“[Papa Moupelo] was our moral compass, the spiritual father of all us children who’d never known their biological father, and whose only example of paternal authority came at best from the priest, and at worst from the Director of the orphanage. Papa Moupelo stood for tolerance, absolution and redemption, while Dieudonné Ngoulmoumako was the embodiment of malice and disrespect. The affection we showed our priest came from the bottom of our hearts, and we looked for nothing in return except the kindness in his eyes, which gave us strength, while the Director’s sullen mien served only to remind us we were children to whom life’s normal course had sadly been denied. The way people looked at us said it all: to the Pontenegrins, ‘orphanage’ meant ‘prison’, and you went to prison for committing a serious offence, or maybe even a crime . . . “
In a bleak orphanage (is there any other kind in literature?) outside Point-Noire, Congo 
in the 1970s, Tokumisa Nzambe po Mose yamoyindo abotami namboka ya Bakako struggles against a bullied present and a dreary future. Moses, as most people call him, gets swept up by two of the orphanage’s twin terrors and eventually runs away with them to Pointe-Noire, where he and his cohorts join the city’s seedy underbelly, surviving through petty theft and felonious violence.
Moses eventually gets taken in by a brothel full of women who mother him in exchange for errand-running and heartfelt devotion. Moses, whose life has been neither easy nor innocent, is exposed to political corruption and the unrest which grips Congo. He sees first hand the hypocritical leaders who frequent the brothel under cloak of night, then persecute them in light of day, all for political gain.
Mabanckou seemingly has created Moses as the personification of his country. Orphaned and vulnerable, both Moses and Congo are drawn at a young age to the white man’s religion and influence.
“When the Whites arrived in Africa, we had land and they had the Bible. They taught us to pray with our eyes closed: when we opened them again, we found the Whites had the land and we had the Bible.”
As they age, they are both tugged and pulled as vying groups fight for power and control. They are privy to the underhanded dealings and nefarious ambitions of so many men in their country. And as the country seems in danger of devolving, Moses himself degenerates into total madness.
“Black Moses” is a sardonic, metaphorical glimpse into the life of a country ill at ease and struggling for stability and identity. It is a rare look at a central African country with which I, at least, am unfamiliar; a land little discussed and poorly understood by many of us in the “Western World”. Mabanckou’s writing is magical, fairy tale like in its extremes, its wit, and its ability to weave lore into a modern story.
Many thanks to The New Press for providing a complimentary copy of this novel in exchange for a fair and honest review.
chronic bibliophilia 