Publisher – Neon Hemlock

Published – Out Now

Price - £9.58 paperback £5.91 Kindle eBook

Nyokabi's world unravels after her brother Baraka's death by suicide. When an eccentric auntie gives Nyokabi a potion that sends her back in time to when Baraka was still alive, it becomes her only goal to keep him that way. Nyokabi learns that storytellers may be the carriers of time, but defying the past comes with its own repercussions.

Content Warning – this review will be discussing suicide and mental health issues

I am not sure fantasy has great way of handling death. Oh we get big sacrifices, final stands and the end of villains but death is ultimately an event, a plot device and the consequences of death are glossed over and in some cases quickly reversed. The impact of death is more often motivation especially for those male heroes seeking vengeance for their lost wives, sisters, mothers, daughters or insert any other form of relationship. But death has many more impacts the impact of grief has a much wider and more long-term result so many stories overlook. In Shingai Njeri Kagunda’s exceptional novella And This Is How To Stay Alive we get an ambitious poignant tale exploring death, culture, and magic in a powerful and yet realistic way,

In present day Nigeria Nyokabi and her family are mourning the sudden death of her younger brother Baraka who committed suicide. At a family gathering before the funeral, she meets her infamous aunt “Mad-ma-Nyasi” who offers a potion that she says could save her brother’s wife. Nyokabi discovers she has the ability to briefly travel back in time in her own younger body, but she is also part of a wider family curse/ability that reflects some much more widely the intolerance of the wider society stretching back many decades.

This story stuns as it opens out quite a focused gaze on Nyokabi and her family. From Nyokabi’s shock, pain and guilt at not being able to present her death and her parents untangling their grief from the knowledge that their son both being gay and also wanting a career in the theatre was viewed as a disappointment or someone making all the wrong choices and yet they both loved him. We witness the cruel comments of the family muttered when people don’t think anyone will hear it. As such when Nyokbi gets a chance to potentially reverse things then we totally understand her desperation to find a way. But what impresses me is this novella does not offer magical cures for death. Indeed, as we move though chapters and narrators one of whom we find is the force of Time itself! and this opens up a wide tale of Nyokabi’s family and we find she is not the first or even the second woman with this ability.

Death in this story is told as a consequence of society. Be it the issues of the war for independence; intolerance of mental illness or just being in the wrong place at the wrong time in a country with limited health services. Baraka’s death itself is trigger by homophobia, bullying and being constantly felt to being a family disappointment. In Nyokabi’s short trips back to key moments we see you can’t fix everything that leads to such a moment. To do so you’d have to fix the world and keep on fixing it and that’s not easy. That is probably not possible for anyone although the story ends open-ended but offering a cautionary tale for those who try too much.

What really impressed me throughout is the way that Kagunda weaves language and different perspectives into the story. Not just the way that language is used to create the family bonds that are said and unsaid; but also, that the story shifts from prose to verse to small scenes in local dialect. Kagunda is using very carefully to give each scene of this story full impact. The emotions of grief, a beautiful moment with a loved one a last great day; displaying anger, the last moments of a life, a relationship lived and ended – all these small scenes are given their moment and with Time narrating sections the message is that life is always precious, messy and had endings. All of which impacts future events in ways and not all of them good. Magic here is not a device to reverse death but used to explore should we even try? It also acts as a reminder that life and death are not just for us but something each generation has to experience for their first time and decide how to deal with it. Can you move on, are you trapped in an endless cycle of grief; or can you use death to move forward? The power of stories to tell us about the people we have lost is noted as its own magical gift and perhaps the better cure for grief.

This novella was a gorgeous read. Thoughtful, sensitive and makes the reader explore their own reactions to death and grief. I was mesmerised by the use of language that is both poetical and delivers the tale with such impact. I strongly recommend you pick this tale up and from a Subjective Chaos viewpoint it delivers everything I’m looking for in a great novella!