Book
The Orchard of Lost Souls (2013) by Nadifa Mohamed: three women in Hargeysa, 1987
The Orchard of Lost Souls is the second novel by the Somali-British writer Nadifa Mohamed, published in 2013. It follows three women in Hargeysa in 1987 and 1988, as the war in the north begins: Deqo, a nine-year-old girl from a refugee camp; Kawsar, a widow; and Filsan, a young woman soldier. Their lives cross at the 21 October celebration of the 1969 coup.
The Orchard of Lost Souls
- Author
- Nadifa Mohamed
- Year
- 2013
- Publisher
- Farrar, Straus and Giroux (US edition)
- Language
- English
- Sources
- 7 sources
The book
The Orchard of Lost Souls is the second novel by Nadifa Mohamed, published in 2013 (Publishers Weekly; BookBrowse). In the same year the literary magazine Granta named her one of the Best of Young British Novelists (Gulf News).
The story
The novel opens in Hargeysa in 1987, on 21 October, the yearly celebration of the 1969 coup that brought the military government to power (Maclean's). Three women's lives cross that day (Gulf News):
- Deqo, a nine-year-old girl from a refugee camp.
- Kawsar, a widow who tries to save Deqo from a beating and is herself badly beaten.
- Filsan, a young woman soldier in the government army.
The book follows the three through the months before the war of 1988 in the north. The country's ruler appears in the novel as a fictional figure (Maclean's). The history behind it is on The Isaaq genocide, 1987 to 1989 and The Siad Barre era.
How it was received
Reviews were mixed. Publishers Weekly and Booklist gave it starred reviews, and one praised its "vibrant, evocative language and imagery"; the Financial Times wrote that the women were "lost" to the story's odd pace and its "many, many revelations" (BookBrowse, summary of reviews; Publishers Weekly). Somali readers and newspapers also reviewed it, including Somaliland Current (Somaliland Current).
It sits between her first novel, Black Mamba Boy (2010), and The Fortune Men (2021).
Where to read it
- Lending copy: Internet Archive
- In a library: WorldCat
Related pages
Sources
- Publishers Weekly · publishersweekly.com
- BookBrowse · bookbrowse.com
- Gulf News · gulfnews.com
- Maclean's · macleans.ca
- Somaliland Current · somalilandcurrent.com
- Internet Archive · archive.org
- WorldCat · search.worldcat.org
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More by this author
- The Fortune Men (2021) by Nadifa Mohamed: the story of Mahmood MattanNadifa Mohamed's The Fortune Men (2021): the true story of Mahmood Mattan, hanged in Cardiff in 1952 and cleared in 1998; Booker shortlist and reviews.
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