Masquerade — Mohamed Wa Baile

Masquerade addresses the complexity of the contemporary experience of African immigrants by focusing on the intersections between race, gender and class divisions between and among Africans, immigrants, and Europeans. It is rooted in the African tradition of the fantastic, and is back-grounded by an alternate reality in which a united postcolonial Pan-Africa struggles to define itself and overcome the legacies of colonialism. The book takes the protagonist's perspective, and follows Sira, a young woman from the city of Kalamu whose growth and development centers the text. Her story begins with a rape at the hands of local thugs. The reader follows her through an ill-considered marriage and hasty emigration to Europe, a difficult adjustment period in which she begins to reclaim her life and explore the possibilities of her relationship. Sira takes with her an open heart and an open mind, but also her own prejudices and fears. As she navigates her path through this land of wealth and isolation, she makes new connections, discovers new horizons before she goes back to Kalamu, where she must face just how much she has changed. The book is notable for its balance between Sira's individual trauma and growth, and the larger political themes addressed by the author. The alternate future Masquerade offers is in the tradition of other black diaspora afrofuturist fictions and fantasies, from W.E.B. Dubois, Martin Delaney, and George Schuyler, but the spin on it is distinctly modern, and articulates in a literary fashion the kind of longing expressed in some of the genre science fiction literature and film coming out of Africa today.