Accra Noir (Akashic Noir)

by Nana-Ama Danquah (Editor), Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond (Contribution by), Kwame Dawes (Contribution by), Adjoa Twum (Contribution by), Kofi Blankson Ocansey (Contribution by)

Overview

Accra joins Lagos, Nairobi, Marrakech, and Addis Ababa in representing the African continent in the Noir Series arena.

“Superb . . . Each story reaffirms how fundamental ‘place’ is to the noir genre and how the locale shapes the story as much as the characters themselves . . . Strongly recommended.” —Library Journal

“There’s good writing as well as a strong sense of place and culture, and the reader will absorb a side of Accra that doesn’t make it into the tourist brochures.” —New York Journal of Books

Akashic Books continues its award-winning series of original noir anthologies, launched in 2004 with Brooklyn Noir. Each book comprises all new stories, each one set in a distinct neighborhood or location within the respective city.

Brand-new stories by: Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond, Kwame Dawes, Adjoa Twum, Kofi Blankson Ocansey, Billie McTernan, Ernest Kwame Nkrumah Addo, Patrick Smith, Anne Sackey, Gbontwi Anyetei, Nana-Ama Danquah, Ayesha Harruna Attah, Eibhlín Ní Chléirigh, and Anna Bossman.

From the introduction by Nana-Ama Danquah:

"Accra is the perfect setting for noir fiction. The telling of such tales—ones involving or suggesting death, with a protagonist who is flawed or devious, driven by either a self-serving motive or one of the seven deadly sins—is woven into the fabric of the city’s everyday life . . .

"Accra is more than just a capital city. It is a microcosm of Ghana. It is a virtual map of the nation’s soul, a complex geographical display of its indigenous presence, the colonial imposition, declarations of freedom, followed by coups d’état, decades of dictatorship, and then, finally, a steady march forward into a promising future . . .

"Much like Accra, these stories are not always what they seem. The contributors who penned them know too well how to spin a story into a web . . . It is an honor and a pleasure to share them and all they reveal about Accra, a city of allegories, one of the most dynamic and diverse places in the world."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781617758942
Publisher:	Akashic Books, Ltd.
Publication date:	12/01/2020
Series:	Akashic Noir Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	256
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

NANA-AMA DANQUAH was born in Accra, Ghana, and raised in the United States. She is the author of the memoir Willow Weep for Me: A Black Woman’s Journey Through Depression, and the editor of three anthologies: Becoming American, Shaking the Tree, and The Black Body. Her essays, fiction, and poetry have been widely anthologized, and she has written for numerous magazines, journals, and newspapers, including Essence, Allure, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and the Los Angeles Times. During her tenure as an international speechwriter for the president of Ghana, the addresses she penned were delivered at the United Nations General Assembly, the African Union, the Palace of Westminster, the University of Oxford, and Harvard University. She has taught at Otis College of Arts and Sciences, Antioch University, Los Angeles, and the University of Ghana, Legon. She splits her time between Accra and Los Angeles, and has one daughter, the actress and writer Korama Danquah. She is the editor of Accra Noir.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Part I: One Day for Master
"Chop Money" by Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond (Mallam Atta Market)
"Shape-Shifters" by Adjoa Twum (Pig Farm)
"Moon Over Aburi" by Kwame Dawes (Aburi)
"Fantasia in Fans and Flat Screens" by Kofi Blankson Ocansey (Jamestown)

Part II: Heaven Gate, No Bribe
"The Labadi Sunshine Bar" by Billie McTernan (Labadi)
"The Driver" by Ernest Kwame Nkrumah Addo (Weija)
"The Situation" by Patrick Smith (Labone)

Part III: All Die Be Die
"Intentional Consequences" by Anne Sackey (Kanda)
"Tabilo Wuɔfɔ" by Gbontwi Anyetei (Airport Hills)
"When a Man Loves a Woman" by Nana-Ama Danquah (Cantonments)

Part IV: Sea Never Dry
"Kweku’s House" by Ayesha Harruna Attah (Tesano)
"The Boy Who Wasn’t There" by Eibhlín Ní Chléirigh (East Legon)
"Instant Justice" by Anna Bossman (High Street)

Editorial Reviews

10/26/2020

This welcome volume in the Akashic noir series, set in Ghana, hits plenty of the expected bleak notes and classical noirish phrasings. Gbontwi Anyetei’s gripping “Tabilo Wuɔfɔ ” contains such memorable lines as “Anybody could burn down a church” while also serving as an almost casual introduction to the nuances of Ghanaian culture (“the barely literates who still insisted on using English”). That doesn’t mean there aren’t traditional noir tales, notably Adjoa Twum’s cocaine-smuggling and murder-filled “Shape-Shifters.” Danquah’s “When a Man Loves a Woman” opens with the fantastic line, “Every day for the past five days, Kwame had woken up next to a corpse,” and delivers a wonderful variant on a spousal murder plot. Anne Sackey’s “Intentional Consequences” takes the scorned-woman revenge story in a surprising and witty direction. Though there are a few weak stories among the 13 selections, this stands as one of the better recent Akashic anthologies. (Dec.)

Publishers Weekly

"The anthology Accra Noir edited by Nana-Ama Danquah captures the hustle of several distinctive neighborhoods of Ghana’s capital."

included in Nadia Owusu’s Year in Reading (2 The Millions

"The anthology Accra Noir edited by Nana-Ama Danquah captures the hustle of several distinctive neighborhoods of Ghana’s capital."
—The Millions, included in Nadia Owusu’s Year in Reading (2020)

"Thirteen tales of the trouble people find in the capital city of Ghana when they’re trying to make a buck...There’s plenty of noir to go around in this all-too-sad volume about people struggling to get by."
—Kirkus Reviews, Starred review

"This spine-chilling 13-story collection offers an opportunity to 'consider the context, beware of a pretext, search for a subtext' on living—and dying—in a major metropolis consumed by poverty and desperation."
—Shelf Awareness for Readers, STARRED Review

"Superb...Each story reaffirms how fundamental 'place' is to the noir genre and how the locale shapes the story as much as the characters themselves...Strongly recommended."
—Library Journal

"This welcome volume in the Akashic noir series, set in Ghana, hits plenty of the expected bleak notes and classical noirish phrasings."
—Publishers Weekly

"There's good writing as well as a strong sense of place and culture, and the reader will absorb a side of Accra that doesn’t make it into the tourist brochures."
—New York Journal of Books

"Within this new book, the authors who share their many stories do so in a much revealing way about Accra, a city of allegories, one of the most dynamic and diverse places in the world."
—Exclusive Magazine

“I was blown away by these stories, and would encourage lovers of noir fiction to try these out. They are gritty enough to fill your noir needs.”
—The Cyberlibrarian"

From the Publisher

12/01/2020

Akashic's "Noir" series consists of short noir fiction all set in a specific locale and now boasts 50 titles. The latest is based in Accra, Ghana's capital, and is a superb choice. Editor Danquah's introduction describes Accra as a city filled with "the tension between modernity and traditionalism, the symbolism and storytelling both obvious and coded, the moral high ground, the duplicity and deceit, the most basic human failings laid bare alongside fear and love and pain, and the corrupting desire to have the very things you are not meant to have." Each story reaffirms how fundamental "place" is to the noir genre and how the locale shapes the story as much as the characters themselves. Stories range from the underbelly of the urban scene, filled with grifters, prostitutes, and thieves, while others explore love, infidelity, and vengeance. Standouts include Ernest Kwame Nkrumah Addo's sublime example of perfect noir, "The Driver"; Eibhlín Ní Chléirigh's heartbreaking tale of "The Boy Who Wasn't There," chronicling a short, depraved life; and Anne Sackey's "Intentional Consequences," a delectable revenge tale with just the right dose of humor. VERDICT Strongly recommended for purchase where international noir is appreciated and requested.—Amy Nolan, St. Joseph, MI

Library Journal

★ 2020-09-16
Thirteen tales of the trouble people find in the capital city of Ghana when they’re trying to make a buck.

“For them it was about the hustle,” Patrick Smith writes about the Labone Choirboys, grifters trying to get a lawyer involved in a billion-dollar scam in “The Situation.” But even those on the margins have their hustles. A kaya girl who carries shoppers’ bundles in the marketplace in Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond’s “Chop Money” tries to make a bit on the side by subletting her rented room. The shop girl in Anna Bossman’s “Instant Justice” hopes to find her way out of poverty through her relationship with an older man. Kofi Blankson Ocansey tells the tale of a woman who parlays her relationships into an assortment of consumer goods in “Fantasiain Fans and Flat Screens.” Loss of innocence is sometimes the price of economic mobility. Billie McTernan’s “The Labadi Sunshine Bar” follows a girl from the country into the sex trade. A young woman earns her keep as a drug mule in Adjoa Twum’s “Shape-Shifters.” Not all the disillusioned are young. Ayesha Harruna Attah’s 30-ish wife finds the rewards of her marriage to the septuagenarian of “Kweku’s House” not what she bargained for. A woman in her 40s discovers her longtime lover has fathered children with two other women in Anne Sackey’s “Intentional Consequences.” Some hustlers wreak havoc on others. Ernest Kwame Nkrumah Addo’s young heroine learns that her husband’s source of income must cost her something precious in “The Driver.” And the vengeful husband in editor Danquah’s “When a Man Loves a Woman” is a hustler who hustles himself.

There’s plenty of noir to go around in this all-too-sad volume about people struggling to get by.

Kirkus Reviews