Theft by Abdul Razzaq Gurnah Audiobook Review – A Coming-of-age Saga in Tanzania | Abdul Razzaq Qurna

TNobel Prize-winning author Abdul Razak Gurnah is known for his depictions of East Africans and the effects of colonial rule. His eleventh novel, The Robbery, opens in Zanzibar in the wake of independence, and spans half a century as it documents the lives of Karim, Fawzia, and Badr. We learn how young Karim is treated by his mother, Raya, who has divorced her much older husband and left her son behind to start a new life.

Mother and son were reunited several years later in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, where Raya married a pharmacist named Haji. Karim, who grows up to be handsome, intelligent and a bit arrogant, gets a scholarship to study in the city and meets Fouzia, who is training to become a teacher and is keen to avoid the fate of another “silent daughter”.[s] “Equipped for defloration.” She and Karim married, and the couple opened their home to Badr, a former servant of Raya and Haji who was abandoned by his parents when he was a child.

Actor Ashley Zangazha is the narrator of this intimate drama about interconnected lives, his reading deftly moving between the contrasting voices and the inner lives of the main characters. A bombshell drops in their midst in the form of an English NGO director who catches Karim’s attention, culminating in a dramatic finale. Although we are attentive to the heroes’ flaws and idiosyncrasies, the heist emphasizes how broader events, past and present, have affected all of their lives.

Available via Bloomsbury, 9 hours 49 minutes

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