12 books about Africa to read before traveling there

Written by: Humphrey N. Ndara, Local Expert

Africa is a continent of such stark contrasts, vibrant culture, and seething emotions, that it is no wonder it has produced so many wonderful writers. From South Africa to Ghana, Nigeria to Kenya and everything in between, following are some of the most interesting and inspiring books to read before you visit enchanting Africa

1. The Perfect Nine by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o

The first book written in an indigenous African language to be long-listed for the International Booker Prize, The Perfect Nine tells the story of the founding of the Gĩkũyũ people of Kenya. Blending folklore, mythology, adventure, and allegory, the book chronicles the efforts the Gĩkũyũ founders make to find partners for their ten exquisite daughters, called “The Perfect Nine,” and the challenges they set for the 99 suitors who seek their hands in marriage.

2. Unbowed by Wangari Maathai

The first book written in an indigenous African language to be long-listed for the International Booker Prize, The Perfect Nine tells the story of the founding of the Gĩkũyũ people of Kenya. Blending folklore, mythology, adventure, and allegory, the book chronicles the efforts the Gĩkũyũ founders make to find partners for their ten exquisite daughters, called “The Perfect Nine,” and the challenges they set for the 99 suitors who seek their hands in marriage.

3. The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuscinski

In 1957, Ryszard Kapuscinski arrived in Africa to chronicle the beginning of the end of colonial rule as the first African correspondent for Poland’s state newspaper. From independence in Ghana to the genocide in Rwanda, Kapuscinski travels the continent chasing the tumult that followed liberation. What emerges is an astounding portrait of Africa–not as a cluster of geographic locations–but as a jubilant tapestry of peoples, cultures, and encounters.

4. Born Free by Joy Adamson

The true story of a lion cub in transition between the captivity in which she is raised and the wilderness to which she is returned to in Kenya. Joy Adamson’s remarkable tale is iconic, and one which is especially poignant in today’s climate of development and encroachment. Adamson’s photographs illustrate the story throughout this heartwarming story of the love between man and animal.

5. The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born by Ayi Kwei Armah

A satire about Kwame Nkrumah’s regime and the period following Ghanaian independence in the 1960s, The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Bornis stands with Things Fall Apart as one of the great works of post-colonial African literature. It’s told from the point of view of a railway clerk in Ghana who holds out against the pressures that lure him toward corruption.

6. West with the Night by Beryl Markham

In a letter he wrote to his editor Maxwell Perkins after reading West with the Night, Ernest Hemingway said of Beryl Markham, “I knew her fairly well in Africa and never would have suspected that she could and would put pen to paper except to write in her flyer’s log book. As it is, she has written so well, and marvelously well, that I was completely ashamed of myself as a writer. I felt that I was simply a carpenter with words, picking up whatever was furnished on the job and sometimes making an okay pig pen… [she] can write rings around all of us who consider ourselves as writers.”

Enough said on this absolutely luminous work of memoir about a female pilot’s escapades across an early 20th century Africa

7. The Tree Where Man Was Born by Peter Matthiessen

This is a classic portrait of East Africa, gripping in its detail on nature and daily life. The book includes the Maasai, Ngorongoro Crater, the Kenyan highlands and the author’s field trips, safaris and adventures in the Serengeti.

8. Long Walk to Freedom

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela tells the extraordinary story of his life — an epic of struggle, setback, renewed hope, and ultimate triumph in this epic autobiography. One of the great leaders of his time, an international hero whose lifelong dedication to the fight against racial oppression in South Africa won him the Nobel Peace Prize and the presidency of his country, the journey recounts his triumphant release in 1990 from more than a quarter-century of imprisonment as he moves South Africa toward multiracial government and majority rule.

9. Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee

Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, South African writer J.M. Coetzee depicts the violence of post-apartheid South Africa in this harrowing story of a university professor’s life on his daughter’s farm in the Eastern Cape where he decamps after being fired for having an affair. Here, he confronts life on life’s terms after a savage attack in which his daughter is raped and impregnated and he is brutally beaten.

10. An African Love Story: Love, Life, and Elephants by Daphne Sheldrick

The late Daphne Sheldrick is the first person ever to have successfully hand-reared newborn elephants. Her pioneering work in perfecting the right milk formula has saved countless animals from death. In this memoir, Daphne shares her relationship with myriad wild creatures, her devotion to David Sheldrick (Tsavo Park warden), and the establishment of the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust and the Orphans’ Nursery in Nairobi National Park, which continues to thrive today.

11. A Grain of Wheat by Ngugi wa Thiong’o

A Grain of Wheat is set to the backdrop of the Mau Mau rebellion and follows a handful of villagers whose lives are altered by the 1952–1960 Emergency Period where colonialists seized and tortured civilians. Mugo is the village’s hero, haunted by a shocking secret. The book explores the themes of compromise, betrayal and love through the turbulent lives of the villagers.

12. The Worlds of a Maasai Warrior by Ole Saitoti

Bridging divergent worlds with grace and dignity, Saitoti reminisces on his life among the proud Maasai, reflecting both as spokesperson for his tribe and as one of the first Maasai safari guides.