Tram 83 by Fiston Mwanza Mujila, translated from the French by Roland Glasser (Deep Vellum, 210 pages, September 8)I read Tram 83 in one sitting, and I think that this is the best way to experience it (if possible).
Why? Because the swirling, kaleidoscopic, jazzy, crude, and hyper atmosphere of the novel is best appreciated through complete immersion. This story of Lucien (a writer trying to hold on to some utopian vision of art) and Requiem (a gangster and trafficker who clings to his power over the debauched world of a fictional separatist African city) offers us a vision of modern colonialism and the devastating cycle of war after war of liberation that has gripped nations across the African continent for over a century.
