Days Come and Go

Days Come and Go

Hemley Boum (Translated by Nchanji Njamnsi)

Paperback, 198×129 mm

Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction

ISBN: 978-1-7337526-9-5

Publication Date: October 2022

CFA5,000.00

At the dusk of her life, Anna is cared for by her daughter, Abi––a reversal of roles which draws mother and daughter closer and opens a window into their lives. Opening with the memories of the dying protagonist, Days Come and Go is the exciting story of three Cameroonian women from three generations: a young Anna who, allured by Western education, finds herself in the midst of a conflict between modernity and tradition; Abi, the journalist, whose liberating idyll with a married artist plunges her tepid family life into turmoil; and Tina, Anna’s young neighbour in Douala, who falls into the clutches of Islamists. The fates of the women in this novel span––and inevitably intertwine with––the history of Cameroon, from pre-colonial and colonial times through the independence movements to the contemporary terror of Boko Haram.

Employing the portraits of mothers and their children fighting for survival in a crumbling patriarchal society, Hemley Boum blurs the lines between personal stories and history in Days Come and Go.”

Séverine Kodjo-Grandvaux, Le Monde

Cover by Ailish Beadle