For Chad, I read Told by Starlight in Chad by Joseph Brahim Said. It was translated by Karen Haire Hoenig, but I’m not sure from which language! According to the book, the author was educated at French colonial schools, so I’m going to assume the book was originally written in French, but ugh, I don’t like making that assumption… but shoutout to the translator for making this work available! The world would be a narrow place if I could only read books written in English.

Told by Starlight is a collection of stories that I can’t lump into one category. There are fables, myths, and legends with talking animals, magical items, and evil stepmothers. Some tell about the founding of great cities while another explains why eclipses happen and yet another was a mashup of Cinderella and Hansel and Gretel but with a cow. This book reminded me of Folktales of Bhutan because both told stories with recognizable themes and tropes but in ways that were steeped in their local setting. With talking lions and hippos, I never for a moment forgot that I was reading stories from Africa.

Although the stories are wildly different, they all take pride in Chad’s tradition and heritage. That’s what drew me to this book. For Africa, I’ve been reading a lot of books that explore dark themes like colonialism, government corruption, and extreme poverty, and there’s plenty of that in Chad. At the moment, Chad is ranked 189th out of 193 countries on the Human Development Index, and the U.S. State Department strongly discourages travel to that land-locked country, so I was interested in a more upbeat perspective. Or, put it another way: all places have culture and stories and traditions that matter.

Is this the sort of book that I will be urging all my bookworm friends to read? Nope!

But did this book introduce me to stories that deepened my sense of the world? Absolutely.

I’ll leave you with this quote that gave me fresh insights into oral traditions:

As far back in time as men can remember, albeit they forget very fast, the oral tradition is there to remind them constantly of events that happened before they were born. Its elasticity and capacity for changing and evolving allows the tradition to yield to the exigencies of the moment; it adapts according to the place and the time in which the individuals live. And thus it guarantees the orderly continuation of custom, linking the past to the present and the present to the future.

Told by starlight in chad, pg. 65

That’s the sort of passage that makes me want to run back to college and spend a year in the stacks writing a thesis about the power of stories.

For Central African Republic, I read Co-Wives, Co-Widows by Adrienne Yabouza, and WOW, it was not at all what I expected. It’s the story of two women whose husband dies unexpectedly, so I assumed I was in for a dark, morose tale. NOPE! It was lively, funny, smart and downright effervescent.

The story is set in 2011 when the country is on the brink of a civil war that started in 2012 and continues to this day. If you live in the United States and feel like our government and elections are a bit chaotic, then spend a little time on the Wikipedia page for Central African Republic. You might come away with a new understanding of what it means to live under a “chaotic” government.

At only 124 pages,Co-wives is a fast read, but Yabouza packed the story with information about life in Central African Republic, including the CAR’s “democratic elections” and the corruption of its government and judicial system. She also weaves daily life into the story with details about clothing, food, family structure, houses, commerce, and customs surrounding grief, courtship, and marriage.

I’d like to especially draw your attention to the local tradition for Mother’s Day: the husbands wear their wives’ dresses and cook dinner. (I think I’ll stick with flowers.)

And the story itself was very interesting! It brought me along the co-widows’ journey, riling up feelings of anger and indignation, and the ending was unexpected but inevitable and emotionally satisfying.

The book was translated from French into English by Rachael McGill (great work there!), and its the first book from the Central African Republic to be translated into English. But this is not the sort of book that should only be read during a Read Around the World quest. It’s a wonderful, uplifting story with a feminist edge that I absolutely adored.

Well, Canada broke my heart.

There was a tiny fight on TikTok when I asked for recommendations for Canada. Nothing like the uproar when I posted about my pick for Bosnia and Herzegovina (the Balkans are spicy and I’m still a little terrified) but for Canada, folks were roughly divided into two camps I shall describe as “Read Anne of Green Gables!” and “For Fuck’s sake, read anything but that.” I read the entire Anne of Green Gables series as a child, plus I’ve read tons of Margaret Atwood, so once folks suggested I read something by a First Nations author, that seemed like the right choice for me. There were a lot of votes for Five Little Indians by Michelle Good and when I learned it was a novel that followed the lives of five survivors of residential schools, my gut screamed, “Yes, please!”

If you have never heard about residential schools, this Wikipedia article provides a decent crash course. I only learned about residential schools a few years ago when headlines started popping up about the discovery of mass graves.

Michelle Good’s novel sucked me in. It was beautifully written with the sort of writing that carries the reader along. The chapters are told from the viewpoint of five different survivors of the same residential school, and Michelle Good brought them all to life. I felt like I had a personal relationship with each character, and the varying viewpoints was such a brilliant way to show the extent and impact of the abuses committed at the residential schools.

My heart broke for the children stolen from their families and sent to boarding schools meant to crush out their indigenous cultures. And it broke again for the parents who could not save their children. And then my heart shattered because based on media I consumed before Five Little Indians, I thought of Canada as this romantic utopian place with lots of maple syrup and hockey that was immune to the problems of the United States.

Nope. Evil shit also happened in Canada.

But I’m glad this book broke my heart because I think we need to break our hearts in order to let more love inside. It’s like tearing down a wall in order to add a wing to a house. This book added a whole new wing to my heart and soul. Now, when I think of Canada, I’ll still think of L.M. Montgomery and Margaret Atwood, but I’ll also think about the victims of the residential schools. They need us to listen to their stories so they can heal. They need us to listen so humanity can learn and reckon with its evils and grow and do better.

For Cameroon, I read How Beautiful We Were: A Novel by Imbolo Mbue. This is the story of a fictional village called Kosawa, and a fictional American oil company that sets up camp nearby and wrecks havoc upon the land with pipeline spills and noxious fumes. The water is poisoned, the soil is ruined, the air is toxic, and children are dying in heartbreaking numbers. If I had to describe this book as quickly as possible, I’d call it Erin Brokovich: The African Edition.

The novel is told from different perspectives, including many chapters told from the perspective of “the Children.” The Children are a group of age mates, and when it’s their turn to narrate, the story is told from the perspective of “we” and “us.” Over the course of several decades, the persons included in this group change and shift. This sounds like a narrative disaster, but Mbue makes it work. (Also, how lovely is the concept of age mates?)

This book does something that I don’t believe I’ve ever encountered in a novel: it raises questions about the role of corporations in modern society. What is a corporation? Does it have a sense of morality? What happens when an American corporation does business in countries ruled by corrupt governments? Can the American legal system hold American corporations responsible when the corporation engages in illegal acts in distant continents? Should it?

I kept thinking about the gas I buy to fuel my SUV. Where does the oil to make the gas come from? What harms are being done? What uncomfortable truths am I ignoring?

I could go on, because this book really made me think and raised a lot of questions about environmental degradation, corporate morality (or lack thereof), corruption, courage, resistance, and revolution. If I was a high school literature teacher, I’d definitely want my students reading this book. I do believe I’ll be adding Imbolo Mbue to my list of favorite authors.

For Cambodia, I read a Loung Ung’s memoir First They Killed My Father in which she describes her experiences during the Cambodian genocide. Ung summarizes the book as follows:

From 1975 to 1979–through execution, starvation, disease, and forced labor–the Khmer Rouge systematically killed an estimated two million Cambodians, almost a fourth of the country’s population.

This is a story of survival: my own and my family’s. Though these events constitute my experience, my story mirrors that of millions of Cambodians. If you had been living in Cambodia during this period, this would be your story too.

First they killed my father, Author’s note.

Ung was five years old in April 1975 when Pol Pot came to power and the genocide began. Her family of nine–two parents, and seven siblings, ranging in age from three to eighteen–lived together in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh and were forced to flee. They traveled into the Cambodian countryside on their truck until they ran out of diesel and had to join the thousands of people walking to villages.

This is not your usual survival memoir. This is the story of a child who lived through unspeakable horrors and witnessed the worst of humanity. Ung describes what happened to her family while diving deeply into her thoughts and feelings. As a history major, I learned about lots of famines, wars, and atrocities and became desensitized to the death tolls of lives lost long ago. This memoir reminded me that history happens to people.

I was wrecked by the time I finished.

I did not simply learn about the Cambodian genocide. I experienced it through the heart, mind, and a soul of a child, which made me think of my own children. To be honest, it’s uncomfortable for me to write this post because I am revisiting the anguish and utter despair I felt for Ung’s family. My heart aches to think of all those families devastated by famine, forced labor, and senseless executions, and as I write this, the ache is pushing out from my chest, thrumming with horror for all the people living in the world today under violent conditions.

Why does humanity commit such evils as genocide?

How do we change and grow and realize our true potential as loving, creative species?

I don’t have the answers to those questions, but I know it’s important to find time and space to honor stories such as First They Killed My Father. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to deepen their connection with humanity across the globe and through the ages. If we want to do better in the future, it is important to bear witness to how humanity has failed in the past.

For Cabo Verde, I read Chiquino: A Novel of Cabo Verde by Balthazar Lopes, translated into English by Isabel P.B. Fêo Rodrigues and Carlos A. Almeida with Anna M. Klobucka. I actually wrote a post about why I chose this book, probably thinking I would create a blogging record of how and why I chose all the books for the C’s (and then D-Z). What a noble aspiration! Too bad I didn’t follow through with that plan for the rest of the C’s…

Anyway, back to Chiquino. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The novel has a three act structure, starting with the protagonist’s childhood on a rural island, continuing with his education on the more populous island of São Vicente, and finally his return to his home island as drought and famine strike the archipelago. The writing style is lyrical, and I was not surprised to learn the author was also a poet.

During the novel’s middle act, the protagonist is friends with an intellectual group of students who decide to start a revolutionary newspaper. In the context of heated discussions about what they should write for the newspaper, Lopes says:

We need to write things that could be written in Cabo Verde, that couldn’t be written, for instance, in Patagonia. We don’t care about Scandinavia and its fjords. We are interested in the coal men on the docks of São Vicente, who have been unemployed for far too long.

Chiquino, Baltazar lopes, pg. 87.

That is exactly what Lopes did in this novel. He wrote a book that could only be written in Cabo Verde, exploring the themes and issues that were important to its people and capturing the life of its people during the first quarter of the twentieth century. He brought to life the geography, smells, and weather of the archipelago; the local lore and folktales of witches and mermaids; and the struggle to earn a living. Throughout the story, Lopes imparted “the Creole longing for the islands and their people.” Id. at 56

The novel felt languid, but when I was done, I felt as if I had spent a semester abroad in Cabo Verde. I also came away with a deep appreciation for the dilemma that Cabo Verdeans faced during the early twentieth century. They wanted to stay home with their families and land, but if they did not emigrate to America or join a whaling ship, their opportunities to make money were few and far between. Lopes says its much better than I can:

Going to America meant the same thing to him as it did to other young men who left the hoe behind to embrace the great adventure. The emigrant experience in North America was the defining moment of their lives. And all of them were leveled by the mills, which reduced to nothing the intellectual distinction they had carried with them from the islands. But the health of his lungs was the most effective ally of that Creole nostalgia that irresistibly pulls them back to the archipelago any son of the island, no matter how deeply accustomed to the pace of American life.

Id. at 163.

It’s books like Chiquinho that remind me why I started my Read Around the World quest. I’d recommend it to anyone who wants to break out of their Western reading bubble.

For Burundi, I read Baho! by Roland Rugero. I really wanted to like this book–it has an exclamation mark in the title!–but alas, Baho! ended up being my least favorite book of the B’s. On the bright side, it was a super fast read clocking in at only 91 pages, so at least I did not suffer for long.

This book actually had a lot of potential. I enjoyed the writing style (sparse with well chosen, precise language) and the writer explored interesting themes (mob mentality, justice in a war torn society) but ultimately, one thing ruined the entire story for me.

The author talked about rape in a way that was disrespectful and harmful to women.

Here’s the premise of the entire book: a young man who does not speak attempts to ask an adolescent girl where he can use the bathroom by grabbing his crotch. Several women have recently been raped, so the girl screams, thinking she is about to be the rapist’s next victim. Pandemonium ensues as villagers descend and a mob chases the young man.

Maybe the author intended these circumstances to be funny? Or maybe he just wanted to create a scenario that would led to vigilante justice at the hands of an enraged mob? Whatever his intentions, his story didn’t work because he described the perceived threat of rape insensitively, even callously:

For two months, the obsessive fear of rape has haunted this country’s women. Mothers make their little girls wear panties under their wraps when they go to draw water and under their skirts when they go to school, when before they did not. Girls are required to go everywhere in groups.

Baho! pg. 15.

On the same page, the author writes that in two months, six girls have been raped in the area. And he dares suggest that being afraid of rape is obsessive? It’s been five days since I finished Baho! and UGH, just rereading that passage makes me want to spew obscenities.

The book’s tone regarding the fear of rape never improved. The author almost seemed to be ridiculing people who would defend girls from rapists. If the author wanted to make a point about mob mentality, then he should have used any other perceived crime but not rape. Not in this world, where women still struggle to be believed and cannot roam the world as safely as men. Not in a world where rape is used as a tool to dominate, as a savage act of violence, as an instrument in war.

Rape should not be used as a clever literary device, end of discussion.

For Burkina Faso, I read Of Water And The Spirit: Ritual, Magic, and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman by Malidoma Patrice Somé. When I finished this book yesterday, I gave it 3/5 stars on Goodreads (rounding up from a 2.5) but the more I think about it, the more I like it. I’ve already revised my Goodreads rating to 4/5 and who knows where I’ll be in another month.

This book is a spiritual memoir. Malidoma was born in Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) as a member of the Dagara tribe. When he was four years old, he was abducted by a Jesuit priest and taken to live at a nearby missionary school. There were, however, hints in the memoir that Malidoma’s father gave the green light to his abduction, and according to Wikipedia, Malidoma’s father took him to a Jesuit boarding school. Perhaps Malidoma later modified his story? Either way, Malidoma’s years at the boarding school were traumatizing and both emotionally and physically abusive.

While at the boarding school, Malidoma was forced to learn French and stop speaking his native Dagara. As an adolescent, he was transferred to the seminary to train to be a priest where he endured more physical and emotional abuse and sexual abuse as well. At about the age of twenty, Malidoma rebelled, escaped the seminary, and walked home over a hundred miles to his home village. Through the African bush. I cannot even imagine.

Except I can imagine what it was like to walk through the African bush because Malidoma did an excellent job of describing the setting throughout the book. I could really visualize his tribal village, the missionary school, the seminary, and the African bush.

Fun fact: As a woman born and raised in California, I think of the African bush as “wilderness” but the members of the Dagara tribe refer to the city as “wilderness.” Just one of the many ways that this book reminded me the two much of life is about our personal experiences and perspective.

Malidoma made it back to his village, but he had forgotten his native tongue and could not speak with his parents. Fortunately, his sister could speak some rudimentary French and with time, Malidoma remembered Dagara. However, he was not welcomed with open arms by his entire tribe. The elders were concerned that Malidoma, now literate, did not belong and would upset the balance of village life. He had also missed the male initiation rites that happen in the bush during adolescence. After much agonizing and reflection, the elders decided that Malidoma could participate in the initiation rites–although they warned that as a man in his twenties, the experience might break him.

Malidoma decided to participate in the initiation rites, and he described these in great detail. My Western beliefs were very prickly during these passages, and I often had to remind myself that to an outsider, my beliefs might seem pretty crazy. If I believe in miracles like Jesus turning water into wine, why should I criticize the things that Malidoma believed happened during his invitation rites? (For example, that he jumped through an animal skin into another dimension.)

Except sometimes, maybe we need to accept that beliefs vary wildly throughout the world but we are also allowed to challenge these beliefs so humanity can grow and change and improve.

I believe there are infinite ways to experience spirituality and connect with the divine. Although there is no RIGHT way to practice spirituality, there are ways that can be wrong–and there were some elements in Malidoma’s book that raised some serious red flags for me. Most obviously, Malidoma participated in initiation rites with adolescent boys from other villages and four of the boys died. FOUR. I am trying to accept and embrace the fact that we all have different beliefs, and I’m coming from a Western bias, but if four adolescents at the local Catholic school died during their confirmation, I would be raising hell.

Another red flag: when Malidoma returned to his village, the elders were concerned that he would be a bad influence on the community because he could read and write. Literacy was perceived as evil. Again, I know I’m coming from a Western bias here, but it seemed like the elders were worried that literacy would introduced new ideas to the young and that could upset the patriarchy. Malidoma’s memoir described a spirituality that seemed to support a seriously patriarchal society and I often found myself wanting to hear from the female members of the Dagara tribe. Do they connect with the tribe’s beliefs in the same way as Malidoma? Do they have their own initiation rites? Do they feel uplifted and inspired by their beliefs or are they stifled and smothered by village life?

Ultimately, I’m really glad I picked Of Water And The Spirit for my Read Around the World quest. As I continue to think about this book, I feel myself pulled by two competing concerns: (1) respecting the beliefs of people who live in a community completely foreign to me; and (2) challenging beliefs that might be oppressive to some members of a community. Or, perhaps I am dealing with two personal and competing concerns: (1) my inherent people pleaser, who does not want to offend anyone, and (2) my inner voice that wants to challenge inequities and the status quo.

And this is why I’m obsessed with this project. With each book, I feel my soul and mind expanding.

For Bulgaria, I read Border: A Journey to the Edge of Europe by Kapka Kassabova. Kassabova was born in communist Bulgaria in 1973 and her family emigrated to New Zealand at the end of the Cold War when she was seventeen.

Kassabova now lives in Scotland but felt drawn to explore the borderlands of Bulgaria, Turkey, and Greece. During the Cold War, it was rumored that the border shared by Bulgaria, Greece, and Turkey was easier to cross than the Berlin Wall. Folks reasoned that traveling through the woods and crossing some barbed wire was easier than Checkpoint Charlie.

Border is a work of narrative nonfiction that is parts travelogue, history, and memoir. Kassabova deftly weaves together her personal journey through the borderlands with the stories of people who tried to cross the border. During the Cold War, we meet East Germans fleeing communism, and in more recent history, we meet refugees desperately seeking asylum in Europe from parts of Turkey, Syria, and Iraq. This book made me think so much about country, nationality, and borders, and I’m still grappling with these shifting ideas.

Kassabova brought the woods of Stranja to life, making them seem more haunted and magical than any woods traveled by Goldilocks or Little Red Riding Hood. There are bears and wolves, spies and soldiers, monasteries carved out of rocky hills, and tunnels filled with treasures left by the Thracians. I ache to visit these places, but they are not exactly tourist destinations for Americans. I’m not sure I could ever find half the villages Kassabova visited, and the tourism industry in that part of the world seems to be damaging the woods–so should I even consider going?

[Though seriously, take a moment and Google “rock monastery of Saint Nicholas.” Now don’t you want to come with me to the Balkans?]

While reading this book, I often thought about its parallels to Secondhand Time, my pick for Belarus. Both Kassabova and Alexievich preserve the stories of ordinary people who lived in communist states and who are struggling to find their footing as borders and governments shift and topple. Kassabova, however, was the protagonist of Border whereas Alexievich rarely appeared in Secondhand Time. No approach is better than the other. Both books touched my soul.

I also thought about The Bridge on the Drina, my pick for Bosnia and Herzegovina. Not only are both countries in the Balkans, but both books explore a part of the world where East meets West, where religions clash, where questions of nationality and ethnicity are spicier than I am used to in my American bubble. Kassabova also described literal bridges that reminded me of the bridge in Višegrad and told stories about the building of these bridges that echoed Ivo Andric’s work.

Both Andric and Alexievich were awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kapka Kassabova someday receives that honor as well. I can’t wait to read more of her books.

For Brunei, I read Written in Black by KH Lim. Poor Brunei. It had the bad luck of following Brazil and The Posthumous Memoirs of Bras Cubas, which was one of the most effervescent experiences I ever had reading a book. Machado de Assis is one of the most incredible writers I’ve ever read. Then there’s the people of Brazil. OMG Brazilians are the most loving, enthusiastic, vibrant people on the internet. Everyone should have the pleasure of going viral in Brazil at least once in their life, plus I am so excited to read more Brazilian literature–

Crap, I’m supposed to be writing a post about Brunei.

The book I read suffered from Wrong Coveritis. Here’s the cover I got:

And here’s the sentence from the Amazon blurb that grabbed my attention:

Jonathan escapes his grandfather’s wake in an empty coffin and embarks on a journey through the backwaters of Brunei to bring his disowned brother back for the funeral and to learn the truth about his absent mother. 

Between the cover design and the book blurb, I thought the protagonist was going to travel by coffin on a river, and holy shit, how cool does that sound? Sign me up!

Spoiler alert: the coffin is never used as a boat. And there’s no travel by river either. Instead, Jonathan hides in a truck with a few empty coffins and then at some point, he hides inside one of the coffins, but most of his journey takes place on foot or by car. Also, we never actually learn the truth about his absent mother. There are just some vague insinuations AND THIS WAS FRUSTRATING.

As a reader, I felt like I’d been sold a bill of goods. This is an important lesson for writers: writers need to manage their readers’ expectations. Do not show a coffin being used as a boat on a river unless your story involves a coffin being used as a freaking boat on a river! (But as a writer, I’m taking a mental note and saving this idea for a future book….probably dark fantasy, yeah?)

I had a few other problems with this book. There was way too much scatological humor. I’m all for a good fart joke, but there is a limit on how many descriptions of diarrhea that I can read. The characters were unlikeable, and no one seemed to grow in a meaningful way. And then suffered from a bunch of scenes that built up tension that ultimately went no where. For example, at the beginning of his journey, Jonathan happens upon an abandoned house with a room of voodoo dolls and obituaries including an obituary for his grandfather. I was on edge, waiting to see where the story was going … and then there were some bats, Jonathan ran away, and we never again heard about the obituaries in the abandoned house. What the actual fuck? Yes, stories need some mystery but this was just bizarre and emotionally unsatisfying. Maybe I’m missing something from Brunei culture?

The book did, however, give me a fascinating glimpse into life in Brunei. The story’s center is the death of Jonathan’s grandfather, and the writer described the mourning rituals beautifully. The funeral was unlike any I’ve ever experienced, and it was a good reminder that although grief and death are universal experiences, there are different ways to process them.

Am I going to be recommending this book to everyone I know? Nope. But was it a good reminder of why I embarked on my Read Around the World quest? Absolutely. I experienced a completely different part of the world and got out of my comfortable American bubble. Although I did not love the story, I did enjoy the insights into life in Brunei.