Exploding with color and energy, The Old Drift is a testament to our yearning to create and cross borders, and a meditation on the slow, grand passage of time. As the generations pass, their lives – their triumphs, errors, losses and hopes – form a symphony about what it means to be human.įrom a woman covered with hair and another plagued with endless tears, to forbidden love affairs and fiery political ones, to homegrown technological marvels like Afronauts, microdrones and viral vaccines – this gripping, unforgettable novel sweeps over the years and the globe, subverting expectations along the way. This sets off a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families (black, white, brown) as they collide and converge over the course of the century, into the present and beyond. Clark, foggy with fever, makes a mistake that entangles the fates of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy.

Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize 2019. In 1904, in a smoky room at the hotel across the river, an Old Drifter named Percy M. Clarke Award 2020 by Serpell, Namwali at .uk - ISBN 10: 1781090491 - ISBN 13: 9781781090497 - Hogarth - 2019 - Hardcover. The tale? A playful panorama of history, fairytale, romance and science fiction.

Here begins the epic story of a small African nation, told by a mysterious swarm-like chorus that calls itself man’s greatest nemesis. On the banks of the Zambezi River, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls, there was once a colonial settlement called The Old Drift. An electrifying debut from the winner of the 2015 Caine Prize for African writing, The Old Drift is the Great Zambian Novel you didn’t know you were waiting for

The old drift a novel