A Girl From Zanzibar [Paperback]

Roger King (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 15, 2002

“A headstrong heroine zigzags from Zanzibar to America in Roger King’s daring new novel.”—Elaina Richardson, O magazine

“There is no safe haven, this brilliant, prescient novel suggests.”—Suzanne Ruta, The New York Times

Winner of the Bay Area Book Reviewers Association Award for Best Novel 2002.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The Western idea of exoticism is turned upside down in A Girl from Zanzibar, a cool, cosmopolitan novel by Roger King (Sea Level, etc.). Marcella D'Souza, a "Goan Indian Portuguese Arab African of Catholic Moslem parentage," displays early entrepreneurial talent, running a small taxi business and then an ice cream stand with her aunt in Zanzibar. She soon seizes the chance to move to London, where she parlays her skills into a small real estate empire and becomes involved with Benji, a Singaporean Indian who hatches grand, shady international schemes. An unfortunate encounter lands Marcella in jail for eight years, and when she gets out she wangles herself a job as an associate professor of Multicultural Studies at a small college in Vermont. From this college she reflects on the odd twists and turnings of her life, the strangest perhaps being her sojourn in snowy, peaceful-and yes, exotic-Vermont.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Marcella D'Souza's migratory life takes her from her native Zanzibar to London and Vermont as she falls in love with an arms dealer, works as a real estate broker, and eventually builds a fortune. Of mixed Goan, Arab, Portuguese, and East African descent, Marcella is beautiful, bright, and business-minded. But she quickly loses everything when she is arrested and wrongly convicted of a drug charge. While in prison for eight years, Marcella gets a formal education and later becomes a college professor of multicultural studies. At the end of this fascinating tale, she is on the road again, traveling all over America and still searching for a place to call home. Born in England and himself well traveled over four continents, King offers wonderful descriptions of distant places. The easy, fluid writing style of his other novels (e.g., Horizontal Hotel) is evident here. Recommended for public and academic libraries.
Lisa Rohrbaugh, East Palestine Memorial P.L., OH
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Helen Marx Books / Books & Co (November 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1885586604
• ISBN-13: 978-1885586605
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,469,088 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A glorious read, December 19, 2002

By 

D. Parker "mykarma" (Lederach, PA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: A Girl From Zanzibar (Paperback)

The wanderings of Marcella D'Souza, the protagonist of Roger King's brilliant new novel, have begun in her native Zanzibar; taken her to the bustling, multi-ethnic streets of Bayswater, London; and finally deposited her in a quiet college town in snowy Vermont, where she has been assigned to teach a vaguely-defined course in "multi-cultural studies." Looking back on her odyssey, she has this observation: "I think I have the making of a new theory here. Maybe these days, everything is so international, there's always an advantage in being from somewhere else. What is important is not local knowledge, but foreign knowledge. If the whole world is in motion, then the world's displaced are those who stay at home." "Those who stay at home" have had little role to play in Marcella's world. As a naive, ambitious newcomer to London--the New York Times calls her a "modern-day Candide"--she falls in with a group of equally peripatetic friends, people whose racial identity, national origin, and even religious affiliations can only be expressed via a long series of adjectives: "I've got it," an earnest British friend remarks of Marcella herself, "You're a Goan Indian Portuguese Arab African of Catholic Moslem parentage." This group of friends, living a hustling and often exuberant existence in the immigrants' netherworld of Thatcher's England, contains elements that the reader rightfully suspects will pull Marcella into dangerous waters. And indeed, from the novel's first page we know that she will end up serving time in prison for an unnamed crime. But the novel unfolds with such luminous grace, effortlessly moving us from scenes of the past, into the present, and back again yet more years, that we surrender to its shifting timeline without impatience. Instead, our knowledge of Marcella and her world becomes more richly layered. Our deepening understanding makes the novel's final revelations far more satisfying then if they had been disclosed earlier. A gloriously enjoyable novel, and one that adds to the reader's perception of a world that exists, if below the radar, in the most ordinary corners of the U.S. and Europe today.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Read this book!, December 13, 2002

By 

phillyreader (Philadelphia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Girl From Zanzibar (Paperback)

If the shape of a life is determined by what one chooses to notice, maybe its trajectory is determined by what one fails to notice. In a world where nothing and no one are what they seem, Marcella D'Souza, intelligent, beautiful and determined, flees the haunted shores of her native Zanzibar to build a new life amidst an ad hoc family of ambitious immigrants in London. In this politically volatile, multi-cultural landscape where no one truly "belongs" Marcella finds love and an unexpected sense of belonging. The life she designs is satisfying and successful, but ultimately falls prey to the hidden designs of others. Multiple schemes, misapprehended systems and coincidence conspire, collide and explode into chaos. But Roger King, through his intriguing protagonist, seems to be saying that even chaos is illusive. "Disorder is only order we can't see, and coincidences are the evidence." Once betrayed, imprisoned and presently living in quiet exile, Marcella is once again reinventing herself in a foreign world, this time as a professor of Multi-cultural studies at a small Vermont College. From this temporary sanctuary she explores the graceful havoc of her personal history in a voice both poignant and utterly devoid of self-pity. "I had failed to read the signs. I had looked up and out when I should have looked down and in. I watched my front when I should have watched my back. I only noticed that...I failed to correctly evaluate... overlooked... misheard...mistook...I had only myself to blame." But personal responsibility, like personal history, is not so easily traced in a world of blurred borders.

Roger King is an adept magician weaving an intricate web in time. Marcella's tumultuous history casts sticky threads into an uncertain future and her present is delicately balanced between the two. The drama that unfolds when timelines meet is powerful -- it's unpredictable and yet somehow manages to deliver a mysterious sense of inevitability. Along the way, King's complex assortment of characters, all enchanting and unsavory in varying degrees, are rendered with profound compassion and insight. It's deeply satisfying reading.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You won't be able to put it down!, January 13, 2003

By 

artemis "artemis" - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Girl From Zanzibar (Paperback)

One of the most grabbing, well written books I've read in a long time. It was especially intriguing as I read it while on holiday in Zanzibar! A definite read for anyone going there, and for anyone interested in a really good read.