Hypestation Book Premiere: Andrew Oki and Griots Lounge Presents - 'Bonfire of the gods'

Nigeria is truly a land blessed with not just natural resources, but human resources. People who can step up to any challenge and confidently rock any stage around the globe. They continue to wow us with every niche they carve for themselves in nearly every creative field they tread. Literature is one way which our stories are told and preserved. From the masters pen of the Chinua Achebe, to Wole Soyinka to Helon Habila to Sefi Atta and up to the youthful invigorating mind of the award-winning international literary icon Chimamanda Adichie. I could go on and on, but I’ll bring my list to yet another soon-to-be literary luminary, Andrew Eseimokumo Oki!

About Andrew Eseimokumo Oki

Andrew Eseimokumo Oki was born on 17th of May in Nigeria. Having grown up in an interesting family moving from one picaresque place to another in the Niger Delta region, he found his passion for writing in Ibadan while attending boarding school at Command Secondary School, Apata. Writing came quite easy for Andrew. According to Andrew E. Oki, his father was his first literary influence. He credits his father, Fairhurst, to being a literary genius. 

“My father was a great storyteller. His genius in re-enacting fiction got me writing fiction itself. My dad was awesome reader. He would read you a story and it would seem like you are seeing a blockbuster movie.” Andrew said during our interview. He went on to tell HypeStation of those good old days when his father would use the power of literary narrative to transport him and his siblings to places beyond this world in the stories his father told them especially from books his father read. One of such books was the classic “Vendetta: A Story of one forgotten” by Marie Corelli.

Andrew has a double honours bachelor’s degree in English Language and Literature from the University of Benin. 'Bonfires of the gods' is his debut novel. It was first published in India in 2011 by Serene Woods, India and is due for a Nigerian release this August by Griots Lounge, Nigeria the publishing imprint of Yagazie Media Limited. He is presently working on his second novel purely inspired by his stay and extensive research in India. Follow Andrew on twitter @stillandrew and join the discussion on Facebook on www.facebook.com/eseimokumo.

1.     Reveiw of ‘Bonfires of the gods’

It is indeed an arduous task for one to adequately criticize a work such as this; pure, wholesome and raw. So many stories interwoven by blood, violence and a shared experience of the gruesome effect of war; war whether with solid moral, political or religious reason or without any cause whatsoever has the same destructive effect on the very fibre of society, wreaking damage to families, relationships, communities, lives and leaving the same aftermath of nothingness, seeming hopelessness wherein neither on either side of the war wins anyway.

There is no good story or bad story. There are only well written and told stories or there are badly narrated stories. “Bonfires of the gods” is a beautifully told story of a major conflict that formed part of the history of the Ijaw and Itsekiri ethnic groups of Warri in Delta State, Nigeria. Andrew Eseimokumo Oki the writer makes use of thoroughly created characters to give a face and depth to the story and with it creates the most eclectic effect of emotions, he uses the diction as a tool of thought provocation, conviction and imagination.

“The rain poured on. Loud cracking thunderclaps chased after flashes of lightning like children playing catch-a-thief in the hot-and-cold sand banks of the River Niger in Patani.”

The language is constructed beautifully with metaphors that blend into the story like a good African weave.

War.

War is the major theme of the novel, and the reader is kept fully aware of the gravity of the situation, the pointlessness of the conflict and the drastic turnaround for the worse of the lives caught in its claws.

-          Review written by Chukwunonso Iwuchukwu.

Andrew Eseimokumo Oki

On his inspiration he says, “Life inspired me to write ‘Bonfires of the gods’. Over the years after 1997 (and after the subsequent ethnic clashes that have happened) it occurred to me that the story (or stories of people) of the ethnic clashes have never really been told. My passion to tell these stories became heightened in late 2009 and that was when I began my research towards writing “Bonfires of the gods”. The research was quite simple. I armed myself with a pen, a notepad and a small tape recorder and hit the streets. The quest I asked was simple: “where you in Warri in 1997?” If the answers were “yes”, it would lead me to stories never before told.  I needed to tell these stories. They were stories about lives; about me!”

He continues, “Well, ‘Bonfires of the gods’ was never written as a form of political propaganda. It doesn’t attempt to answer the questions of “who said what”, “who did what”, and “to whom what was done”. It’s a novel that simply tells about lives thrown before an unexpected war. The very plot of “Bonfires of the gods” is set with the Warri Crisis of 1997 at the backdrop of the story.”