MARLON JAMES — BLACK LEOPARD, RED WOLF

Image: cover detail

I read Black Leopard, Red Wolf fairly soon after reading The Palm-Wine Drinkard. I didn’t plan this sequence but find it fortuitous. The two novels seem to have a lot of common DNA. We are in a world of African myth. Characters are going into the bush, confronting beasts, and emerging changed.  

It was sometimes difficult for me to recall which characters in this story had wings. I’m talking about literal wings here. And I say characters and not monsters. Even the many monstrous beings in the world of this novel are given their share of pathos; they joke around; they enter into alliances, betray, and earn forgiveness. Monsters get to tip the pinball table of morality in this story. And generally I’m all for it. Marlon James ranks among my favorite contemporary authors, and it’s inspiring to see him dive into something so fantastical, a generic departure from A Brief History of Seven Killings (for my money the best novel to be published in the past ten years). It’s a wild move. 

That said, this thing is like 600+ pages and some scenes felt expository to me. A small imperfection. And I should point out that I didn’t always remember who was who in these 600+ pages, so I reckon some readers would actually want more exposition. I’m not so sure it matters who has wings and who has none.