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In this book, there are questions
of identity. City of Memories explores the gap between individuality and
muddled self-personality. There is indeed a difference between the two. To
ascertain one’s individuality is to understand one’s self worth and weaknesses.
Aside the many minor stories hedging it, City of Memories delves into the tortuous journey of self-certainness. Swiftly, the reader is let into
the characters’ quests for completeness. The expository is rapid and the plot mesmerizes
in no time. It is never an easy following from the start, but with subsequent
flashbacks and the blending of the same into present occurrences, the reader
understands the conflicts.
Farouk’s love is rejected and
bedraggled. His attempt at resolving that puts him at risk. His journey of
discovery to Bolewa is not without some mixed dramas. He loves Rahila Pam. As
much as he searches for personal completeness, his finding will also set off inflammable
mysteries. Only at the end will the victims be known. From the start,
everybody’s balance is undetermined. There are secrets; stinking with worms. There
are also discoveries; hunting and scandalous. Shards of issues meld with other broad
concerns; the revealing of one becomes the evil of the other. City
of Memories is all-revolving. When the last page rustles, Faruk will
have love-hated and love-loved. And while the ghosts of horrible things breathe,
political scores will be bloodily settled.
For Eunice Pam and Ibrahim
Dabirama, theirs are familiar difference with their children as collateral
things. It is with them that memories are blackened. Usman and Ahmed are two
ill-assorted sides of startling memories back-dropping Ummi al-Qassim. The gory
politics played by common lives also comes up. The power-fight for the title of
the Guma of Fulani almost becomes a closure on the internecine war billowing in
the North. The decades' long conflict between Jos settlers and locals are as
well touched. The manner all these are reined in and interlaced with the main
story is laudable. Richard Ali’s masterly hold on the reader is clearly visible.
These brief reflective lines sum up the novel;
“The
difference between us, Faruk, and those we rule over is that we regularly go to
our cities of memory, not to live there, but to discover how things really are
before disintegration sets in – the ideal past is where we find the solutions
that help us each day that becomes our future”
***
Love-Hate
There is a reason behind every drawn
sword. Eunice Pam draws hers for maternal love. But there are also other
reasons why it must be sheathed; there are the helplessness of the weak and the
innocence of many. When the other reasons are neglected for the survival of the
singly loved, then the love is bestial. The relationship between Eunice Pam and
her daughter, Rahila Pam, cannot be properly placed. It is one with consequences
too disastrous. For the care of her daughter and the sustenance of her political
clout, Eunice Pam will run the extra devilish mileage. Her love drowns Rahila Pam
in mystery, leaving her stuck in the dilemma to requite her mother’s love or
scorn her heart, Faruk;
“My
mother engineered the uprising in the Benue. A hundred people died there…
because of me. She was jealous that I was in love… The motives are complex and
I do not understand them and really, I do not want to. ” (pg. 255)
Love is an awful split; a side of
it is labeled hate. Ummi al-Quassim experiences the other side of love and she
is doomed for posterity to unravel, or maybe for Faruk to discover.
A Study Case
Richard Ali’s perspective on
delicate matters is interesting. This book swirls discussions and struts with
them. In calculated drops, Ali artfully comments on some of the issues besieging the
country. Ali offers their possible causes. While you may take Ali up on some, few
are closer to the truth. For instance, the book would rather have us believe,
despite the complexity that is the Northern crises, that the Bigotry of religion
and the deceptiveness of the elites are the root causes of the Northern
carnages. Using Eunice Pam and Ibrahim
Dabirama, Ali portrays the manipulative tendency of the elites to maintain
their relevance. However, this is debatable when one considers that classes are
not stable and the crises in question have outspanned numerous stratifications
in the past.
***
Next Book; Ali Might
Do Better.
There is an urgent need to tell and balance so many things in this novel. This makes it cluttered up and the
reader is the worst for it. There is also a convulsion of too many things
breathing hard for expression. In cramming so many things together, some of the messages appear carelessly
skewed. If City of Memories were to be better written, it would be rid of those
things. The novel’s over grouchiness constrains it to handle matters that should not
ordinarily mingle. I can observe Ali’s thirsty need to dissect some matters and
offer the Northern view of it, even when that is not necessary. This is really
short of wit.
This novel dulls one's reading with
histories that never add any weight to the storyline. This book suffers greatly
from the hungry inclination to de-stereotype and straighten twisted stories bordered
on ethnicity, politics and religion. In the process of tackling, it mires
itself. That makes the narrative labored. The overreaching attempt to
rescue the telling with mashed-up flashbacks does also not help. Ali’s shoddy
use of flashbacks makes the book a labyrinth, you are easily lost in it. Though poorly
done, Richard Ali sustains the flashback technique to a reasonable extent. But
the sustaining leaves much to be desired in an artistic work as a novel.
Powerful use of imageries
enlivens words. It is not the words that speak, it is the images attached to
them that excite. Ali disappointed me on many pages. Descriptive words slurred
where I was expecting them to appeal to my imagination. They didn’t and I lost connection
with them. An instance out of many is on pg. 160;
“Rahila
would have never guessed that her mother’s revenge already lay concealed within
the pleasant mountains. In the weeks Rahila had spent in torment over whether
or not Faruk would return, Eunice Pam had scooped the mountain clean and placed
a charge of explosives there…”
Though City
of Memories showcases Ali’s ability to relate good tales, but for now,
Ali certainly
needs to hone upon some writing techniques. The use of effective imagery and
flashback are just some of them. Ali can do better next time.
Read this book. This is mine. My views. My shelf is growing. I am still reading. More books.