• St. Augustine’s College: Conquering With Perseverance – Our Past, Our Present And Our Future

    The 724-page book is the first-ever reference book by any college in Ghana. It serves as both a history book on everything one needs to know about the St. Augustine’s College and serves as both an encyclopaedia as well as almanac that compiles in detail, every single one of the over 400 parishes, out-stations and individuals that contributed towards the establishment of the College. It also traces the history of the Gold Coast Catholic as the root of Catholic Education, contribution of the Catholic Church to Ghana’s Education Sector, the establishment of St. Augustine’s College initially as a Teacher Training College in Amisano and subsequent construction and transfer of the College to Cape Coast with a Secondary Department. In all the narration, the authors bring out the undercurrents that led to the clamour of the Gold Coast Catholic faithful to have their own Secondary School and the frustrations that the Catholic Church hierarchy had to endure to have the College established.

    The book gives a background to the naming of the College after the foremost Christian Theologian of African descent and how that dove-tailed into the philosophy, unique identity and character of the College’s products. Detailed highlights are given on major roles played by the Society of African Missions and the Congregation of Holy Cross in the holistic development of the College’s students. The College’s scholarship, excellence in sports and role as a citadel of the arts are well explained in the book with an impressive roll-call of outstanding alumni across various sectors as an emphasis to the role of the College within the context of national development. The very essence of campus life, management and curriculum is brought to the fore through reminiscence by APSUnians across its nine decades of existence. The various narrations are interlaced with interviews, discussions with College Management, academic staff and alumni dating as far back as the 1950s.

    The book also does a comprehensive listing of every college alumnus from 1933 when the very first graduates left college till 2017 by their programmes offered and provides 65 coloured pages of very historic privileged pictures some dating as far back as 1930s. The role of the past students’ union (APSU) as one of the most critical stakeholders in the development of the College is clearly established all through the book which closes with prospects on the establishment of an endowment fund to secure the gains made over the decades.

    Whether an APSUnian, Augusco parent, Catholic faithful, a historian or researcher, one will require a copy of this historic document to fully appreciate the work of the missionaries in the development of education in Ghana, role of the Catholic Church in the establishment of schools in Ghana among others.

    The book is printed on quality paper and stitched hard-bound with dust jacket.

  • A Charge to Keep

    A Charge to Keep – a collection of his articles published since 1996 – is Raymond Tuvi’s third book. Bukom, the first article, was featured in the “My Town” segment of the July–September 1996 edition of the BBC Focus on Africa magazine.

    Faith, Individual Character and National Development, is the composite theme that runs through the over 50 highly-readable essays. The Foreword is by Ambassador K.B. Asante, former Ghana High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, who served as Minister of Education, and Trade and Industry.

    Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first President and preeminent champion of the total liberation of Africa’s longtime Executive Secretary, Mr. K.B. Asante, as he’s popularly known to a Ghanaian populace that dotes on him as Elder Statesman, and probably the “Last of the Great Ghanaian Freedom Fighters”, writes:

    “The book is a welcome addition to the growing number of books written by Ghanaians who should thereby be encouraged to read more widely. The truth is that we do not read much and this is shown by the narrowness of mind many of us exhibit on national issues. By this book, Raymond Tuvi is telling us that we have one less excuse for not having any idea about what we should know.”

    A Charge to Keep

    120.00
  • Abrokyire Nkomo

    For many Africans, the dream of travelling to Europe or America represents a burning lifetime ambition that they would do anything (well, almost) to achieve. So what is it really like out there? What is the story behind the rosy images of the west that are beamed to Africa on television, in movies and in the glossy magazines? What is the reality behind the grim stories we hear at times from our friends and relatives abroad? Just how hard, or easy, is it out there? This book is a collection of a number of articles written by the author and seeks to address these issues. Written in a conversational style, it is an attempt to provide an interesting, witty, yet serious insight into the good, the bad and the ugly sides of life abroad, and raises several issues that should engage the attention of the contemporary African whether at home or abroad.

    Abrokyire Nkomo

    110.00
  • Safe House: Explorations in Creative Nonfiction

    In a collection of creative essays that ranges from travel writing and memoir to reportage, Ellah Wakatama Allfrey brings together some of the most talented writers of creative nonfiction from across Africa.

    A Ghanaian explores the increasing influence of China across the region; a Kenyan student activist writes of exile in Kampala; a Liberian scientist shares her diary of the Ebola crisis; a Nigerian writer travels to the north to meet a community at risk; a Kenyan travels to Senegal to interview a gay rights activist and a South African writer recounts a tale of family discord and murder in a remote seaside town.

    This anthology contains a range of unforgettable stories by authors from across Africa and presents personal views of contemporary issues in an accessible and thought-provoking manner.

  • Hardly Working: A Travel Memoir of Sorts

    “Zukiswa has mastered the art of writing a travel memoir. Through engaging prose she takes you on a journey — which she seamlessly intertwines with her innocent childhood memories — through Africa, Europe and then back to Africa. Even better she is doing part of the trip with her family which is unchartered territory: an African family exploring their own continent by public transport for adventure’s sake. What a way to bond.” — Sihle Khumalo, author of Almost Sleeping My Way to Timbuktu, Heart of Africa and the best-selling Dark Continent, My Black Arse

    Ten years after her first book was published, Zukiswa Wanner leaves her Nairobi home on an adventure-filled road trip with her partner and son. Travelling by road to the southern most country in Africa, she gets stranded in a border town in Malawi; finds herself in the midst of a protest against bond notes in Zimbabwe that shows her that Mugabe isn’t the force that he once was. And while dealing with immigration officials from Uganda to Ukraine, she learns what it means to carry an African passport. Wanner deals with the politics of the nations she considers home as well as the politics of literary festivals and writing with the same touch of humour that has been her signature since her first book — The Madams.

  • A Sense of Savannah: Tales of a Friendly Walk through Northern Ghana

    Caution: For fear of emitting loud, embarrassing laughs, do not read this book in public.

    When Kofi Akpabli was posted to the northern border town of Paga to do his national service, he thought it was just going to be another ‘national suffering’. But when he encountered love at first sight with the landscape and the people, he was soon to realise that something close to destiny tied him to the place.

    The author was welcomed to a world refreshingly different from the back streets of Accra and Cape Coast. He discovered the smell of dawadawa, the taste of pito and the mystery of border towns. Over a period of seven years, Kofi criss-crossed the Upper East, Upper West and the Northern Regions.

    His real life adventures have been published in a cross-section of Ghanaian newspapers. By popular request, here comes A Sense of Savannah, a witty collection of travel tales that best express the character of Ghana’s savannah setting. While the entertaining narratives are guaranteed to interest a wide range of readers, what makes A Sense of Savannah worth reading is how the author generously dishes out well-researched facts and humour in equal measure.

    As story after story shows, Kofi is always on the road:

    – In Wa, he is ‘arrested’ and forced to drink beer without end on a Sunday morning

    – In Bolgatanga, his well-shirted body gets sprayed with goat urine from the top of a bus

    – In Tamale, during curfew hours and against the background of Wangara music, he spends the night on hard, cold asphalt

    – And on a busy market day in Navrongo, he is told, ‘you have no conscience!’

    Relax, grab a seat and let A Sense of Savannah drive you through the rather interesting northern half of Ghana.

     

  • Tickling the Ghanaian: Encounters with Contemporary Culture

    A book on contemporary Ghanaian culture and heritage.

    In this book, Kofi Akpabli seeks to unravel what at all tickles the Ghanaian. Is it Sunday afternoon’s after church Omo Tuo and beer, or when Ghana is ‘beating’ its arch-rivals in sports, Nigeria?

    Articles in this book include the two that won him the CNN/Multichoice Journalist Award for Arts and Culture back to back in 2010 and 2011, becoming the first journalist, in the award’s history, to have won one category back to back: The Serious Business of Soup in Ghana and What is Right with Akpeteshie.

    Following his usual humorous style of writing, Tickling the Ghanaian promises to be funny and educating. Kofi takes a different view of what we have perceived as always to be archaic. Kofi has eyes of details and tells his story the best way it could possibly be told.

  • Welcome to Lagos

    “Storylines and twists abound. But action is secondary to atmosphere: Onuzo excels at evoking a stratified city, where society weddings feature ‘ice sculptures as cold as the unmarried belles’ and thugs write tidy receipts for kickbacks extorted from homeless travelers.” —The New Yorker

    Deep in the Niger Delta, officer Chike Ameobi deserts the army and sets out on the road to Lagos. He is soon joined by a wayward private, a naïve militant, a vulnerable young woman and a runaway middle-class wife. The shared goals of this unlikely group: freedom and new life.

    As they strive to find their places in the city, they become embroiled in a political scandal. Ahmed Bakare, editor of the failing Nigerian Journal, is determined to report the truth. Yet government minister Chief Sandayo will do anything to maintain his position. Trapped between the two, they are forced to make a life-changing decision. Full of shimmering detail, Welcome to Lagos is a stunning portrayal of an extraordinary city, and of seen lives that intersect in a breathless story of courage and survival.

  • Aluta Insomnia

    This book of reflections is about a Ghana boy who travels within his country and around the world, sharing the anecdotes graciously. Whether it is a visit to see the US President at the White House or a trip to an Ada village called Totimehkope, each story is down a memory lane that is paved with nuggets of wisdom. The work showcases the beauty of being alive to the moral and developmental happenings around us. The author’s capacity to smell and milk story ideas from the most mundane scenario is remarkable.

    A neurosurgeon by profession, his words cut and heal clinically in equal measure. Page after page, he operates as in the theatre − precise, penetrating, productive. If you love the brilliance of Ernest Hemingway and Ayi Kwei Armah, you will never stop reading Teddy Totimeh.

    Sometimes, you do not know what you did right to be rewarded with a priceless gem. Aluta Insomnia is one such gift!

    Aluta Insomnia

    90.00
  • Lagos: City of the Imagination – Hardcover

    “I don’t think you can be in Lagos without becoming aware of its potency; when Lagos gets itself organised it will be extremely powerful; and already – without organisation – it is very powerful.” Rem Koolhaas, 2002

    Lagos is fast becoming a global city – a place people visit for curiosity and the vibe as much as for business or family. The mesmerising energy and intensity of the city have to be experienced to be understood. But what is the story of Lagos? When did the city begin? Who were the first inhabitants? When did it become the city of iniquity and wisdom that continues to confound all who encounters it? Who have been the key chroniclers of this real yet imaginary city?

    Veteran journalist and writer Kaye Whiteman has given us a gem that answers these questions and more. Lagos: City of the Imagination explains the origins of Lagos as both outpost of the Benin Empire and also the city run by the White Cap Chiefs. Whiteman shows that Lagos was always multicultural and cosmopolitan, with the Portuguese and later educated returnees from Sierra Leone and artisans from Brazil adding to the eclectic mix.

    The book examines the key moments in the history of Lagos: from the concerted attack by the British in the 1860s, Independence in 1960, the 1966 coup through to FESTAC and the assassination of Murtala Muhammed. Also included are vivid character portraits of some of the most powerful Lagosians in history, from Oba Kosoko and Madam Tinubu, to well-regarded colonial figures such as Sir Bernard Bourdillon and those – like Lord Lugard – not so fondly remembered.

    As the name suggests, Lagos: City of the Imagination deals extensively in those for whom Lagos is the backdrop of their work, from highlife musicians and Fela Kuti to Wole Soyinka and, more recently, the American-Nigerian writer Teju Cole.

    Lagos: City of the Imagination is an absorbing and delightful “must-read” for anyone with an interest in one of the most dramatic cities of the 21st century.

  • My First Coup d’Etat: Memories from the Lost Decades of Africa

    My First Coup D’Etat chronicles the coming-of-age of John Dramani Mahama (former President of Ghana) in Ghana during the dismal post-independence ‘lost decades’ of Africa. He was seven years old when rumours of a coup reached his boarding school in Accra. His father, a minister of state, was suddenly missing, then imprisoned for more than a year.

    My First Coup D’Etat offers a look at the country that has long been considered Africa’s success story. This is a one-of-a-kind book: Mahama’s is a rare literary voice from a political leader, and his stories work on many levels – as fables, as history, as cultural and political analysis, and, of course, as the memoir of a young man who, unbeknownst to him or anyone else, would grow up to be vice president of his nation. Though non-fiction, these are stories that rise above their specific settings and transport the reader – much like the fiction of Isaac Bashevis Singer and Nadine Gordimer – into a world all their own, one which straddles a time lost and explores the universal human emotions of love, fear, faith, despair, loss, longing, and hope despite all else.

    An important literary debut from the then Vice President of Ghana, a fable-like memoir that offers a shimmering microcosm of post-colonial Africa.

    ‘A much welcome work of immense relevance.’ ~ Chinua Achebe

  • Returning to Ghana After a Ph.D

    Returnee experts play a vital role in contributing to the development and progress of their home countries. They can bring back their acquired knowledge, skills, and experiences to support various sectors, including academia, research, industry, entrepreneurship, policy-making, and social development. Their expertise can help drive innovation, improve productivity, foster international collaborations, and contribute to economic growth and social well-being. Albert recounts his experiences as a Ghanaian PhD returnee expert in this book. After his return to Ghana in March 2022, he documents all he went through first-hand. He’s been gone for over 9 years: three years in Nairobi, three months in Arusha, and five years in Bochum. The book also includes interview reports from other returnee Ph.D. professionals who were largely trained overseas and then returned home to help build Ghana. This is our home, but will returnee specialists find a house that will entice them to stay? Many of these are revealed in the book.

  • Manuwa Street

    “Lagos brings you alive. Lagos kills you. Here, you’ll be wrong about everything. Here, you won’t have anything to worry about. Lagos creates as many millionaires as it sends poor people to the mat. Here, Nature abounds as much as it self-destructs. And never, you humans, despite your beliefs and certainties, have you ever wanted to live so much. In the midst of this overflow, this too many people, this too much waste, injustices, parties and excesses. Of everything you’ve tried to ignore until now.”

    French journalist Sophie Bouillon documents living in Lagos in 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdown. As a journalist, she gets out of her night to go and write the dispatch that will announce to the world that Africa, in turn, is affected by this “white virus” that is bringing the West to its knees.

    In this thoughtful narrative non-fiction, Bouillon explores everyday life in Lagos through experiences from her career and personal life. In one unforgettable year, the city was rocked by explosions, evictions and protests. A city that never sleeps put to bed by the pandemic. Manuwa Street is the impressive story of a year that will end with the uprising of a people. It is also and above all a hypnotic and luminous dive into a city that never lets up, meeting men and women struggling with the din of the world.

    But Manuwa Street isn’t just a disinterested documentation of a foreigner’s impression of Lagos; it is about love, uncertainty, hope and survival.

    Manuwa Street

    75.00
  • Tour Guiding: The Ultimate Guide to Theory and Practice

    **Available from 16 October, 2021

    Guides are tourism professionals who lead their guests through the most interesting parts of their region. It is their task to engage visitors and to help interpret the sights that they visit. They please tourists by telling interesting but relevant narratives and respond in proactive ways to their complaints and requests. Guides are trained to always have enough knowledge and insight about the subject of the tour and ensure the safety and satisfaction of their guests.

    In this handy resource book, two seasoned practitioners have combined their working experience of a lifetime. What makes this book priceless is that it is enriched by over two decades of guide training experience as well as engagements with colleague guides, tourism professionals and a cross-section of tourists.

    “The scope of coverage is vast and will be very useful as a general guidebook for any reader seeking access to our history, geography and our rich cultural heritage.” – Mrs. Stella W. Appenteng, CEO, Apstar Tours Limited

    “Tour guiding is a bridging process around which the tourism experience revolves. This book comes to edify our tour guides on the substance and mechanics of their profession. It comes at a time when the industry has become more dynamic and in need of accurate, adequate, culture-nuanced interpretations.” – Tata Nkunu Akyea, Tourism Consultant & Tour Guide Extraordinaire

  • The Imported Ghanaian

    With her rose tinted glasses firmly in place, the Imported Ghanaian deluded herself, believing that she could simply waltz into Kotoka International Airport with a grin like the winning ticket in the national lottery, and the band would strike up whilst the jubilant nation screamed, “Akwaaba-o, akwaaba, our sister has returned back to us.” She returned home thinking she was as Ghanaian as any other and that she would fit in snugly with the skills of a chameleon. The reality proved otherwise as she plunged headfirst into the endurance test of living in Ghana, where nothing is ever what it seems. Layer by layer, as if peeling an onion, each ‘coming back home’ cultural reality weaves her through a world where you can never be too sure, where an invitation is not exactly an invitation, where you have to die to find out how popular you are, and where being a Ghanaian and being Ghanaian are often two opposing concepts.

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