OUR MEN…
A university graduate in desperate need of a job. A father’s vengeance for a dead son. A young pragmatic man humbled by the horrors of incarceration. An old man’s dying gift to a generation. A journalist’s courage in a notorious military government. A youth corper’s temperance of religion, love and survival
…THEIR STORIES.
From the quiet town of Umuahia to the creeks of Bonny Island, the sweltering plains of Jos to the bustling hub of Lagos, these Nigerian men have a story to tell. Stories of life, love, family, happiness, sorrow, pestilence and death—situations faced every day in their lives. Armed with objectivity, some find peace with their resolutions, while some face dire consequences with prices to pay; with their freedom, or worst yet, their lives.
Who tells the story? Is it the machete that witnesses a man’s pain or the man that wields the machete? Is it the man searching for a loved one or the words he uses to express his journey? Is it the shoes that are falling apart from overuse or their owner on the brink of giving up?
In these six stories of loss, love, pain and murder; Amara Okolo harnesses her powers of description, giving us POVs we would almost never consider in this collection filled with humans frailties.
‘Son of Man’ is an outstanding collection from a writer fast establishing herself as a unique storyteller in a sea of new voices.
- Enajite Efemuaye
What Amara Nicole Okoro presents in her short story collection, “Son of Man”, are objects and ideas so defining of the six protagonists, she imbues them with their humanity. They are the second skins the men inhabit, experiencing their love and pain. They are their third eye, weeping at the human condition. They are the men’s voices, message bearers, speaking the men’s stories with a force, a clarity and an authority the men are denied.
- Olatoun Williams, Book Border Reviews