For everything there is a book. And, to be sure, there are many novels that describe horrendous events and tell tales of abuse and atrocity. Few are as heartbreaking and sad as the tales told by Uwem Akpan in his debut 
All the stories focus on the lives of African children. All are sad or worse. Terrible. Barbaric. Appalling. As the narrator in one of the stories, “Fattening for Gabon”, laconically observes: “Selling your child or nephew could be more difficult than selling other kids.” Then he goes on to describe how he experienced being sold as a slave by a family member.
Uwem Akpan is a Nigerian Jesuit priest with an MFA in creative writing from the University of Michigan. He has seen and experienced. And he has the ability to communicate vividly. He gives us glimpses of lives lived in extreme circumstances, that I – and I assume most readers along with me – know nothing about, that are compelling to the extreme.
There are five tales. Two of them are novella length. They are all told with the uninhibited, truth-filled voices of the children involved. Each one takes place in a different African country. They all bear witness to the fact that possibly the biggest challenge for children in parts of Africa is to stay alive. And they make us see, perhaps all too well, if that is possible, what many of them have endured to achieve that feat. The stories in Say You’re One of Them are tales of prostitution, selling of children, violence, poverty, theft and Sharia law, racial conflict, murder, and more.
These are not easy stories to read – there are details in these texts that are gruesome to the point of causing distress and rendering your mind numb. The final story, “My Parents’ Bedroom,” is about rape, ethnic cleansing, family members hunting one another, and a parental bloodbath. “Say you’re one of them,” the phrase that has given name to the book, is from this story. It is the command given by a very desperate Rwandan Tutsi mother to her Hutu-fathered child as machete-wielding killers approach their house.
The book is extremely well written, has a lot of dramatic intensity and tells the stories in a way that convinces me that they are real. You will find that no hiding place is good enough with these stories battering at your mind and heart. Something like this collection of short stories only comes around once in a rare while. It is a passionate book that seeks to enlighten us about the situation children of Africa. Seize the opportunity and pain! It is a powerful lesson from a unique pastor. Say You’re One of Them is an important book that leaves an impression!
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