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Nadifa Mohamed Hargeisa 1981 • Somalian author full text search: the ledge - flash version* *	Nadifa Mohamed was born in Hargeisa (now in the Republic of Somaliland) in 1981, while Somalia was falling deeper into dictatorship. In 1986 she moved to London with her family in what she thought was a temporary move, but ended up staying permanently when war broke out in Somalia. She studied History and Politics at Oxford and then returned to London, where	she still lives. Her first novel, Black Mamba Boy, based on her father's memories of his travels in the 1930s, was published in 2010. It was longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Dylan Thomas Prize and won the 2010 Betty Trask Prize. She is currently working on her second novel.
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ON NADIFA MOHAMED'S BOOKSHELF The God of Small Things Arundhati Roy, 1997 Rahel with her pineapple hair and Love-in-Tokyo hairbands is an unforgettable character and Velutha could be so many people in so many places. - NM Middlesex Jeffrey Eugenides, 2002 I found it on the floor of my friend’s room in Geneva as I was beginning to write my novel. I stayed up all night to read, he had me enthralled. - NM Eugene Onegin Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin, 1823-1831 A lyrical, amusing, gorgeous, ageless book. - NM Beloved Toni Morrison, 1987 When I first read Beloved, I wondered why Morrison had added this kind of supernatural, ghost-y thing to a really intense slave story. But then it made perfect sense, when you think that that life was not normal. Anything was possible, any type of horror was possible. - NM Under Milk Wood Dylan Thomas, 1954 A play that reads like a poem, I love its humour, suppleness, musicality, It feels like a daydream and it gave me an example to aspire too when writing about my own little village in the valleys of Eritrea. - NM Marabou Stork Nightmares Irvine Welsh, 1995 A book with soul, I think the structure is incredible and Welsh’s writing is always idiosyncratic, funny and wise. - NM The Aeneid Virgil, 29-19 BCE Rich, boundless language so similar to that used in Somali poetry, book one and three are particularly gorgeous. - NM	BOOKS BY NADIFA MOHAMED: Black Mamba Boy 2010 –› Excerpt A novel set in 1930s Somalia spanning a decade of war and upheaval, all seen through the eyes of a small boy alone in the world.	WHAT TO READ AFTER BLACK MAMBA BOY ? What is the What? Dave Eggers, 2006 A similar story to my father’s which made me weep but also smile, Fainting Boy especially so. - NM The Yibir of Las Burghabo Mahmood Gaildon, 2004 This is one of those books that changes the way you see the world, I saw through this book another Somalia, a place of isolation, humiliation and constant threat. - NM Going to Meet the Man James Baldwin, 1965 In this short story Baldwin does a rare thing, he writes completely convincingly from the perspective of a man he is diametrically opposed too, I felt I had a glimpse into the soul of a man who commits unforgivable acts. - NM By the Sea Abdulrazak Gurnah, 2001 From Zanzibar to the English coast, I love books about journeys and this one is particularly beautiful. - NM
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