Allah is Not Obliged

#BookReport 13/22

Another good book. I am enjoying the #internationalbookerprize2022 longlist and am making progress on #ReadingAfrica2022 too. This week‘s favorite: Love in the big city

Cinfhen

Cinfhen Great 😊 2y

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BarbaraBB

Allah is Not Obliged | Ahmadou Kourouma

so-so

What a mess, West-Africa in the 90s. When his mother dies and he is left without family, a young boy from #IvoryCoast travels through war torn Liberia and Sierra Leone in search of his aunt. He becomes a child soldier and witnesses all the horrible things a kid shouldn‘t. Drugged and hyper he writes down his story.

#19822022 #2000 #ReadingAfrica2022 🇨🇮 #pop21 #FeaturesTwoLanguages

KarenUK, Megabooks, Cinfhen, Cortg, Librarybelle, Laughterhp, alisiakae, RaeLovesToRead

Librarybelle This sounds heartbreaking 2y

Cinfhen The history in modern day Africa is just as heartbreaking as the days of early slavery 2y

BarbaraBB @Librarybelle @Cinfhen It is heartbreaking indeed and it seems hopeless 💔 2y

Megabooks Thinking about what the west has imposed on Africa and the issues colonization and slavery created just breaks my heart. It‘s been hard for me to have the emotional space to read these stories this year with the other issues I‘ve had. 2y

BarbaraBB @Megabooks I can understand that. It is hard to read and to deal with. 2y

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BarbaraBB

Allah is Not Obliged | Ahmadou Kourouma

#WeeklyForecast 12/22

I want to read an #InternationalBooker nominated book a week. This week that‘ll be After the Sun. But of course there‘s also #ReadingAfrica2022. I‘m almost finished with the fantastic The Burgess Boys for Somalia. Next will be the tagged one for Liberia. Last but not least my Greek #FoodAndLit choice, a book that I can use for some challenges as well!

Cinfhen

Cinfhen I LOVED

The Burgess Boys

BarbaraBB @Cinfhen I am too. I feel like I know these people! 2y

Cinfhen I‘m SUCH a FAN of Elizabeth Strout 💕💕💕 2y

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ErinSBecker

Allah is Not Obliged | Ahmadou Kourouma

Completed so far for #bookspinbonanza!

rockpools Wow! 4y

TheAromaofBooks Yay!!! 4y

43 likes2 comments

ErinSBecker

Allah is Not Obliged | Ahmadou Kourouma

pick

Well, that was quite a ride... Think Adventures of Huck Finn, but Huck is a child-soldier in Liberia's 1990s civil wars. Add a strong, repetitive narrative voice reminiscent of three part jokes or formal prayer, a dash of Joyceian circular narrative, and a metric fuckton of obscenity. I. Was. Not. Expecting. This. 😳😶😳

ErinSBecker This was #bookspinbonanza number six. @TheAromaofBooks 4y

TheAromaofBooks Sounds interesting! 4y

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ErinSBecker

Allah is Not Obliged | Ahmadou Kourouma

"three genuine old k***** shamans wearing filthy bubus - as filthy and disgusting as a hyena's anus. They had been chewing cola nuts for so long that two of them were, as toothless as a chimpanzee's arse." - ok, I get that the author is trying to sound like an 11 yo boy, but two ass similes back to back? Seems a bit overkill...

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ErinSBecker

Allah is Not Obliged | Ahmadou Kourouma

I happen to have landed two really harsh downers next to each other on#bookspinbonanza. Having trouble getting into either. Tagged and Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko. I really want to read both, they're good! But finding myself for the first time this month reading something that's not on my #bookspin list. Should I leapfrog over these two or keep trying?

vlwelser Read one and go back to the other later is what I would probably do. 4y

TheAromaofBooks I'm not being horrifically strict on the “read in order“ rule, so if you have two back-to-back that just aren't working, feel free to swap one with a book further down the list if that will help!! 4y

ErinSBecker Thanks @vlwelser and @TheAromaofBooks for the advice! 🙂 4y

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