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Walking With Abel: Journey with the Nomads of the African Savannah

(Paperback)


Publishing Details

Full Title:

Walking With Abel: Journey with the Nomads of the African Savannah

Contributors:

By (Author) Anna Badkhen

ISBN:

9780399576010

Publisher:

Penguin Putnam Inc

Imprint:

Penguin Putnam Inc

Publication Date:

1st August 2016

Country:

United States

Classifications

Readership:

General

Fiction/Non-fiction:

Non Fiction

Main Subject:
Other Subjects:

Ethnic studies
Social and cultural history
Travel writing

Dewey:

306.896623

Physical Properties

Physical Format:

Paperback

Number of Pages:

320

Dimensions:

Width 140mm, Height 210mm

Description

The Fulani are the largest surviving group of nomads on the planet. In Walking With Abel, Anna Badkhen embeds herself with a family of Fulani cowboys in Mali, experiencing first-hand a way of life that has endured for centuries. Dubbing her Anna Ba and embracing her as one of their own, the nomads take her along as they embark on their annual migration across the West African Sahel, herding their cattle from their dry season camp to their rainy season camp and back. Badkhen narrates her hosts' journeys, and her own, with compassion and keen observation.

Reviews

Praise for Walking with Abel:

Named a Top Summer Reading Pick by the Los Angeles Times, Playboy, Esquire, Christian Science Monitor, Vol 1. Brooklyn,BBC.com,and Mental Floss

Badkhen's rich and lucid prose illustrates her journey as vividly as might a series of photographs By the time readers put the book down, they will have done something remarkable: visited a mostly inhospitable but eminently seductive locale alongside a storyteller able to render the strange and different both familiar and engrossing. Walking With Abelnot only takes us somewhere new, it viscerally reminds us that such places still exist in the world. Christian Science Monitor

Fascinatinghighly ambitious and deeply profound. Los Angeles Times

Lyrical [and] meditative[a] tender tribute to a people deeply rooted in the land. Boston Globe

"[D]isplays the skill of a writer accustomed to telling the stories of those living unimaginable lives. Ms. Magazine

[Badkhen] who was given the Fulani name Anna B, describes all in graceful prose, word paintings that approach poetrynearly perfect. Minneapolis Star-Tribune

"Fascinating." -The Brian Lehrer Show

EnthrallingWalking with Abel is essential reading. Dayton Daily News

Staggeringly vivid poetic, and tactile...[Walking with Abel] amasses much of its strength from isolated movements taken together. Its a subtle path, but a deeply effective one. Biographile

"Extraordinarily poetic." -BBC.com

[The Fulani] live in the here and now in ways the modern world has lost even the memory of, and their story, told with deftly measured, evocative prose and poetically precise detail, slows the reader down to consider just what that means Badkhen infuses her story with the kind of authenticity only a fellow traveler can know. BookPage

"We swooned over Anna Badkhen's writing the way we did for Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers." Shelf Awareness

"Vivid, memorable nonfiction." Playboy

A careful rendering of one of the worlds last remaining migratory peoples [Badkhen] uses her credentials as a war reporter with tact, reconditioning readers whose only context for West Africa and perhaps the continent is that of violence She situates the Fulani in relief across centuries and physical space [and] her richly detailed and delivered observations are crafted with a careful ear for the rhythms of language. The Los Angeles Review of Books

"An engrossing look into an alien world from the perspective of a writer with a unique story of her own. Philadelphia Inquirer

Lyrical Badkhen combines journalistic observation with deep feelingThe Fulani are individuals, not archetypes. Their journey is both beautiful and difficult tenderly render[ed][and] exquisitely written. Publisher's Weekly (starred)

"In lyrical and evocative prose, Badkhen writes of the beauty of the land and the sky and the grace and wisdom of the peoplereaders [will] savor her gentle, elegant story. Kirkus Reviews

[Badken] mak[es] Fulani culture come alive as she follows the herders daily efforts to cope with drought, disease, and death in an often unforgiving landscape...[Walking with Abel] will appeal to anyone interested in Africas nomadic peoples and readers of memoirs such as Cheryl Strayeds Wild. Library Journal

[Badkhen] vividly captures and communicates an increasingly rare and wondrous experience. Booklist

"Walking with Abelis a rare and extraordinary book. Anna Badkhen writes with so much precision and soul that practically every line delivers its own revelation. This intrepid writer has given us more than a window into an ancient, and possibly doomed, way of life; she digs down to the very core of what it means to be human. Ben Fountain, author, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, winner of the National Book Critics' Circle Award and finalist for the National Book Award

"Lucid, generous, and rugged, Badkhen has written a magisterial book which speaks to us as a species in the early twenty-first century - where have we walked from and where are we walking."
J.M. Ledgard, author of Submergence

Sumptuously narrated, Badkhens sojourn compels you to ponder the existential centers of lifelove and loss, loyalty and betrayal, courage and fear. At the end of this riveting tale, the reader not only knows something about the fascinating particularities of Fulani being-in-the -world, but is also inspired by the indomitable resilience of the human spirit.
Paul Stoller, author of Yayas Story: The Quest for Well-Being in the World

An amazing saga among the nomadic Fulani in the African Sahel. Badkhens account is a wondrous tableau of survival in one of the planets toughest environments, threaded with history, legend, and a wealth of stories.
Wayne White, Middle East Institute

Author Bio

Anna Badkhen has written about wars on four continents, including the conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and Chechnya. Her reporting has appeared in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The New Republic, Foreign Policy, and other publications. She is the author of several books of nonfiction, most recently The World Is a Carpet- Four Seasons in an Afghan Village.

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