A fond but cleareyed look at a steady leader and the African nation on his shoulders.
A debut political biography examines Zambia’s current head of state.
In his book, Zambia’s deputy ambassador to Sweden introduces the world’s readers to his boss, Edgar Chagwa Lungu, a relatively new president attempting to unify the African country’s warring factions and to diversify the nation’s copper-dependent economy. The 60-year-old Lungu’s tenure follows that of his fierce and flamboyant mentor, Michael Sata. Appointed by his predecessor to effectively run the country in Sata’s absence, “the acting president did not have the luxury to sit down and cry or mourn” when news of the leader’s death reached Zambia. Mukwita was by his side as Lungu witnessed Vice President Guy Scott’s appointment as acting president on Sata’s death but chose not to contest this action lest he be accused of treason. Mukwita locates in this abnegation the seeds of Lungu’s genius. Throughout Lungu’s political career, “it was hard to see him coming, but that was always his secret weapon.” The narrative tracks his rise to power, the contested 2015 election against the wealthy businessman Hakainde Hichilema, and Lungu’s subsequent efforts to shore up the landlocked country’s economy in the face of falling copper prices and rising inflation. With a strong track record of professional competence and a unique team of rivals in his cabinet, Lungu has maintained his dignity during “what some political commentators have described as the fastest rise in political office” to serve his nation stalwartly and boldly both at home and abroad. Thoughtfulness and eloquence aside, this work is a campaign biography. The genre has its limitations. The subject’s favorite book must inevitably be the Bible, and the figure must possess no overriding hunger for power, just a steady drive to do what’s best for the country. This volume, however, aims for and achieves more than most such entries in the genre by repeatedly pausing to deliver thoughtful, researched, and exacting biographies of the major characters (the opposition figures are, generally, treated fairly) and to provide historical context for non-native readers. Mukwita’s efforts have paid off: this is a fine work to begin one’s reading about Zambia and the passions of its people.
A fond but cleareyed look at a steady leader and the African nation on his shoulders.Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4828-7726-7
Page Count: 174
Publisher: PartridgeAfrica
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
PERSPECTIVES
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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