Wizard of the Crow

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o · b. 1938 · Kenya

Originally Mũrogi wa Kagogo (Gikuyu) · translated by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o

Why it matters

In the fictional Free Republic of Aburĩria, a trickster sorcerer and a shape-shifting dictator's grotesque body politic collide in a sprawling satire of postcolonial tyranny and global capital. Ngũgĩ's first Gikuyu novel since his exile began, and his most ambitious: an epic built in the language he fought to reclaim.

At a glance

A vast cast and folkloric excess stretch across nearly 800 pages of interlocking political satire.