She Would Be King
Book Review #01
I read the title, then the summary on the back. That alone did not prepare me for the obsession I would have with this novel.
All I knew was that I wanted to read a book by an African author. Authors who aren’t mainstream. Authors whom I want the world to know their name.
This novel focuses on a retelling of Liberian history with each character being a representation of the different backgrounds of people that made up the country’s history. In doing so Moore even discovered documents from her own genealogy and in doing so she realized how much Liberian history is very much so American history as well. She incorporates the storytelling of her childhood into her debut novel.
The story is spoken in third person by a spirit who seems to be watching over all of characters throughout time. One may think of it as God, a feminine version of God. Guiding them with only a whisper each step of the journey and watching over them in uncertain times.
She Would Be King was all I craved even into the midnight hours. I’d wake from my sleep to read about the lives of three characters:
Gbessa, a native of the Vai tribe in Liberia
June Dey, a mysteriously born a slave in Virginia, USA
Norman Aragon, a biracial man who holds the love of the motherland from his mother, a Maroon of Jamaica, and the stigma of white skin from his father.
Born oceans apart, but once their paths cross, their lives as they once were are just memories of the past. Now the three must become one and decide what to do with their God given gifts to save a land of Africa that they have only heard of and for Gbessa, a land that has exiled her.
Between the three of them they learn that, as Zora Neale Hurston quotes ‘all my skin folk ain’t kin folk’. They realize that the battle to save the natives of blacks — Liberia — Africa isn’t just against the West but within the heart of Africa itself.
Quotes:
“We did not have books on Emerson. That place where we lost our language, lost ourselves. They told us we had no history but darkness, so they kept the books away for fear we might understand the truth better, and thus find those lost selves.”
“Alike spirits separated at great distances will always be bound to meet, even if only once; kindred souls will always collide; and strings of coincidences are never what they appear to be on the surface, but instead are the mask of God.“
“The girl with the biggest gift of us all. Life. If she was not a girl or if she was not a woman; if she was not a woman or if she was not a witch, she would be king,” I said.”
5/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
About the Author: Wayétu Moore
She is Liberian born and fled with her family to the USA with her family when she was five years old to escape the First Liberian Civil War. She is one of five siblings and in order to protect the children from the horrors of the war her grandmother and father used story telling in efforts to make sure their childhoods were not traumatically effected from the unrest of war. She created a nonprofit called ‘One More Book’ along with her siblings to ensure that areas with low literary rates are provided to children who aren’t accustomed to seeing characters that look like them in books.
She Would Be King was named a best book of 2018 by Publishers Weekly, Booklist & Entertainment Weekly. The novel was a Sarah Jessica Parker ALA Book Club selection, a BEA Buzz Panel Book, a #1 Indie Next Pick and a finalist for the Hurston/Wright Award. She also has a sophomore novel titled: The Dragons, The Giant, The Women.
*Additional Info:
Good review !
What a great idea. I started reading more African writing about 5 years ago but it isn’t always easy to find examples beyond commercial reading lists. Looking forward to new books, new names and some good reading.