Maps

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Summary: Description of MAPS
Review: Exiled from his native Somalia nearly twenty-five years ago, NuruddinFarah embarked on what has developed into a lifelong literary project:"to keep my country alive by writing about it." Since that time, Farah has become not only "the most important African novelist to emerge in the last twenty-five years, [but] one of the most sophisticated voices in modern fiction" (Neil Ascherson, New York Review of Books).

In this strikingly lyrical novel, Farah tells the story of the orphan Askar.

MAPS is the first volume in Farah's "Blood in the Sun" trilogy. Its publication simultaneously with GIFTS (volume two) and following the appearance of SECRETS (1998) marks a major literary event: the first complete publication of the trilogy. Farah's first trilogy, "Variations on the Theme of an African Dictatorship" is recognized as one of the great achievements of modern African literature, "a powerful political statement that moves constantly toward song" (New York Times Book Review). Taken together, the novels of the "Blood in the Sun" trilogy, each of which stands by itself, form one of the most extraordinary portraits of a nation written in our time. END

Rating:
Summary: An Unknown Superstar
Review: I came to thi s book after reading the review in the New York Times Book Review (the quote on this page doesn't do the review justice). I had never heard of the author and thought I was discovering someone completely new. When I looked at the book I learned that many of the world's great writers--Rushdie, Achebe, Gordimer--have been reading him for years and loving him. If you look at the page for Secrets and click on the Click Here for All the Reviews button you'll see what I mean. They're right. He's a great writer who deserves to be more famous. This is a great book. Now I'm going to read all of his other books.

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Summary: A GREAT BOOK
Review: I don't know a lot about African literature, and what I had read about Nurrudin Farah was a little intimidating, but this book was recommended to me by a friend who read it when it was first published in ENgland, and since then I've read the whole Blood in theSun trilogy (Gifts and Secrets follow). The books have taught me a lot about Africa and Somalia especially. But this book is, quite simply, a great novel, regardless of what continent it comes from. Farah writes like no other author I have ever encountered: he really makes the language come alive in a very special way. I'm convinced he's one of the most brilliant writers alive today.

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Summary: READ THESE BOOKS!
Review: I just posted a review of Nurrudin Farah's Maps, and I wanted to make sure everyone knows the whole trilogy is brilliant. If I had to separate them, Gifts I think is the easiest to read, but all by itslef is maybe less rewarding than Maps or Secrets. But it's still an amzing book--one of the best contemporary novels that I've read--and the whole trilogy has radically reshaped changed the way I think about literature and the world.

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Summary: A Society Much Different Than the U.S.A.
Review: I read this book based on the glowing, 5 star reviews of others. I stopped reading the book 30 pages before the end. The first half of the story held my interest well, but then it started lagging until my interest stopped altogether.

Mr. Farah does have a pleasant way with words and presents the life in Somalia well indeed. I enjoyed the differences and understand the importance of superstition in their society. Also it seems that every word spoken is analyzed by each person to the extent that all sorts of unspoken psychological challenges are experienced in a chit chat conversation.

For me this was not a reading joy.

Rating:
Summary: A Society Much Different Than the U.S.A.
Review: I read this book based on the glowing, 5 star reviews of others. I stopped reading the book 30 pages before the end. The first half of the story held my interest well, but then it started lagging until my interest stopped altogether.

Mr. Farah does have a pleasant way with words and presents the life in Somalia well indeed. I enjoyed the differences and understand the importance of superstition in their society. Also it seems that every word spoken is analyzed by each person to the extent that all sorts of unspoken psychological challenges are experienced in a chit chat conversation.

For me this was not a reading joy.

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Summary: Touching and Extremely Well-Written
Review: Nuruddin Farah is one of my favorite novelists and I think his "Blood in the Sun" trilogy (MAPS, GIFTS, SECRETS) is a masterpiece. While MAPS and SECRETS are books filled with terror and tragedy, GIFTS is quite different. It's surprisingly upbeat and it concentrates on women more than the other books do (though Farah is always good with his female characters).

The protagonist of GIFTS is a woman named Duniya who works as a nurse at the maternity hospital in Mogadishu. She meets her lover, Bosaaso, in a very comical manner when she runs out of gasoline on her way to work. Bosaaso is Somalian, but he's not a typical Somalian. American-educated and now quite wealthy, Bosaaso is the man Duniya has dreamed of meeting...literally.

Although Duniya has dreamed of her meeting with Bosaaso, she hasn't been dreaming of love and romance. She's far too modern and independent for that. (In a flashback to the village of Duniya's birth, Farah dramatizes the events that have shaped Duniya's fierce independence and also why the novel is titled GIFTS.)

Instead of terror and tragedy, GIFTS is a touching, and, at times, an almost sweet book. GIFTS contains several narrative strands and Farah develops them and brings them together wonderfully.

The theme of GIFTS revolves around the question of whether a gift brings good or ill and Farah never lets us forget this theme throughout the book.

GIFTS is a surprising book simply because it doesn't contain the terror and tragedy that overshadow so much of Farah's other work. Some people, I think, won't like GIFTS because of this. Other, however, like me, will find GIFTS a wonderful change of pace and will welcome it.

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Summary: ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Review: Nuruddin Farah is the laureate of the 1998 Neustadt International Prize for Literature, "widely regarded as the most prestigious international literary award after the Nobel" (New York Times). He is the author of eight novels, which have won numerous awards and been translated into a dozen languages. Farah lives in Cape Town, South Africa, with his wife and children.

Rating:
Summary: Hmmm?
Review: This book is not exactly what I would call a joy. You start reading it and you just can't wait to finish it. I found the whole novel dry and uninteresting. It did have a brilliant beginning, but as time went on, you just get tired because the story itself never really develops in a way that would pique your interests at all. I can't say I'm a fan of Farah, but maybe I should try another of his books and see.

Rating:
Summary: An Unknown Superstar
Review: This is one of the major contemporary African novels to date. Its author, the Somalian English-speaking writer Nuruddin Farah, has been in exile since 1975, because he opposed Siyad Barre's military regime. Since Barre's eviction from power and death, Farah has chosen to stay abroad. The novel was published in 1986 and comes first in a trilogy that also includes GIFTS (1992) and SECRETS (1998). It is the story of a young orphan, named Askar ("soldier" or "arm-bearer" in Somali), who, as he thinks, killed his mother at his birth. During his infancy and early childhood, he shares everything (except his dreams) with his foster-mother, a woman of Oromo origin named Misra. In Kallafo, where he stays until the age of seven, he is happy and at one with Misra. Then, because of the different political problems that threaten Ogaden (the Ethiopian area mostly inhabited by Somali speakers and claimed by Somalia as its own), he is sent to the Somalian capital, Mogadiscio, where he lives with his maternal uncle, Hilaal, and his uncle's wife, Salaado. There, he tends to become a fierce patriot, though his moods are moderated by the presence of his uncle and his aunt, two loving but demanding intellectuals. At the age of 17, Askar sees Misra again. This is during the 1977 war in the Ogaden, and Askar has been misled into thinking that Misra betrayed Somali patriots. The whole story is told by three different voices, each of which the third case, the tale is more "objective", with Askar being referred to as a classical novel character ("he"). On the whole, Askar's dilemmas and split personality make up a deeply felt and immensely rewarding work of fiction. As the end shows, there is always fiction in life, but perhaps not the way you would expect it