Fadimatu is a strong-willed and impulsive young Nigerian. These traits alone would make her life difficult as a Christian, Muslim and member of the Bachama tribe. But her firey personality reflects the turbulence of contemporary northeastern Nigeria. In a world both modern and traditional, money is king but juju magic has more power. And every schoolchild knows the name of Nigeria's problem: corruption.

Fadimatu must make many difficult choices such as when she is expelled from school, she has mixed feelings about the marriage her father arranges, she must undergo female circumcision, she can't get along with one of her co-wives, and her husband stops speaking to her. She refuses to give up her search for her mother, who, her father claims, was illiterate, and therefore not worth keeping as a wife.

Jennifer Mitton's first published story, "Bring Rain, Bring Water," published in Matrix, was about a schoolgirl's protest against a public sacrifice of 6 prostitues in order to bring rain during a drought. This story was the seed for the novel, Fadimatu,an affectionate, darkly comic testimony of what Chinua Achebe called, The Trouble With Nigeria

As Chinua Achebe said of his country when he quoted W.B. Yeats, "Things Fall Apart." Nevertheless, Fadimatu carries on.

How to order this book: contact Goose Lane Editions, tel. toll-free 1-888-926-8377, or (506) 450-4251, fax (506) 459-4991 or e-mail gooselane@nb.aibn.com

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