Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on March 21, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.
The Lies of the Ajungo is the debut novella of Nigerian-American author Moses Ose Utomi. The novella features a story about a boy from a city in world filled with desert that was taken advantage of by a powerful neighboring empire (the Ajungo). The Ajungo offers this city just enough water for its people to barely survive...in exchange for the tongues of every adult resident...and to make it worse, the Ajungo rename the city the "City of Lies" to prevent its residents from being believed when they seek for help. In this setting, the boy - Tutu - sets out into the desert to try to find water to save his dying mother...only to find the things he understands about the world aren't quite what he believed....
The result is a story of greed ad colonial and economic oppression and about the lies those in power use to prevent the oppressed from being able to rise up and change their fates. I'm gonna try to make this review as spoiler free as possible, although I may rot13 some spoilers after the jump, but I'll say straight out: this is a really effective novella in characters, themes, and message, and well worthy of award recognition.
Note: The novella is part of a series that will be continued next year apparently. But the story is entirely stand alone and the only connection I suspect there is in the series - from what I can tell from the next novella's plot summary - is that it takes place in the same world some 300 years later, when this story's events are long mythologized history.
Quick Plot Summary:
Tutu grew up in a city now known as the City of Lies. It wasn't always called that, but ages ago when the City ran out of water, it had no choice but to turn to the terrifying Ajungo Empire for help. And the Ajungo made them a horrific bargain: cut off the tongues of all citizens when they turn 13 and ship those tongues to the Ajungo...and the Ajungo will provide the city with just enough water for its people to survive. Barely. And to make sure that the City's inhabitants couldn't get help, the Ajungo renamed the city the "City of Lies", ensuring that no one would believe any of the City's residents who reached them and tried to explain their plight.
Since that bargain, countless wanna-be heroes have set out from the City into the desert to seek water or aid for the City so as to save its people....and none have returned successfully. And so the heroes have stopped coming and the saying has emerged: "There are no heroes in the City of Lies".
But when Tutu's mother is on the verge of death from a lack of water, 12 year old Tutu sees no other choice but to try to be that hero - to trek into the desert in search of water to save his city. But what he finds there will change....everything.
Thoughts: The Lies of the Ajungo packs a lot of details into a short package - as evidenced by the fact that my plot summary above being as long as the plot summaries I use in my reviews of novels despite this being a shorter work. The story features a strong lead character in Tutu, a boy who leaves his city hoping just to save his people and his mother in particular and who is in some ways naïve about how things work in the desert even as he is in no way optimistic about his chances. And so as Tutu grows and as he encounters other people in the desert who are in similar situations (a trio of girls/young-women whose city is forced to cut off its people's ears in exchange for iron for example), you really see how that naivete is broken and how he responds to the truths he uncovers. And it makes him incredibly relatable as he discovers that the world is even more unjust than he could've known...and as he becomes determined to take a desperate final action to put an end to it.
And then there are the reveals, which really centralize the themes of this novella. The novella begins as one that makes you think it's going to deal primarily with the horrors of colonization and empire...and while those themes are still definitely there, they are touched in a way that is not how you'd expect from how the novella starts. And yet the themes all make utter sense, as the plot reveals make both the reader and Tutu realize how much they missed in the first few pages. And so you have in the end a story about how greed and power really make people in power into monsters who will do almost anything to hold their grip on power...and how they will use propaganda and lies in order to ensure that no one can do anything to stop it. And I won't say much more since I don't want to spoil, but this story really shows in ways you won't expect the depths that people in power will go to keep their hold on power and makes clear that the only way to meet such monstrous acts is with desperate extreme actions.
A tour de force and I'll be back for Utomi's next novella in this world.
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