Home | Whole Planet Foundation



2016 Q3 Book Review – Zoe SoBook: The Orchard of Lost Souls (Fiction)Author: Nadifa MohammedTopic: Somaliland, Somali Civil WarThis book is set in 1988 in Hargeisa. The story follows three women, Deqo, Kawsar, and Filsan, through the turbulent period leading up to the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in the northwest region of the country. Deqo is a young orphan who was born in a refugee camp near the Ethiopian border, then abandoned by her mother. Kawsar is a middle-aged widow and long-time resident of Hargeisa. Filsan is a female soldier from Mogadishu, whose father is a once famous but now disgraced military man. These three women are from different age groups and socioeconomic classes, and through them we experience different perspectives of the pre-war tensions.Their lives collide at the beginning of the story, which opens at the anniversary celebrations in Hargeisa commemorating 18 years after the revolution through which the ruling Communist military dictatorship came into power. Filsan is in Hargeisa to help quell the rising rebellion, and is overseeing the anniversary celebrations. Kawsar, like everyone else in Hargeisa, is compelled to participate. She sits in the audience with her friends. Deqo, along with others from the refugee camp, travel into Hargeisa to perform during the festivities. During the dance performance, she freezes; her whole troupe is embarrassed. She is taken aside and reprimanded and beaten by the troupe leader. Kawsar see this unfold and tries to intercede, causing an altercation. Filsan then steps in to stop the disruption, but Kawsar is feeling rebellious and does not respond obediently. Kawsar is arrested by Filsan, and beaten at the police station. At the end of this opening sequence, Kawsar has been beaten so badly that she cannot walk; she eventually returns home but is bedridden for the remainder of the story. Deqo runs away and fends for herself, by turns living off the street and staying at a brothel as a cleaner. Filsan follows her ambitions to become a military leader for the regime but gets nowhere, in part because of her gender. I chose this book because I didn’t know much about the history of Somaliland. This story touches on the historical context of the war between Ethiopia and Somalia over Ogaden, the resulting weakening of the Barre revolutionary regime in Somalia, the rise of rebellion in Somaliland with support from Ethiopia, and the resulting escalation of conflict. Beyond the historical grounding, the book also captures the sense of disillusionment and disconnectedness between the people of Hargeisa and the military dictatorship. The “Orchard of Lost Souls” refers to a grove of trees next to Kawsar’s house. Kawsar has buried many of her own children, mostly as newborns and infants. She planted a fruit tree at each of their graves, and the graveyard has become an orchard. False starts and lost opportunities – from circumstances beyond a character’s control and as a direct result of a character’s decisions -- are constant themes in this story. The character’s broken paths are implicitly, and sometimes explicitly, intertwined with the equally broken paths of Somalia and Somaliland throughout the story. In one passage, Filsan reflects on her childhood, caught between her controlling father, once a decorated solider; and her mother, who left her father and the family when Filsan was still young. Filsan’s father accepted her mother’s request for a divorce, but only if he could keep Filsan in his care, and “from then on the child had become their little Ogaden, their little piece of disputed earth.” (p258) Hargeisa and Somalia are engaged in literal territorial disputes, while the characters are engaged in existential territorial disputes defined or constrained by their genders, histories, and the political context.In the end, it is Deqo, the refugee child living on her own, who brings together Filsan and Kawsar, and they flee together into Ogaden to create a new family and life, in a refugee camp across the border. ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download