Bound to Secrecy (Liberia)

Bound to Secrecy ISBN: 9781906300111 Published: April 2010

by Vamba Sherif

William Mawolo, a stranger from the capital, arrives in the border town of Wologizi, in an unnamed African state, on a secret mission to investigate the disappearance of the local paramount chief. His mission is complicated by the suspicion with which the local population treat him, and his infatuation with Makemeh, the mysterious daughter of the chief.

Her apparent indifference to her father’s disappearance serves only to draw him dangerously closer to Makemeh. In the tradition of supernatural detective fiction, William’s task takes second place to his role in the community, and the more he discovers, the closer he brings himself to his own demise. He asserts his authority over the townspeople, as envoy of the President, but this only serves to bolster his ego and antagonise the locals even further.

While built around the structure of the traditional detective form, Bound to Secrecy is as much about the use and abuse of power in dysfunctional states as it is about the quest for truth.

As a novel from Liberia, an African country still recovering from a brutal civil war, this work offers a surprising view of the insidious grip of absolute power and the forces, and ordinary people, ranged against it.

Vamba Sherif is a young writer who lives in the Netherlands after going into exile during the war in his country. Bound to Secrecy was first published in Dutch translation, although it was written in English.

For more information about Vamba Sherif and his work, visit his website.