"Peppered with chatty observations from his own travels, and with a merciless eye for hypocrisy and cruelty, Májà -Pearce goes deep into the torturous history that makes this complex region both endlessly fascinating and so hard to pacify." -- Tim Cocks, author of Lagos: Supernatural City"Few nonfiction writers can merge their own life story with West Africa's and have it all make sense quite like Adéwálé Májà -Pearce, who's made it his trademark. Simply, a compelling read." -- Femke van Zeijl, journalist and writer"With incisive wit, Adéwálé Májà -Pearce offers a lucid and unsparing account of the tragedies that beset West Africa, from the legacies of slavery and colonialism to the incompetence and corruption of postcolonial states. A must-read book and a model for writing on contemporary Africa." -- Adom Getachew, author of Worldmaking after Empire: The Rise and Fall of Self-Determination"A tour of West Africa by a restive writer with no illusions. His account of his overnight stay in a Togolese jail gets to the heart of his aversion to post-colonial African regimes and his empathy with their citizens." -- Jeremy Harding, Contributing Editor, London Review of Books, and author of Analogue Africa: Notes on the Anti-Colonial Imagination"There is a quiet rage in Adéwálé Májà -Pearce's writing.

With dark humor and unflinching social criticism, he tells a personal story that intersects with the collective narrative. In doing so, he takes us to a deeper understanding of West Africa's broken trajectory." -- Véronique Tadjo, author of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize-winning In the Company of Men.