Azaro is a spirit child who is born only to live for a short while before returning to the idyllic world of his spirit companions. Now he has chosen to stay in the world of the living.

Offers a frightening look at oil-boom Nigeria, a world of robberies, road blocks and intimidation in which those who are meant to be protecting a country's citizens are in reality supervising the looting.

Longlisted for the 2004 Man Booker Prize Shortlisted for the 2004 Orange Prize A haunting tale of an Africa and an adolescence undergoing tremendous changes by a talented young Nigerian writer.

This novel was included in Anthony Burgess's personal selection of the 99 best novels in English since 1939.

Ezeulu, the chief priest of Ulu, has rivals in the tribe, in the white government and even in his own family. Surrounded by trouble, he adopts an increasingly cosmic view of events - surely in the battle of the dieties, he is merely an arrow in the bow of his God?

Written in the form of a diary, kept by the Cameroonian houseboy Toundi, this book looks at Toundi's innocence and his awe of the white world of his masters.