Ghostroots

The supernatural looms over the grime and sweat of everyday life in Lagos in this dazzling collection of stories from a prize-winning young Nigerian writer.

'You'll find it hard to tear yourself away' Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of The Three of Us

'Each story is a tiny wonder' Kirsty Logan, author of The Unfamiliar

'Marvellously unsettling' Kelly Link, author of The Book of Love

'An astonishing talent' Lauren Groff, author of The Vaster Wilds

The Lagos of these twelve sinister and beguiling stories is multi-faceted, peopled by Pentecostal Christians and exasperated atheists; by tight-knit extended families and struggling single fathers. Here are characters cursed by guilt, bound by the ties of ancestors and community; or enchanted by the allure of mysticism and would-be prophets. There are gossips and party girls - and a schoolboy followed home by a group of tribal masquerades, cloaked in feathers and twinkling beads. Yes, his mother has warned him not to bring strangers home, but he is sure she will understand ...

Exploring the dark borders between psychology and superstition, these feverishly imaginative stories of trauma, betrayal, terror and love lay bare the forces of myth, tradition, gender, sexuality and modernity in Nigerian society. Powered by a deep empathy, and glinting with humour and insight, they announce a major new literary talent.

The eerie and the everyday are perfectly aligned in these twelve stories set in the hustle and bustle of Lagos in Nigeria ... excellently uncanny Daily Mail
A thrilling work by a truly sublime and imaginative writer. 'Pemi Aguda's stories are both absorbing and terrifying in the most delightful and addictive way ... you'll find it hard to tear yourself away from the pages -- Ore Agbaje-Williams, author of The Three of Us
Beautifully strange and delightfully unexpected, each story is a tiny wonder. I'm desperate to read more from 'Pemi Aguda -- Kirsty Logan, author of The Unfamiliar
Ghostroots is the kind of collection you dream of discovering and reading - from one of my favorite living writers Jeff VanderMeer, author of Hummingbird Salamander
A marvellously unsettling collection where the everyday strangeness of life and the uncanny rub up against each other to create real fire Kelly Link, author of White Cat, Black Dog
'Pemi Aguda is an astonishing talent. She's inventive with form and playful with sentences. In Ghostroots, the delightful speculative conceits of the stories are elegantly, even architecturally, balanced with the gorgeous fullness of human emotion, all the hunger and longing and fear and delight of being a human being in the world. A wonderful collection from a truly gifted writer Lauren Groff, author of The Vaster Wilds
'Pemi Aguda is spectacular. This book is a big, strong river. Once you are caught in its currents, you flow with it no matter where it runs. And it runs through gorgeous and startling places Luis Alberto Urrea, author of Good Night, Irene
In this perceptive and astute collection, 'Pemi Aguda tells of the metaphysical cracks on the surface of contemporary Nigerian society with an uncompromising humane touch -- Emmanuel Iduma, author of I Am Still With You
Here you'll find breathtaking stories of the familiar and the strange, full of empathy for characters trying to bridge chasms between communities, families, generations, and their ghosts. 'Pemi Aguda builds worlds with blade-like acuity. You'll be caught in their sway and transported. -- Diane Cook, author of The New Wilderness
I loved everything about this book, which heralds a major and extraordinary new voice in fiction. 'Pemi Aguda knows where the real magic is, and she gives it all its gorgeousness, all its teeth. These stories consumed me. I'll be thinking about them for years to come -- Clare Beams, author of The Garden
Ghostroots is a triumph! The author's strong storytelling skills give readers the gift of realistic characters and darkly imaginative stories that creep under your skin and stay buried there. Disturbing, enthralling and unforgettable. 'Pemi Aguda is now among my favourites. -- Tananarive Due, author of The Reformatory
Where to even start? This is one of the finest collections I have read. Inventive, cunning, original, and all conveyed with impeccable prose. And what a voice, what a unique vision. These stories read like only 'Pemi Aguda could have written them, with her distinct style and an unshakable sensibility evident in every sly turn of story, taking the narrative in perfect, unpredictable directions. Nothing short of phenomenal -- Lesley Nneka Arimah, author of What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky
The 12 thought-provoking speculative stories, featuring mostly women protagonists, a strong narrative voice, and a focus on the unsettling results of generational divides, lay bare the universal human experience, illuminating the menace that constantly lurks just below the surface ... Aguda's excellent story collection deserves a wide audience Library Journal
Wildly inventive and odd, but written with surgeonlike precision, these stories herald the arrival of a major voice in speculative fiction New York Times Book Review
Mesmerizing and unsettling ... a smart, playful, and compassionate collection worthy of repeated reads Vulture (The Best Books of 2024)
Magic and mayhem on the streets of Lagos ... Aguda stirs her cauldron of social criticism, feminism, structural invention and grotesque gothic twists into a triumph of genre-bending storytelling, a kind of African uncanny all of her own ... thrilling and disturbing Financial Times
Haunted and blazingly original Poets and Writers
An instant classic. Ghostroots is an elegantly constructed, breathtakingly beautiful, numinous collection of stories that present emotional blueprints of the Lagosian soul as a way of investigating the larger human condition Locus
Impeccably voiced and consistently unsettling ... a must-read Ancillary Review of Books

'Pemi Aguda is from Lagos, Nigeria. She is the winner of the 2020 Deborah Rogers Foundation Writers' Award and a graduate of the Zell MFA program at the University of Michigan. Her work has been published in American Short Fiction, Granta, One Story, Ploughshares, Zoetrope and The Best Short Stories 2022 and 2023: The O. Henry Prize Winners, edited by Valeria Luiselli (2022) and Lauren Groff (2023), among other publications.

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