The Old Drift

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On the banks of the Zambezi River, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls, there was once a colonial settlement called The Old Drift. Here begins the epic story of a small African nation, told by a mysterious swarm-like chorus that calls itself man’s greatest nemesis. The tale? A playful panorama of history, fairytale, romance, and science fiction. The moral? To err is human. In 1904, in a smoky room at the hotel across the river, an Old Drifter named Percy M. Clark, foggy with fever, makes a mistake that entangles the fates of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy. This sets off a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families (black, white, brown) as they collide and converge over the course of the century, into the present and beyond.

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Description

**Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award 2020**

‘The great African novel of the twenty-first century’ Tade Thompson, author of Rosewater

On the banks of the Zambezi River, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls, there was once a colonial settlement called The Old Drift.

In 1904, in a smoky room at the hotel across the river, an Old Drifter named Percy M. Clark, foggy with fever, makes a mistake that entangles his fate with those of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy.

So begins a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families as they collide and converge over the course of the century, into the present and beyond.

‘Extraordinary, ambitious, evocative, dazzling’ Salman Rushdie

‘Brilliant . . . heartbreaking’ Sunday Times

‘Charming, heartbreaking and breathtaking’ Carmen Maria Machado, author of In the Dream House

Additional information

Weight 0.453 kg
Dimensions 19.8 × 12.9 × 3.4 cm
Book_author

Serpell, Namwali

Publisher

Vintage

Imprint

Vintage

Cover

Paperback

Pages

566

Language

English

Edition

1st paperback ed

Dewey

813.6 (edition:23)

Readership

General – Trade / Code: K

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