Category: YOUNG ADULT

Currently, there are nearly 69 million refugees in the world. Let’s start there. This is true today.

Now imagine a city in which a native population, a population of a former colonial power, and an immigrant population who migrated centuries ago and struggle to maintain their culture are thrown together. There are the obvious divisions between race, ethnicity, gender, wealth, education, and access to resources. There is marginalization of those who cannot or do not willing fall into the cultural stereotypes. And then there is Ang, a young woman living on a rooftop, consorting with thugs and plying her trade as steeplejack. In the context of the cultures around her, she is an anomaly.

What begins as an investigation of the murder of a boy who was destined to be her apprentice becomes an investigation of the theft of the emblem of the city, The Beacon. The investigation spirals as Ang finds herself entangled with politicians, a corrupt police force, and a host of characters converging on her city intent on profit and, if necessary, war. This is a novel of displacement, of finding self, and of forging and disintegrating the ties that bind us.

Through the winter and into the spring, my reading has focused on literature of resistance and post-colonial discourse. While most of it has been academic in nature (think Fanon, Cesaire, and Toby Green’s excellent history FISTFUL OF SHELLS) I’ve taken some time to explore young adult fiction emerging in response to crises that grow out of displacement. This is one of the first such books I read.
Tina and her mother fled Congo years ago and settled Kenya as refugees. Tina’s mother finds work with the Greyhill family and it is in the Greyhill family home that she is shot and killed. It is clear who murdered her mother. The problem is that she can’t prove it, and even if she could who would listen to her? The Greyhills are respected, wealthy, and corrupt. But Tina has grown up on the streets and with some unexpected help must find justice – and vengeance – for the mother she lost.