Harare Voices and Beyond

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As I think about that, I realise that perhaps, a big take away from this novel is the author’s ability (which may surprise Muponde) to skillfully showcase and dramatize to the reader that the land reform in Zimbabwe has its sharp and irreconcilable contradictions. There are many versions of the land reform story of Zimbabwe, depending on who is telling which part of the broad story, where… and who is listening! Harare Voices and Beyond delves into the racial politics and turmoil that consumes life in Zimbabwe. It explores the drug addiction, abuse, grief, and loss that festers due to the political chaos that influences a majority of the characters’ life’s and decisions. I think this book would be a good fit for you if you like experiencing parts of other cultures. I don’t think you should read it if talks of abuse or drug use or self harm will trigger you.

Harare Voices and Beyondgets me to a point where I say to myself, “No one has the right to really judge another’s actions.”Because, when it comes right down to it, while Julian easily lends himself to judgement for hurting himself, his brother, still holding on to his dignity, is hurting others for his own profit. When you judge the two, it turns out not to be what it seemed. This is a detective story with no detectives. It is more like Doris Lessing’s The Grass is Singing and Ngugi wa Thiongo’s A Grain of Wheat in that the guilty is always in your midst, helping you solve the crime but making sure the criminal is not easily found. In the end you appreciate both the crime and the cause of the crime. You see that the criminal is an ordinary man who is driven over the precipice by irreparable generational loss. This is a deft work of art. What happens in Zimbabwe is essentially stripping one race of control and putting in a detached elite who makes no real change, just more damage Fari’s reverse trip is a story about the human body, a tight memory test and a duel between geography and anticipation…This story is based on the troubled lives of a white commercial farming family who dramatically lose both their very active father and their farm in Mazowe to jambanja. The term jambanja means fast and sometimes dramatic activity, which became the other term for the recent occupations of white farms.

Andrew Chatora presents a layered look on Zimbabwe's turbulent 2000s, from the perspective of the super-rich and/ or wildly corrupt to the disadvantaged and disenfranchised. Harare Voices and Beyond tells the stories of the predator, the prey and everyone else in-between. I also found some of the chapters confusing because it would switch between characters’ POV without always putting the name of the character at the top of the chapter so that you would know who is telling the story now. So you would think you were reading the mom’s story, Doris, POV but then you’d actually be in Rhys’ POV. Harare Voices and Beyondis an enlightened piece of literature, significantly beyond what we are currently reading about race relations. Finally, a book comes in which all points of view are shared, where the question is presented, “What do we do to rehabilitate race relations?” story about loss and strife in post independent Zimbabwe. This is a detective story with no detectives. It is more like Doris Lessing’s The Grass is Singing and Ngugi wa Thiongo’s A Grain of Wheat in that the guilty is always in your midst, helping you solve the crime but making sure the criminal is not easily found. In the end you appreciate both the crime and the cause of the crime. You see that the criminal is an ordinary man who is driven over the precipice by irreparable generational loss. This is a deft work of art. ─ Memory Chirere, University of Zimbabwe Andrew Chatora’s debut novella, Diaspora Dreams (2021), was approvingly received and nominated for the National Arts Merit Awards (2022).

Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror: Fluid identities – life beyond virtual reality

A drunken confession exposes a dark family secret. Rhys appears to have it all. A white Zimbabwean living in affluent Borrowdale Brooke area he gets involved in a freak traffic accident. Therein unfolds a confession which unleashes a cathartic chain of events in the family’s hitherto well-choreographed life, a family whose lived experience becomes microcosmic and an eye opener to Zimbabwe’s seemingly closed, forgotten, white minority community. David Chasumba’s The Mad Man of First Street and Other Short Stories heralds the emergence of a refreshing and pertinent voice on the Zimbabwean and diaspora literary landscape. A wonderful read Chasumba’s prose is engaging with its empathetic charac David Chasumba’s The Mad Man of First Street and Other Short Stories heralds the emergence of a refreshing and pertinent voice on the Zimbabwean and diaspora literary landscape. A wonderful read Chasumba’s prose is engaging with its empathetic characters. Harare Voices and Beyond is an enlightened piece of literature, significantly beyond what we are currently reading about race relations. Finally, a book comes in which all points of view are shared, where the question is presented, “What do we do to rehabilitate race relations?” Daring. Harare Voices & Beyond is full of intrigue and brutality. An unflinching portrait of broken families and a broken society.” Told through multiple perspectives of young adults and grownups, Harare Voices & Beyond offers a masterful exploration of what happens when family bonds become frayed, society fails its citizenry coupled with a hegemonic class bent on primitive accumulation at the expense of its citizens. It is a poignant read which poses difficult questions.