Harare North

Harare North, aka London, is the new home of an unnamed young man from Zimbabwe. Escaping the trouble he's got into because of his activities as a member of Mugabe's youth militia, the man intends to stay in the UK long enough to earn the £5,000 he needs to pay back people at home. He claims asylum on arrival, gets taken to a detention centre and is later released into the care of his cousin with a few pounds in his pocket. It's immediately clear that he is not welcome in his cousin's house so he hooks up with his childhood friend Shingi who has been is living in a squat in Brixton, south London.

Harare North is the story of this young man and his journey through the underbelly of London life. The young man is an unreliable and show more unlikeable narrator but he is fascinating. The observations about British life as seen by a new arrival, which have been tackled by many other writers, feel fresh, interesting and funny. For example, the narrator believes that pubs with names like The Queen's Head and The Kings Arms are commemorations of a British propensity for dismembering royalty!

This is also a domestic story; much of the action plays out in houses, perhaps a nod to the fact that the lives of people awaiting asylum approval are circumscribed by the prohibition on them seeking work. And food is really important from the very first page with the description of the 'white ice-cold sun hanging in the sky like frozen pizza base'. Family also feature prominently, particularly those left behind who send requests for money and gifts in the belief that their son must be making his fortune in Harare North.

It's a great debut novel - I can't wait to read what Chikwava writes next. show less

The unnamed narrator of this debut novel emigrates to London, or Harare North, from Zimbabwe, where he served as one of President Mugabe's Green Bombers, the youth attack squads that terrorized the regime's opponents. He needs US$5000 to buy back his freedom from local officials, after he is caught beating up an opposition party official.

Upon his arrival in London, he is granted temporary asylum, but does not have working papers. After staying with a cousin and his wife, he moves in with a childhood friend living in an abandoned house in Brixton, along with several other countrymen trying to make it. He eventually obtains work in the underground industry, where the best paying jobs are held by BBCs, or British Buttock Cleaners, who show more look after "old people that poo their pants every hour". The daily internal and external stressors on the narrator and his housemates take a large toll on their physical and mental health, and each one is ultimately left to rely on himself to survive and to avoid a descent into crime or madness.

[Harare North] is a dark comedy that becomes a suffocating and dizzying ride that the reader takes along with the narrator, which gives an instructive glimpse into the lives of illegal immigrants living under the radar of the average city resident, whether in London or any other international city. show less

I really wanted to like this novel. It's in one of my favourite places in the entire world (London). It has lots of references to my favourite place to read about (Sub-saharan Africa). But I couldn't do it. It just didn't work for me. I felt it started out strong, but by the end, I had no investment in any of the characters. The fatal flaw is the protagonist. He's unlikeable, which in and off itself isn't a problem, there are plenty of unlikeable protagonists, but that Chikwava doesn't give him enough emotional depth that I felt interested in how his story would play out. He just does stuff without any real sense of consequence, and I just didn't care by the end.

So strong start, then sort of fizzled out.

I read this on an LT ecommendation. A somewhat satiric, at times bleak look at the lives of immigrants/asylum seekers from Zimbabwe in London (the Harare North of the title), as well as other poor people who are largely unseen in the bustle of a major city, flavored with politics, exploitation of all kinds, and a grim sense of humor.

I bought this book based on some other reviews I had read elsewhere and maybe I shouldn't have. The story, from the much I read, was quite interesting. It followed the life of an asylum seeker, newly arrived in England from Zimbabwe, and trying to find his footing in this new place and culture, and at the same time become a permanent resident. He ends up moving out of his cousin's place and in with another group of immigrants. That was where I stopped. The narrative was in such a tortuous narrative that I got a headache each time I picked it up, and before I could finish a couple of pages.