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The God Child cover art

The God Child

By: Nana Oforiatta Ayim
Narrated by: Adjoa Andoh
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Summary

Bloomsbury presents The God Child by Nana Oforiatta Ayim, read by Adjoa Andoh.

Maya grows up in Germany knowing that her parents are different: from one another, and from the rest of the world. Her reserved, studious father is distant; and her beautiful, volatile mother is a whirlwind, with a penchant for lavish shopping sprees and a mesmerising power for spinning stories of the family’s former glory - of what was had, and what was lost.

And then Kojo arrives one Christmas, like an annunciation: Maya’s cousin, and her mother’s godson. Kojo has a way with words - a way of talking about Ghana, and empire, and what happens when a country’s treasures are spirited away by colonialists. For the first time, Maya has someone who can help her understand why exile has made her parents the way they are. But then Maya and Kojo are separated, shuttled off to school in England, where they come face to face with the maddening rituals of Empire.

Returning to Ghana as a young woman, Maya is reunited with her powerful but increasingly troubled cousin. Her homecoming will set off an exorcism of their family and country’s strangest, darkest demons. It is in this destruction’s wake that Maya realises her own purpose: to tell the story of her mother, her cousin, their land and their loss, on her own terms, in her own voice.

©2019 Nana Oforiatta Ayim (P)2020 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Critic reviews

"Meditative, gestural, philosophic: a brave reinvention of the immigrant narrative...Unprecedented." (Taiye Selasi)

"I read this novel very slowly. I didn't want to miss anything...It is a rich, beautiful book and when I got to the end, I wanted to start again." (Chibundu Onuzo)

What listeners say about The God Child

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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A multi faceted, and complex story

I loved the authors use of language and descriptive detail. Maya the God Child is an intriguing and sometimes an annoying character as all God Children are. Adjoa's performance was decent but as a Ghanaian I felt disappointed in her Twi accent. Overall, a well worth read and listen.

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  • Overall
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Much as I wanted it to - it didn't engage me

I'm about half way through this book and about to return it. the story leaps about geographically but characters reveal parts of the plot casually as if the reader should have known them all along. This feels as though you've missed huge chunks of the text when you haven't. Add to that a feeling of slowness getting to the point and there's a strange feeling of it being both too fast and too slow.

the narration is fantastic, particularly the characterisations. But ultimately this felt like many books I've read before and not truly loved and not worth struggling through. So sadly I'm returning it. I'll watch for other things by this narrator though

**Decided to read to the end - totally not worth it, the story putters out and ends with that flat feeling of a story that went nowhere and time wasted with these characters. The book does conjure the feeling of movement, heat and light confusion of being slightly apart in africa. but the sum is not more than the parts. Skip, unless you're a huge fan of the author or a ghana literature completist.

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