For Angola, I read The Return of the Water Spirit by Pepetela, which is the nom de plume of Artur Carlos Maurício Pestana. Pepetela was born in Angola in 1941, left for Portugal in 1958 to study engineering, spent time in France and then Algeria, and returned to Angola at the end of its war for independence in the 1970s.

The Return of the Water Spirit is a novella that takes place in Luanda, the capital of Angola in the late 1980s as the newly independent country abandoned socialism in favor of capitalism. Buildings in the city have mysteriously begun to crumble and fall, but anyone inside floats safely to the ground.

The story is a scathing critique of capitalism that draws upon African mythology. It was a quick enjoyable read that gave me a lot of insights into life in Angola in the 1980s, and I’d recommend it to anyone on a Read Around the World quest or any bookworm interested in a modern-day fable that might challenge their preconceived notions about the world.