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"* 'A novel remarkable for its slowed, measured pulse and its calm analysis, its keenness to promise hope and rehabilitation even after the worst' Ali Smith, Guardian * 'A courageous look at what happens to those expendable children...spirited, sometimes beautiful writing' Ruth Pavey, Independent * 'The civil war in Sierra Leone provides the horrific backdrop in Delia Jarrett-Macauley's debut...her understated prose a foil to the bleak and disturbing subject matter...Jarrett-Macauley sensitively establishes Julia's family as a microcosm of the ruptured nation' Literary Review * 'Lucidly written, the simple horror of peoples' lives comes trickling out over cups of stewed tea and bubbling pots of rice' Big Issue"
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When Julia flies in to war-scarred Sierra Leone from London, she is apprehensive about seeing her uncle Moses for the first time in twenty years. But nothing could have prepared her for her encounter with her eight-year-old cousin, Citizen, a former child soldier, and for the shocking truth of what he has done. Driven by a desire to understand Citizen, Julia takes the disturbed child into the 'bush'. There they meet other child soldiers, and a storyteller, Bemba G., who provides a safe haven for them all and strives to return them to childhood through play, love, story-telling and performance. As Julia gradually rediscovers Africa, the different generations of her family rediscover their bonds. And then Bemba G. directs the child soldiers in a version of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, with powerful effect.
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Vultures appeared in the skies, croaked and exited to hover with other gods. Read the first page
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Vultures appeared in the skies, croaked and exited to hover with other gods. Read the first page
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Format:Paperback
Moses, Citizen and Me is a story about the lasting impact of war as felt through a family dealing -or struggling to deal- with the discovery that their grandmother was killed by her 8 year old grandson named Citizen. Moses, the grandfather, is barely able to communicate when Julia arrives from her home in London having been sent for by his neighbour.
Julia is the `Me' of the title and the teller of the story as it unfolds. The story is interspersed with italicised dream-like paragraphs as if written by an invisible narrator who helps provide another layer for the reader to contemplate (and baffles us too). We learn about Moses and Julia through flashbacks and follow her thoughts and responses as she begins to unravel what has happened to Citizen.
Julia's journey leads to the Gola forest where she meets other children like Citizen and hears their stories with the help of Bemba G, a storyteller. His job is `to tell them stories and when they are ready... they will tell their own.' And so begin the stories we never like to hear: of children `shooting all over the place' fuelled with drugs and even gunpowder. With time the children are able to act and find purpose and relevance in performing Julius Caesar. Similar events including the killing of family members, maiming and rape by child soldiers did take place during the nation's 10 year civil war and drama was also used in trauma healing programmes.
Julia takes us from the familiarity of Heathrow airport to Freetown and to a Sierra Leone we rarely hear about in the news media: one which provides us with a context to the atrocities which were committed during the 10 year civil war yet still leaves us facing the question of Why? At times surreal, at times documentary, this novel feels like a biography yet manages to fictionalise a history of civil war. It crosses time and continents and is both a family story and a call for healing through theatre. It is a book which makes demands of the reader to face a reality we often ignore, and to consider how change and transformation might just be possible.
Julia is the `Me' of the title and the teller of the story as it unfolds. The story is interspersed with italicised dream-like paragraphs as if written by an invisible narrator who helps provide another layer for the reader to contemplate (and baffles us too). We learn about Moses and Julia through flashbacks and follow her thoughts and responses as she begins to unravel what has happened to Citizen.
Julia's journey leads to the Gola forest where she meets other children like Citizen and hears their stories with the help of Bemba G, a storyteller. His job is `to tell them stories and when they are ready... they will tell their own.' And so begin the stories we never like to hear: of children `shooting all over the place' fuelled with drugs and even gunpowder. With time the children are able to act and find purpose and relevance in performing Julius Caesar. Similar events including the killing of family members, maiming and rape by child soldiers did take place during the nation's 10 year civil war and drama was also used in trauma healing programmes.
Julia takes us from the familiarity of Heathrow airport to Freetown and to a Sierra Leone we rarely hear about in the news media: one which provides us with a context to the atrocities which were committed during the 10 year civil war yet still leaves us facing the question of Why? At times surreal, at times documentary, this novel feels like a biography yet manages to fictionalise a history of civil war. It crosses time and continents and is both a family story and a call for healing through theatre. It is a book which makes demands of the reader to face a reality we often ignore, and to consider how change and transformation might just be possible.
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