BOOKER PRIZE WINNER • A modern classic that reveals the tension between the land of the living, with its violence and political struggles, and the temptations of the carefree kingdom of the spirits. • "A dazzling achievement for any writer in any language." — The New York Times Book Review In the decade since it won the Booker Prize, Ben Okri's Famished Road has become a classic. Like Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children or Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude, it combines brilliant narrative technique with a fresh vision to create an essential work of world literature. The narrator, Azaro, is an abiku, a spirit child, who in the Yoruba tradition of Nigeria exists between life and death. The life he foresees for himself and the tale he tells is full of sadness and tragedy, but inexplicably he is born with a smile on his face. Nearly called back to the land of the dead, he is resurrected. But in their efforts to save their child, Azaro's loving parents are made destitute.

Myth and naturalism are combined in the story of Azaro, the spirit-child who lives in an impoverished African village, and the upheavals that he and his family face

This is a startling novel about different kinds of riches and different forms of power. It opens another chapter in the adventures of Azaro, the celebrated spirit-child of The Famished Road, winner of the Booker Prize. By turns thunderous and tender, it will resonate in the mind and heart of the reader for a long time.