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pickachu780's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
usualjellyfish's review
medium-paced
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
misspalah's review against another edition
4.0
I seldom read short stories collection because it is usually left me dissatisfied with open ending or mediocre level writing stories in it. However, seeing this book in a shelves of a book store intrigued me to pick and bought it. I know nothing about Ghana and reading this may not illustrate 100% the people, culture or their country, but at least, I know a little bit about them. There are some of the stories that I can't shake them off right after finishing it, there are some I forgot about it after turning the next pages. 'The True Aryan' and 'The manhood test' , 'Mallam Sole' and 'faith' definitely made me urges myself to read faster because I wanted to know how the tales are going to end. Overall, this is an interesting read where the place setting in a book interchange frequently from Ghana to New York. The characters that featured in a book though majority is a Ghanaian, there are some new Yorkers and Armenian in it. I gave it 4 stars.
kfreedman's review against another edition
Awesome short stories about a fictional Zongo Street, a muslim neighborhood with lots of characters somewhere in Ghana.
shonatiger's review against another edition
4.0
A mostly very fun short story collection, with the strongest stories being the Zongo Street ones.
blacksentai's review against another edition
2.0
So this is a book of short stories, the first one I've come across on the shelf. I hope it isn't the last because I really like these. They're a breeze to read. The backbone to this entire book is that someone in the stories is probably from Ghana.
Anyway, this book is a mixed bag of goodies. Oh the whole, I enjoyed it. When the book is dealing with issues of race or colonialization or imperialism and religion, it's pretty on point. When the book touches on gender issues it's not as cohesive. That stuff clearly isn't the authors bag, but problems are problems.
So most of these short stories are very conversational. People talking about life and stuff. Since almost all the protagonists are men, you come across a few male gazey scenes. Those are whatever, and then there's the representation. We get the single moms and the mean women and the needy queen bee and the poor maid and the big fat ugly domineering wife.
Not all of these are 'negative' or intended to be that way, but there isn't the scholar or shop owner or leader to balance anything out, and the ones that are negative definitely get their full time.
The positives are that the stories are all generally well written, and the language is good. I feel that he's at his personal best doing the thoughtful conversation stuff (even though one of those stories goes off rails in the worst way possible). It's a quick read and if a story doesn't hit you in a page or two you miss nothing by hopping to the next one.
And the more I thought about it the more I changed my mind. The story Rachmaninov is so bad and so disgusting that it invalidates everything else this book tries to do.
Anyway, this book is a mixed bag of goodies. Oh the whole, I enjoyed it. When the book is dealing with issues of race or colonialization or imperialism and religion, it's pretty on point. When the book touches on gender issues it's not as cohesive. That stuff clearly isn't the authors bag, but problems are problems.
So most of these short stories are very conversational. People talking about life and stuff. Since almost all the protagonists are men, you come across a few male gazey scenes. Those are whatever, and then there's the representation. We get the single moms and the mean women and the needy queen bee and the poor maid and the big fat ugly domineering wife.
Not all of these are 'negative' or intended to be that way, but there isn't the scholar or shop owner or leader to balance anything out, and the ones that are negative definitely get their full time.
The positives are that the stories are all generally well written, and the language is good. I feel that he's at his personal best doing the thoughtful conversation stuff (even though one of those stories goes off rails in the worst way possible). It's a quick read and if a story doesn't hit you in a page or two you miss nothing by hopping to the next one.
And the more I thought about it the more I changed my mind. The story Rachmaninov is so bad and so disgusting that it invalidates everything else this book tries to do.
Spoiler
It's the story about how a dude rapes a woman to save her from dying from a bad high. Yup.josephfinn's review
3.0
It's about half and half for me, but there are some real gems scattered in this collection of stories. In particular, the final two stories are wonderful. (Fair warning, there's an instance of date rape in one story about halfway through.)
literaryinfatuation's review
5.0
One of the excuses for works of fiction failing to represent women accurately or portray strong female characters is that either in that period of history women were sidelined or that in such culture women have traditional gender roles which keep them backstage. I am never really convinced by those are arguments. A story is all about how you tell it, how you spin it; and there has always been powerful, encouraging women around shaping their communities. This is something that really surprised me from “The Prophet of Zongo Street” by Mohammed Naseehu Ali. It’s a collection of short stories centering around a fictitious street in a city in Ghana, where most inhabitants are Hausa, Muslim, struggling to get by and with minimal education. Syncretism between Islam and traditional beliefs is common. Women bear the burden of the household and raising numerous children. And yet, every story defies stereotypes in its depiction of women. Every story has a strong women at the front. And they are quite diverse, from stories about the creation of the world, a Ghanaian painter trying to make it in NYC, a nightmare-like depiction of the Day of Judgement, a man who has to prove to court he is not impotent, and a man who was the joke of town until his wife changed his life around. It is probably the best collection of short stories I’ve read in a really long time and I can’t recommended it enough.
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