REVIEW: The Fishermen

The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma

Published by Scribe 2015

I love reading books written by people from cultures not my own. The novel, The Fishermen, based in western Nigeria, delivers everything I expect from such a story.

It is rich in Nigerian landscape, language and culture. Obioma is a skilled storyteller who seamlessly carries you along the line of ever deepening doom into a madness that like the river featured, pulls you into the current and washes you ashore, a different person.

It is based around four brothers who become 'fishermen' in the prohibited 'evil' river near their house after the rock of the family, the revered and feared father has to move away from home for work.


Set against the unstable political background of Nigeria, the evangelical Christianity of the time and the undercurrent of superstitions encompassing ghosts and mad prophets, the characters of the boys, their family and neighbours, are shaped into beings they never thought possible.

I was pulled into this book by the seemingly effortless writing, the metamorphis of the characters and the horror of the story unfolding.

I wanted to stop reading at times, but could not walk away from knowing how it ended. I could not even skip to the end because I would have missed the the subtle shaping of the characters that led to the final word.

This is a book that stays with you, resonating through hidden places of your consciousness, bringing forth questions on the human condition you think you don't need to ask.

For me, that's a book worth reading.