![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The spray was so powerful it was hard to say whether the Falls flowed up or down. Beyond it, veiled in spray, the main falls leapt roaring into the chasm four hundred feet below. In the foreground was the bluff of Barouka island. She describes the essence of its primordial landscape before European influence: In many ways, The Old Drift reads like a love letter to her homeland. The novel depicts a pageant of complex characters from many racial backgrounds (with a family tree supplied for reference), unifying in a dramatic chorus that ties together the narrative with broader themes.Īuthor Namwali Serpell was born in Zambia to a black mother and white British father, then moved to the United States during her childhood. I was most drawn to the third section, which churns like the rapids, then floods in a surge of future-set climate catastrophe. The first section, "The Grandmothers," unrolls like a meandering river and introduces native and colonial characters whose descendants will propel the next two sections, titled "The Mothers" and "The Children," respectively. This panoramic (576 page) debut novel spans a tumultuous century of socio-political and family dynamics in Zambia. Debut novelist Serpell presents a genre-bending opus spanning over a century of history (and future) in the African nation of Zambia. ![]()
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