My Destiny, My Choice and Hidden Sparkle by Idris Bankole Sulaiman: SYNW Books of the Month (September 2020)

 

MY DESTINY, MY CHOICE AND HIDDEN SPARKLE BY IDRIS BANKOLE SULAIMAN: SYNW BOOKS OF THE MONTH (SEPTEMBER 2020)

MY DESTINY, MY CHOICE

My Destiny, My Choice is a didactic play. It is written with a strong conviction to lift teenagers out mental dungeons that our society has put them. In these days when glamorous lifestyle seems the other of the day, the play tries to point the youth to a better path: path where hard work pays. The play paints the picture that the future is a piece of blank paper and each of us, with our actions and inaction, writes what we want our future to be; hence, the title of the play.

   The play employs lateral plots of two youths in the same tertiary institution. Akeju Oriowo, a son of a wealthy man, who chooses to waste his childhood basking in the euphoria of his father's wealth, rather than his studies. Fate plays a fast one on him when his parents died tragically in an auto crash and the lawyer reveals to him that his father's estate had suffered terribly during a recent recession and the old man had turned to banks to keep his business afloat. And now the banks own everything the he left behind. However, his father sets aside a sizable amount for his education which he can only access if he succeeds in his coming examination. Abandon by friends and girlfriends, Akeju bites his finger in utter regret.

   On the other hand, is Beeko Onilari, an orphan boy, who owes his education to a local church from their village. Beeko receives sad news from the Bishop of the church that they will not be able to fund his education further than the college. He is told he may have to take up some kind of job to be able to go to the University. About the time, the Provost of the College informs the students that a novel scholarship scheme has come the way of the institution for the best overall student that session. Beeko puts himself to task to win the scholarship. In the end, he is able to win it due to his sheer will power.

   The play is clearly an entertaining piece of writing. It is enjoyable to read and even better as stage play where the students acted out the roles themselves.

HIDDEN SPARKLE

Hidden Sparkle is a motivational play at the same time an educative one. It employs perfectly scripted dialogue to teach the students how to get the best out of their studies with well-researched psychological and philosophical facts.

   The play captures the struggle of a child with learning disability. Bodunde Oni, final year student in a secondary school, he is being maligned both at home and at school. His teachers are fed up with him in the school so they promote him so as to ease him out of school. At home, his father, Mr Oni has had enough. He has only his mother to support him. At school, one teacher in particular, biology teacher, Mr. Mongudu, makes it his business to remind him every time that he can never amount to anything in life academically. When the time for SSCE registration approaches an angel is sent to him in form of a female student, Chimamanda, who just transferred to the school. She is a girl ahead of his age having come from a educational privileged family. She decides to make friends Bodunde and counsel him on steps to take to make the best of one's studies. Eventually, Bodunde makes progress, slowly at first but get better with time. He graduates from the secondary schools and goes on to study Medicine and Surgery at the University and later becomes a Neurosurgeon. The play concludes when, Mr Mongudu, in his old age , suffers Parkinson    disease and Bodunde, now a doctor, is brought in to treat him. Whatever mind can conceive, it can achieve is the ultimate lesson from the play and that no one is defeated until he or she acknowledges the defeat.

   The play is very easy  to perform in a school environment or on any occasion. It is entertaining as it is educative and the lessons learnt stays with the students forever.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

The Author, Idris Bankole Sulaiman, hails from Osogbo in Osun State. He is an educator per excellence. He is also a scriptwriter as well as playwright. He believes in educating our youths right by having the common sense to tell them the truth about where our country and continent presently stands.

Pollution by Ademola Ayomide Miracle: SYNW Book of the Month (August 2020)

POLLUTION BY ADEMOLA AYOMIDE MIRACLE: SYNW BOOK OF THE MONTH (AUGUST 2020)

Many definitions of pollution are usually restricted to contamination of the physical and concrete world only ignoring the social and abstract world. A review of the origin and previous usage of the word "pollution" report that it originally means corruption, defilement, soil or desecrate. It is a common saying that our world is highly corrupted as a result of accumulated social debris in our daily activities.

The 73 page book defined pollution in respect to the concrete and abstract world. Agreeing with the popularly known definition; environmental contamination and also making emphasis on the forgotten old meaning; contamination of the world through bad behaviors.

The message was passed across through the story of a young man that embarked on a mysterious journey. The book contains nine chapters explaining different phases of his journey and reality of our world. The mystery of his journey was solved with enlightenment to what pollution really means through reading of books, simplicity of mind, and willingness to learn and relearn.

Pollution addressed and explained the dangers of several overlooked social activities that have been polluting mankind inwardly and are responsible for many humanity catastrophes through the story of a young man that got enlightened on the negative effects of physical and social pollution. This book does not only analyse the trend of how corrupt things have been normalized from the past to the present but also give an insight of what could happen in the future. Most importantly providing solutions to the problems by laying great emphasis on how collective individualistic positive change can make the world a better place.

Ademola Ayomide Miracle is currently an undergraduate of Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta studying nutrition and dietetics. He is an alumnus of Federal Polytechnic, Ede where he earned a diploma in the same course.

He is a passionate young man committed to making Nigeria and the world in general a better place through health and nutrition advocacy, writing, entrepreneurship, climate change advocacy, and other opportunities that shall be available. And to effect these, he is member and ambassador of several organizations.

Ripostes of Locked Down Voices: SYNW Book of the Month (July 2020)

 RIPOSTES OF LOCKED DOWN VOICES: SYNW BOOK OF THE MONTH (JULY 2020)

 

 This is an international anthology of poems and essays on Coronavirus.

The fight against the novel Coronavirus has become a global affray that requires the collective effort of every creature –writers inclusive –and the application of every efficacious weapon at man’s disposal– pen inclusive. This is buttressed by Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s age-long aphorism that ‘pen is mightier than sword’.

Unarguably, this basically informed this journey to this classic anthology – the quest to employ the weapon of pen in the fight against Coronavirus.

In response to our Call for Submission which lasted for 30 days, a total of 249 beautiful poems and essays were received from writers from different countries of the world, jostling for space in the anthology. However, after a series of vetting, the editorial team found 97 entries worthy for the anthology, particularly with regard to adherence to the theme. 

These writers, employing the tool of creativity, and toeing the path of experience and art diversity, masterfully dissect the theme, unleash their ripostes and make headway towards defeating the world’s latest enemy – Coronavirus. It was the conglomeration of these ninety-six classical works of these writers that gave birth to this masterpiece – Ripostes of Locked Down Voices, which is a must-read for everyone.

Obviously, with this publication, another feat has indeed been recorded in this global fight against the monstrous virus christened ‘COVID-19’. And this will hauntingly stand as global writers’ common ‘voice’ and ‘punch’ in this universal fight, even for generations to come. 

 

Arrows of Words: SYNW Book of the Month (JUNE 2020)

ARROWS OF WORDS: SYNW BOOK OF THE MONTH (MAY 2020)

“Arrows of Words” is a poetry/essay anthology published in honour of Prof. Chinua Achebe, by an association of young writers, known as the Society of Young Nigerian Writers (Anambra State Chapter).

It was edited by Izunna Okafor and unveiled during the 2019 edition of the Chinua Achebe Literary Festival, which is the association’s annual literary event held in honour of the foremost Nigerian writer and critic – Achebe.

Published in 2019, the anthology contains works and essays written and submitted by writers from different countries of the world, in response to the association’s ‘Call for Submissions’ prior to the 2016, 2017 and 2018 editions of the event respectively. These works previously published respectively as separate collections, each in its year’s edition of the event.

However, in 2019, there was no fresh ‘Call for Submission’, rather, the three previous separate collections were collated and published as a single anthology; and that gave birth to this masterpiece, entitled “Arrows of Words”.

City of Smoke: SYNW Book of the Month (May 2020)

CITY OF SMOKE: SYNW BOOK OF THE MONTH (MAY 2020)

A REVIEW BY ABUBAKAR SULEIMAN MUHD

Mujahid’s collection contains five short stories centering on female experiences. In each story we have a woman battling forces around her, pushing her into a marriage without her consent, or aguishly attending to the demands of her duties. The collection aptly captures the dominant issues of a typical northern home: marriage and procreation on one hand, and loveless and arranged marriage on the other. This is not only happening in the lower class strata but also in the elite circle where the rich parents decide the fate of their children; the only difference is that the children of the elite have a way of neutralizing the marriage and living it under false pretense, funcuckolding and all. 

It’s difficult to know, but the woman’s consent that Islam gives to the women seems to be only in theory in our society. What happened in the past was that some women went into loveless marriage on the pronouncements of their parents. While in the present, especially in elite and middle class circle, some women go into marriage as chattels, as commodity in exchange for the debt that their parents owe, or as some bond for some kind of material gain or business link. Stories abound like this and I believe this is what gives integrity to Mujahid’s stories.

Told in second person point of view, the first story “Questions to the Mirror” is about a nameless voice forced into an arranged marriage. She is in anguish and pain. She stands before the mirror and shoots out questions to herself regarding the possible options that she lacks.

If her society considers that marriage is not only about physical growth, as it is not only about biology as our people are wont to see, she would have been spared the pain. Marriage involves chemistry, bonding, emotional attachment and readiness. The woman and the man need to be psychologically ready for a happy and successful marriage, but it seems all the people in the stories don’t consider the feeling and opinion of the girl child. 

Why I seem to expend considerable energy railing against arranged marriage is because some people want to corner me except that I stand arms akimbo and fight them, though I am yet to see my end, lol. Nonetheless, it is not entirely bad if the spouse is one that blink in your radar and one you will still marry if you were to meet in Mars. 

“First Love” features an unnamed character whose parents are preparing to get her into an arranged marriage. She has a lover who she plans to elope with but who instead impregnates her and runs away to the city, leaving her in ruin and rubbles of her life. 

Each woman in the collection has some burden to carry, from the family being disturbed by the news of their son in Boko Haram conscription in “Leaving Borno” to a woman who is forced into violence from antagonism and tension in intermarriage between two different ethnic groups in “Dear Husband”, especially in a polygamous home.“Wingless Bird” is about forced marriage and the faith in bad luck that a woman can bring to a man. A woman is married to a man; there is no love between them. She is married to him as an article in return of material gain for her parents and the school fees of her siblings. Bad luck hits him as per his business and the man blames the woman for his mishap. 

All in all, City of Smoke captures matrimonial experiences of the female figures and their struggle in patriarchal society that thinks the first female need is marriage. The book follows in the footsteps of Zainab Alkali’s Cobwebs and Other Stories, that some matrimonial homes are some state of bondage, that women are mostly pressured into marriage, that they are infantilized and must serve as sex objects to their men. Back to back they are faced with choicelessness. In Alkali’s work, however, the women are depicted to have education as their liberation power.

One deceitful thing about this book is that the title doesn’t rhyme with the stories. I thought I would be encountering stories about burning and raging inferno and terror of Boko Haram but it is predominantly about the matrimonial battles. I don’t know why the collection is titled City of Smoke instead of some name that goes way better, maybe Wingless Bird if I may suggest.

Abubakar Suleiman Muhd

 

Abubakar Suleiman Muhd writes from Kano Nigeria. He’s a graduate of English and Literary Studies from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.