeshift shanty in urban Kenya in "Ex-Mas Feast" to a a Rwandan girl who relates her family's struggles to maintain a facade of normalcy amid unspeakable acts, and a young brother and sister coping with their uncle's attempt to sell them into slavery, the toll of poverty and religious conflict becomes clear. Louise Erdrich called this book "A beautiful, bitter, compelling read. The savagely strange juxtapositions in these stories are grounded by…
New York & Boston: Little Brown, (2008). First edition - Nigerian author's prize winning first book - a collection of five short stories, each set in a different country in Africa, and each a testament to the incredible resilience of children. From a family living in a makeshift shanty in urban Kenya in "Ex-Mas Feast" to a a Rwandan girl who relates her family's struggles to maintain a facade of normalcy amid unspeakable acts, and a young brother and sister coping with their uncle's attempt to sell them into slavery, the toll of poverty and religious conflict becomes clear. Louise Erdrich called this book "A beautiful, bitter, compelling read. The savagely strange juxtapositions in these stories are grounded by the loving relationships between brothers and sisters forced to survive in a world of dreamlike horror. Open the book at any page, as in divination, and a stunning sentence will leap out. Newspaper facts are molded by Akpan's sure touch into fictional works of great power." Winner of the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best First Book (Africa Region) 2009 and PEN/Beyond Margins Award 2009, and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction among other honors. The author has his first novel, second book, coming out in November 2021. Map frontispiece. Includes a conversation with the author. 364 pp.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994. dj. Hardcover first edition - Second book by this Florida born author, a unique blend of travel writing and literary scholarship. Although Samuel Taylor Coleridge's images in his poem 'Kubla Khan" were composed in an opium reverie, he was inspired by travel books of the time - Alexander traveled to three continents - from the steppes of Central Asia to North Florida with its mighty fountains, Kashmir's holy cave of ice and to 'Mount Abora' in Ethiopia - to discover first hand 'the miracle of rare device', the sources of Coleridge's inspiration. Bibliography. 205 pp. ISBN: 0-679419004.
New York: Dodd, Mead, (1974) dj. Hardcover first edition - An account of Fax's trips first to African - to Uganda, Northern Sudan, Ethopia, Tanzania - and then to Moscow and the then Soviet Republic of Uzbekistan. "In each of these exotic areas, so different in many respects, he was to find the history of oppression by colonialism, as it had occurred in similar ways among his own people at home. Everywhere he went the artist in Elton Fax recorded with beautiful drawings, even as the text did in words, what he saw with his own discerning eyes to produce a fascinating parts of the world." Illustrated with drawings by the author/artist. Index. x, 203 pp. ISBN: 0-396068421.
Condition: Fine in near fine dust jacket (short closed tears to dj, minor edgewear)
Edition: First appearance in print of these works.
Boston: African Studies Center, Boston University, 2000. First edition - A journal devoted to the study of Africa's past from prehistoric archeology to modern problems, and to the interaction between Africa and the Afro-American people of the new world. This issue includes articles on Winnie Mandela and the 1976 Soweto uprising, on women's naming practices in Mozambique, the 1937 Somaliland camel corps mutiny and more. Book reviews. Index for Volume 33. pp 513-758.
Condition: Near fine in glossy red wrappers (slight curling to edges.)
New York: Riverhead Books, 2006. First edition - The author's award-winning first novel - "Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution for a new start in the United States. Now he finds himself running a failing grocery store in a poor African-American section of Washington, D. C. , his only companions two fellow African immigrants who share his bitter nostalgia and longing for his home continent. Years ago and worlds away Sepha could never have imagined a life of such isolation. As his environment begins to change, hope comes in the form of a friendship with new neighbors Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her biracial daughter. But when a series of racial incidents disturbs the…
New York: Riverhead Books, 2006. First edition - The author's award-winning first novel - "Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution for a new start in the United States. Now he finds himself running a failing grocery store in a poor African-American section of Washington, D. C. , his only companions two fellow African immigrants who share his bitter nostalgia and longing for his home continent. Years ago and worlds away Sepha could never have imagined a life of such isolation. As his environment begins to change, hope comes in the form of a friendship with new neighbors Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her biracial daughter. But when a series of racial incidents disturbs the community, Sepha may lose everything all over again." 229 pp.
New York: Riverhead Books, 2007. dj. Hardcover first edition - The author's award-winning first novel - "Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution for a new start in the United States. Now he finds himself running a failing grocery store in a poor African-American section of Washington, D. C. , his only companions two fellow African immigrants who share his bitter nostalgia and longing for his home continent. Years ago and worlds away Sepha could never have imagined a life of such isolation. As his environment begins to change, hope comes in the form of a friendship with new neighbors Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her biracial daughter. But when a series of racial incidents…
New York: Riverhead Books, 2007. dj. Hardcover first edition - The author's award-winning first novel - "Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution for a new start in the United States. Now he finds himself running a failing grocery store in a poor African-American section of Washington, D. C. , his only companions two fellow African immigrants who share his bitter nostalgia and longing for his home continent. Years ago and worlds away Sepha could never have imagined a life of such isolation. As his environment begins to change, hope comes in the form of a friendship with new neighbors Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her biracial daughter. But when a series of racial incidents disturbs the community, Sepha may lose everything all over again." 228 pp. ISBN: 978-1594489402.
SAY YOU'RE ONE OF THEM.
SAY YOU'RE ONE OF THEM.
THROUGH BLACK EYES: Journeys of A Black Artist To East Africa and Russia.
THE BEAUTIFUL THINGS THAT HEAVEN BEARS.
THE BEAUTIFUL THINGS THAT HEAVEN BEARS.
