An African Looks at Africa

by John F. Baker -- Publishers Weekly, 8/23/2004

Ken Wiwa is the son of the celebrated Nigerian environmental activist and rebel Ken Saro-Wiwa, who paid with his life for his resistance—he was hanged, on government orders, in his jail cell. Young Wiwa, who lives in Canada, has already written a memoir of his famous father, In The Shadow of a Saint, and now Penguin Canada chief David Davidar has signed him to write a wide-ranging book about contemporary Africa and the ways in which Wiwa thinks it has lost its way. The author will travel all over the continent examining the current regimes for a book he plans to call Last Train to Azania: Africa at the End of History. Davidar bought the book for Canadian, U.K. and Commonwealth rights from Toronto agent Ashton Westwood of Westwood Creative and will publish, simultaneously with Penguin U.K., in fall 2006.