Allow me to introduce you to two translated novels with a supernatural element, albeit less central to the story in the second. Both also give a nod to mental health issues linked to criminality: via one of the off-stage characters in Norma; a neurological disorder thought to be Korsakoff syndrome for the unfortunate narrator of Black Moses. Plus a return to Carrot Ranch Flash Fiction Challenge. For another novel with a supernatural element, see my review of A Jigsaw of Fire and Stars.
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Norma by Sofi Okansen translated by Owen F Witesman
When her mother jumps in front of a train in the Helsinki Metro, Norma’s hair tells her it wasn’t suicide. That’s right, her hair! Since childhood, Norma and her mother have guarded the secret of her supernatural hair – hair that recognises her emotions and those of others; luxuriant hair that coils and curls, and grows so fast it needs cutting a couple of times a day – so Norma, a social isolate in her mid-thirties, has reason to miss her mother more than most. But as she delves into the circumstances surrounding her mother’s death, she discovers her own hair is implicated beyond her wildest imaginings, as she becomes embroiled in a Mafia-style family business on the darker side of hair extensions and rent-a-womb surrogacy.
What bothered me about this novel was less the magic-realism element (although I’m not a big fan, the sheer zaniness of this one appealed), but that most of the story is related at a distance, offstage or in the past, such that, despite the intriguing plot, I didn’t really engage. But there’s no doubting that Sofi Okansen’s third novel is novel and radically different from her previous When the Doves Disappeared and I also welcomed the chance to read a novel with, like Liesel in my second novel, Underneath, a woman with Pre-Raphaelite hair. Thanks to Atlantic Books for my advance proof copy.
What bothered me about this novel was less the magic-realism element (although I’m not a big fan, the sheer zaniness of this one appealed), but that most of the story is related at a distance, offstage or in the past, such that, despite the intriguing plot, I didn’t really engage. But there’s no doubting that Sofi Okansen’s third novel is novel and radically different from her previous When the Doves Disappeared and I also welcomed the chance to read a novel with, like Liesel in my second novel, Underneath, a woman with Pre-Raphaelite hair. Thanks to Atlantic Books for my advance proof copy.
Black Moses by Alain Mabanckou translated by Helen Stevenson
It's 1970, and in the People's Republic of Congo a Marxist-Leninist revolution is ushering in a new age. But over at the orphanage on the outskirts of Pointe-Noire where young Moses has grown up, the revolution has only strengthened the reign of terror of Dieudonné Ngoulmoumako, the institution's corrupt director.
So Moses escapes to Pointe-Noire, where he finds a home with a larcenous band of Congolese Merry Men and among the Zairian prostitutes of the Trois-Cents quarter. But the authorities won't leave Moses in peace, and intervene to chase both the Merry Men and the Trois-Cents girls out of town. All this injustice pushes poor Moses over the edge. Could he really be the Robin Hood of the Congo? Or is he just losing his marbles?
Black Moses is a larger-than-life comic tale of a young man obsessed with helping the helpless in an unjust world. It is also a vital new extension of Mabanckou's extraordinary, interlinked body of work dedicated to his native Congo, and confirms his status as one of our great storytellers.
Not my words, I’m afraid, but the publisher’s blurb that made me think I’d like it, pasted here because I can’t construct a narrative out of the book I actually read. It started well, with some vivid scenes illustrating the highlight of the orphans’ week with the arrival of a priest to teach them a new song and dance in which they can forget the cruelties and deprivations of the regime. All that comes to a halt with the communist revolution. Despite this, and half the book set in the orphanage, I didn’t get a strong sense of the children’s lives. Instead, we dip into the back stories of the adults just before they leave the stage. And the escape, which is one of the novel’s main events, happens across only five and a bit pages, with no foreshadowing I noticed, significantly reducing narrative tension. Elsewhere, there is a pattern of events occurring seemingly haphazardly, and subsequently being explained, as if the story is moving backwards. I do appreciate that it’s meant to be satire but it didn’t work for me.
Thanks to Serpent’s Tail for my review copy. Maybe I just wasn’t in the right mood.
So Moses escapes to Pointe-Noire, where he finds a home with a larcenous band of Congolese Merry Men and among the Zairian prostitutes of the Trois-Cents quarter. But the authorities won't leave Moses in peace, and intervene to chase both the Merry Men and the Trois-Cents girls out of town. All this injustice pushes poor Moses over the edge. Could he really be the Robin Hood of the Congo? Or is he just losing his marbles?
Black Moses is a larger-than-life comic tale of a young man obsessed with helping the helpless in an unjust world. It is also a vital new extension of Mabanckou's extraordinary, interlinked body of work dedicated to his native Congo, and confirms his status as one of our great storytellers.
Not my words, I’m afraid, but the publisher’s blurb that made me think I’d like it, pasted here because I can’t construct a narrative out of the book I actually read. It started well, with some vivid scenes illustrating the highlight of the orphans’ week with the arrival of a priest to teach them a new song and dance in which they can forget the cruelties and deprivations of the regime. All that comes to a halt with the communist revolution. Despite this, and half the book set in the orphanage, I didn’t get a strong sense of the children’s lives. Instead, we dip into the back stories of the adults just before they leave the stage. And the escape, which is one of the novel’s main events, happens across only five and a bit pages, with no foreshadowing I noticed, significantly reducing narrative tension. Elsewhere, there is a pattern of events occurring seemingly haphazardly, and subsequently being explained, as if the story is moving backwards. I do appreciate that it’s meant to be satire but it didn’t work for me.
Thanks to Serpent’s Tail for my review copy. Maybe I just wasn’t in the right mood.
 | After October’s contests, the 99-word story challenge is back, this time to write about a chair on a porch. My effort shows I’ve got a bit rusty, but I have managed to draw on both these novels. The hair connection to Norma will be obvious; watching spinach grow is a nod to Black Moses. |
Supernatural hair
The chair creaks like old knees, as it rock-a-bye-babys me back and forth, the gentle rhythm drowning my so-much-to-do. Pushed back and farther back, beyond the patio, the rose garden, the vegetable plot. Responsibility retreats beyond the fence, the neighbours’ house, the town. Over fields onto moors and farther, to where the land meets the sea. I could sit and rock and watch the spinach grow.
A clock chimes the work hour. Reluctantly, I rise. And stall. My head jerked back, chairbound by ropes of tangled hair. My supernatural hair knows my needs better than my brain.
The chair creaks like old knees, as it rock-a-bye-babys me back and forth, the gentle rhythm drowning my so-much-to-do. Pushed back and farther back, beyond the patio, the rose garden, the vegetable plot. Responsibility retreats beyond the fence, the neighbours’ house, the town. Over fields onto moors and farther, to where the land meets the sea. I could sit and rock and watch the spinach grow.
A clock chimes the work hour. Reluctantly, I rise. And stall. My head jerked back, chairbound by ropes of tangled hair. My supernatural hair knows my needs better than my brain.
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