Others: Positive In the far reaches of northwestern Nigeria, Dantala lives among a gang of street boys that are paid by the Small Party to cause trouble during the election. When their attempt to burn down the opposition's headquarters ends in disaster, Dantala must run for his life, leaving his best friend behind. He ends up at a mosque in a motor park where he soon becomes a favored apprentice to the mosque's Sheikh. He is assigned a roommate name Jibril, and a friendship develops as the boys trade language skills -- Dantala's Arabic for Jibril's English. But when one of the Sheikh's closest advisors begins to raise his own radical movement, Dantala finds himself faced with a terrible conflict of loyalties. As bloodshed erupts in the city around him, he must decide what kind of Muslim -- and what kind of man -- he wants to be.
Lists: …
Crystal Wilkinson
2002 · 179 pages · 1 review
Others: Positive"Water Street examines the secret lives of neighbors and friends who live on Water Street in small town in Kentucky"--P. 2 of jacket.
What made the match, strongest first
Attica Locke
2019 · 294 pages · 2 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positive"9-year-old Levi King knew he should have left for home sooner; now he's alone in the darkness of vast Caddo Lake, in a boat whose motor just died. A sudden noise distracts him - and all goes dark. Darren Mathews is trying to emerge from another kind of darkness; after the events of his previous investigation, his marriage is in a precarious state of re-building, and his career and reputation lie in the hands of his mother, who's never exactly had his best interests at heart. Now she holds the key to his freedom, and she's not above a little maternal blackmail to press her advantage. An unlikely possibility of rescue arrives in the form of a case down Highway 59, in a small lakeside town where the local economy thrives on nostalgia for ante-bellum Texas - and some of the era's racial attitudes still thrive as well. Levi's disappearance has links to Darren's last case, and to a wealthy businesswoman, the boy's grandmother, who seems more concerned about the fate of her business than that of her grandson. Darren has to battle centuries-old suspicions and prejudices, as well as threats that have been reignited in the current political climate, as he races to find the boy, and to save himself."--Provided by publisher.
What made the match, strongest first
Tarquin Hall
2009 · 320 pages · 1 review
Others: PositiveLight-hearted cosy mystery set in Gurgaon and Lutyens's New Delhi. Satiric but kind.
What made the match, strongest first
Lily Anderson
2018 · 305 pages · 1 review
Others: PositiveLanguage/Content. A teen girl investigates the suspicious deaths of three classmates and accidentally ends up bringing them back to life to form a hilariously unlikely--and unwilling--vigilante girl gang.
Roxane Gay
2014 · 384 pages · 3 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positiveMireille Duval Jameson is living a fairy tale. The strong-willed youngest daughter of one of Haiti’s richest sons, she has an adoring husband, a precocious infant son, by all appearances a perfect life. The fairy tale ends one day when Mireille is kidnapped in broad daylight by a gang of heavily armed men, in front of her father’s Port au Prince estate. Held captive by a man who calls himself The Commander, Mireille waits for her father to pay her ransom. As it becomes clear her father intends to resist the kidnappers, Mireille must endure the torments of a man who resents everything she represents. An Untamed State is a novel of privilege in the face of crushing poverty, and of the lawless anger that corrupt governments produce. It is the story of a wilful woman attempting to find her way back to the person she once was, and of how redemption is found in the most unexpected of places. An Untamed State establishes Roxane Gay as a writer of prodigious, arresting talent.
What made the match, strongest first
Gabriel Tallent
2017 · 459 pages · 4 reviews
Others: Overwhelmingly positive"Turtle Alveston is a survivor. At fourteen, she roams the woods along the northern California coast. The creeks, tide pools, and rocky islands are her haunts and her hiding grounds, and she is known to wander for miles. But while her physical world is expansive, her personal one is small and treacherous: Turtle has grown up isolated since the death of her mother, in the thrall of her tortured and charismatic father, Martin. Her social existence is confined to the middle school (where she fends off the interest of anyone, student or teacher, who might penetrate her shell) and to her life with her father. Then Turtle meets Jacob, a high-school boy who tells jokes, lives in a big clean house, and looks at Turtle as if she is the sunrise. And for the first time, the larger world begins to come into focus: her life with Martin is neither safe nor sustainable. Motivated by her first experience with real friendship and a teenage crush, Turtle starts to imagine escape, using the very survival skills her father devoted himself to teaching her."--
What made the match, strongest first
Loved itI read this book when it came out, I think it was two or three years ago and loved it, gave it five stars, read it again last year, loved it again, gave it five stars. This book really basically talks about the development of Islamic fundamentalism in a small town in northern Nigeria.
