I cannot be bothered to rewrite the plot, so just look up the reviews on Amazon if you are interested. In short summary, the story is about Jama, a ten-year-old Somalian boy from 1930's Aden, who journeys across North-East Africa to find his father. Along the way Jama meets clansmen, friends and soldiers as Africa and Europe becomes embroiled in the Second World War.
It took me quite a while to finish this book. Not because it was a tedious read, but the death of one of Jama's friends by torture at the hand of Italian soldiers really shook me to the core. It took me several weeks before I could pick up the book to continue reading.
The novel won the 2010 Betty Trask prize, and while I found the writing style a bit inconsistent, the context was definitely spellbinding. There were nuggets of wonderful prose and the descriptions of the places were very detailed. My favourite was this dialogue between Jama and his friend when describing Italian soldiers:
"So they're like the British?" piped up Abdi."Yes, but they use more hair oil."
