Title: A Moonless, Starless Sky: Ordinary Men and Women Fighting Extremism in Africa

Author: Alexis Okeowo

Genre: Non-Fiction

Publisher: Hachette Books

Format: Paperback, Advanced Readers Copy    

Pages: 256

Rating: 5/5 stars

Synopsis (Goodreads):

In the tradition of Behind the Beautiful Forevers and Nothing to Envy, this is a masterful, humane work of literary journalism by New Yorker staff writer Alexis Okeowo–a vivid narrative of Africans, many of them women, who are courageously resisting their continent’s wave of fundamentalism.

In A Moonless, Starless Sky Okeowo weaves together four narratives that form a powerful tapestry of modern Africa: a young couple, kidnap victims of Joseph Kony’s LRA; a Mauritanian waging a lonely campaign against modern-day slavery; a women’s basketball team flourishing amid war-torn Somalia; and a vigilante who takes up arms against the extremist group Boko Haram. This debut book by one of America’s most acclaimed young journalists illuminates the inner lives of ordinary people doing the extraordinary–lives that are too often hidden, underreported, or ignored by the rest of the world.

Review:

Thank you so much to @hachettebooks for sending me this book! I absolutely loved it!

The book is a work of nonfiction by Alexis Okeowo, who went to Africa and met all these interesting people fighting extremism in Africa. The book follows four different events: a couple in Uganda who were kidnapping victims of Joseph Kony’s LRA, a man in Mauritania fighting to abolish slavery in his country, two people in Nigeria affected by Boko Haram, and a young woman playing basketball in Somalia, even though her life is threatened. Reading about how these people have fought for justice in their own country, and their terrible experiences is a real eye-opener into how little we know of what goes on in Africa and how little the media covers it. Okeowo writes in a beautiful and descriptive way so that the ready is along for an intense ride!

I was completely hooked from the preface, as Okeowo writes, “The four stories in A Moonless, Starless Sky all deal, in some way, with extremism within Christianity and Islam. But there are many types of extremism, in the spheres of gender and sexuality, nationalism, and race.” She then goes on to describe the importance of keeping in mind that the men and women fighting back are doing so within their own religion, for their own beliefs. She also discusses in the prequel how she has also had a run in with racism and extremism, while living in the Southern United States. Okeowo paints a beautiful and real picture that many people have experienced some forms of extremism, yet the stories in Africa are less known.

I highly recommend this book!

Happy reading!