Victims of Betrayal

The mood of this work is almost pulsating with energy; there is such a sense of foreboding that the tension of the author’s writing feels like a pressure that is sure to blow. Yet this is a welcome pressure as the reader is aware that they are caught up in a profound conflict-- faith betrayal and what it means when there is not just friction but collision can be no less than momentous—and the author captures this in all its visceral evocativeness. There is a lyricism to the violence that simply cannot be overlooked—evidenced in a sentence such as “Young man hear it now I am not afraid of death Old men go to death but death comes to young men.” The form is reminiscent of parable sermon and the diasporic work of a writer like Chinua Achebe. While this F.E.C. Nwaiwu’s work is clearly a unique voice and the experience he is reflecting is likely to feel profoundly singular his incorporation of multiple “voices” through Biblical literary poetic and lyrical references ensures a multi-textured feels that almost begs for numerous points of interpretation—providing a welcome opening for the engaged reader. Equally so he very much hit his stride in terms of dialogue (and dialect) in sentences such as: “*Officer I no de carry kidnappers and no drugs de inside my bus.”Cole Gustafson New York.