A great novel, but a little difficult and challenging to read, mostly for non native English speakers. The author develops a very complex Kenyan reality, not that one that is seen at the newspapers or in touristic guides. Ngugi goes deeper and further and shows us an independent Kenya that is an extension of the colonised one. The novelist, the eternal candidate for the Nobel price, has always dedicated his life to defend the poor people in Kenya and report injustices against them, not only during the English colonisation, but mostly during the independence, when just a few selected Kenyan families have unfairly inherited all the power and wealth of the country.
Petals of Blood talks about these poor people who confront one injustice after another and, at the end, they keep silent and buried under the stones of the powerful, those mostly selected by foreigners. Munira, Karega, Abdulla, Wanja... they are Ngugi's heroes and, while the author keeps alive, they will always have a prominent presence in his books.
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