Gifts

“Nuruddin Farah is one of the finest contemporary African novelists.”—Salman RushdieThe second novel in Nuruddin Farah's Blood in the Sun trilogy, Gifts is the beguiling tale of a Somali family and the struggles of its powerful matriarch to keep it whole. Duniya is a single mother, raising twins while working as a nurse in a Mogadiscio hospital. Her self-sufficient world is rocked when her rebellious daughter brings home a mysterious foundling infant. And when Duniya accepts a ride to work from a wealthy, romantically interested family friend, her whole life is turned upside down.Meanwhile, the hospital where she works is besieged by a desperate population ravaged by war, drought, disease, and famine. Western relief agencies have invaded Somalia with their charity, and some Somalis chafe at tainted goods and the burden of debts they can never hope to repay. With lyrical, luxuriant prose, Farah weaves a spellbinding tapestry of reportage, dreams, memory, folktales, and family lore. In his hands, Duniya's tale becomes emblematic of the struggles of an entire people.Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade, Yucca, and Good Books imprints, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in fiction—novels, novellas, political and medical thrillers, comedy, satire, historical fiction, romance, erotic and love stories, mystery, classic literature, folklore and mythology, literary classics including Shakespeare, Dumas, Wilde, Cather, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

“One of Africa’s major writers . . . a genuine artist . . . His mastery of complex forms of narration, based on echoes, symmetry, and musical patterns, make his an original voice.” —Times Literary Supplement “Farah is in control of his enormous talents as a novelist, writing in the best tradition of Solzhenitsyn and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. . . . One of his continent’s major novelists.” —World Literature Today “Nuruddin Farah is one of the finest contemporary African novelists.”—Salman Rushdie

Nuruddin Farah was born in 1945 in Baidoa, Somalia. He is the author of numerous novels, novellas, short stories, and plays. His novels include Hiding in Plain Sight, Crossbones, and his trilogies Variations on the Theme of an African Dictatorship and Blood in the Sun, which comprises Maps and Gifts as well as Secrets. After the publication of Sweet and Sour Milk in 1979, Farah became persona non grata in Somalia and served a self-imposed exile of more than twenty years, before he was permitted to visit in 1996. His novels have been translated into many languages and have won numerous international awards. Farah was named the 1998 laureate of the Neustadt International Prize for Literature. He now divides his time between Cape Town, South Africa and Annandale, New York.