TERRA SONÂMBULA

Mia Couto’s debut novel, Terra Sonâmbula, is a masterclass in the ancient art of storytelling. Set in post-independence Mozambique, devastated by civil war, it follows an old man and a boy on a journey infused with mythical fantasy.
A burned-out bus on a dusty road becomes a shelter for the elderly Tuahir and the young Muidinga, both fleeing the horrors of the civil war ravaging Mozambique. After ten years of anti-colonial struggle (1965–1975), the southeastern African country found itself plunged into a long and bloody internal conflict from 1976 to 1992.
The vehicle is filled with charred bodies. But beside the road lies another corpse, next to a suitcase that contains the “notebooks of Kindzu,” the long diary of the deceased. From this point, two parallel stories unfold: the journey of Tuahir and Muidinga, and, in flashback, Kindzu’s path in search of the naparamas—traditional warriors blessed by healers—whom the boy sees as the only hope against the warlords.
Terra Sonâmbula—considered by a special jury at the Zimbabwe International Book Fair to be one of the twelve best African books of the 20th century—is a novel within a novel, written in poetic prose reminiscent of Guimarães Rosa. Mia Couto also draws on elements of magical realism and traditional African storytelling to craft this beautiful fable, which reminds us that even under the harshest conditions, dreaming is essential to staying alive.