Kirjahaku

First ever collection of plays by award-winning Nigerian-American playwright Sefi Atta. "This is contemporary family drama at its best: jam-packed with complex characters of largely middle class backgrounds; terse, witty dialogues that demonstrate Atta's skills at portraying genders and generations with widely differing aspirations; sibling rivalries, conjugal dynamics and meddling extended families; best friends and bad neighbors; and a whole plethora of religious practices and ethical mores which affect business ventures, professional conduct, and personal relations. This and much more you will find in Atta's Selected Plays--a drama collection which offers thought-provoking entertainment for theatre lovers." --Christine Matzke, University of Bayreuth

A rich, fearless novel from the winner of the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa.

A powerful story about two friends negotiating the politics of their nation, Sefi Atta's coming-of-age narrative is written with lyrical wisdom and brilliant insight. With insight and a lyrical wisdom, Nigerian-born Sefi Atta has written a powerful and eloquent story set in her African homeland. It is 1971, a year after the Biafran War, and Nigeria is under military rule- though the politics of the state matter less than those of her home to Enitan Taiwo, an eleven-year-old girl tired of waiting for school to start. Will her mother, who has become deeply religious since the death of Enitan's brother, allow her friendship with the new girl next door, the brash and beautiful Sheri Bakare? This novel charts the fate of these two African girls; one who is prepared to manipulate the traditional system and one who attempts to defy it. Written in the voice of Enitan, the novel traces this unusual friendship into their adult lives, against the backdrop of tragedy, family strife, and a war-torn Nigeria. In the end, Everything Good Will Come is Enitan's story; one of a fiercely intelligent, strong young woman coming of age in a culture that still insists on feminine submission. Enitan bucks the familial and political systems until she is confronted with the one desire too precious to forfeit in the name of personal freedom: her desire for a child. Everything Good Will Come evokes the sights and smells of Africa while imparting a wise and universal story of love, friendship, prejudice, survival, politics, and the cost of divided loyalties.

Four women grapple with social circumstances out of their control in this novella and short stories collection written by an award-winning Nigerian author. Perceptive and satirical, Indigene highlights revealing moments in the everyday lives of four introspective professional Nigerian women who grapple with circumstances out of their control. In the novella, Indigene, a sequel to Atta's debut novel, Everything Good Will Come, Enitan, a law partner in Lagos, takes stock of herself after she turns sixty. In the short stories that follow, "Unsuitable Ties," "Debt," and "Housekeeping," Yemisi, a caterer attending a London dinner party as a guest, assesses the company she keeps; Grace, a consultant for a Big Four accounting firm, confronts her shopping habit in a New Jersey mall; and Abi, an ER physician staying in an Atlanta hotel, reflects on the peculiarities of working in the American South. Set in cities where Atta has lived, Indigene leans into social criticism as it explores the dilemmas of these and other characters.

Lagos, January 1976, six years after the Nigerian Civil War. A new military regime has been in power for six months, but rumors are spreading that a countercoup is imminent. At an art exhibition in the affluent Ikoyi neighborhood, Remi Lawal, a Nigerian woman who runs her own greeting-card shop, meets Frances Cooke, who introduces herself as an American art dealer, in Nigeria to buy rare beads. They become friends and over the next few weeks confide in each other about their aspirations, loyalties, marriage, motherhood—and Nigeria itself, as hospitable Remi welcomes the enigmatic Frances into her world. Remi’s husband, Tunde, naturally suspects Frances—like any American in Lagos—of gathering intelligence for the CIA, yet she is unconvinced. Cynical about the country’s unending instability, and alienated by the shallowness of the city’s elite, she willingly shares her views with Frances. But the February 13 assassination of General Muhammed prompts Remi to reconsider one particular conversation with her new acquaintance in a different light. Her discouragement overcome by a reawakened sense of patriotism, she begins to doubt that the bead collector is who she claims to be. With her signature subtlety and wit, Sefi Atta examines a brief but profound friendship, and one Nigerian mother’s yearning—amid legacies of conflict and uncertainty—to help build her country from home.

It is 1971, a year after the Biafran War, and Nigeria is under military rule. The politics of the state matter less to eleven-year-old Enitan than whether her mother, now deeply religious since the death of Enitan’s brother, will allow her friendship with the new girl next door, the brash and beautiful Sheri Bakare. Everything Good Will Come charts the unusual friendship and fate of these two girls; one who is prepared to manipulate the traditional system and one who attempts to defy it. Enitan’s is the story of a fiercely intelligent, strong young woman coming of age in a culture that still insists on feminine submission. She sees the poverty and knows about the brutal military dictatorship but it is not until politics invades her own family that she defies her husband and moves from bystander to activist. She bucks the familial and political systems until she is confronted with the one desire that is too precious to forfeit in the name of personal freedom—her desire for a child. Sefi Atta is also author of The Bead Collector.

Now a Netflix original film, Swallow is brought to us from the award-winning author Sefi Atta In the 1980s in Lagos, the government's War Against Indiscipline and austerity measures are in full swing. A succession of unfortunate events leads Tolani, a bank secretary, to be persuaded by her roommate Rose to consider drug trafficking as a way to make a living. Tolani's subsequent struggle with temptation forces her to reconsider her morality--and that of her mother Arike's--as she embarks on a turbulent journey of self-discovery.