Alex Perry’s lyrical and meticulous seven-year exploration of the new Africa required a spell in jail, visits to numerous wars and, eventually, his resignation as a magazine correspondent. But this is no tale of African woe. On every page, Perry overturns our preconceptions of the world’s biggest continent, exposing them as self-indulgent, out-of-date and damaging. A new Africa is arising, one that is lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty. And this new economic and political titan disdains aid, rejects Western preeminence and demands sovereign control over its own affairs. That is one big Rift, but there are many others in what Perry demonstrates convincingly will be a tumultuous transition in which pirates, al-Qaeda, cocaine smugglers and youthful revolutionaries all play a part. Africa’s emergence will not be smooth. But the story of the new Africa –astonishing, and largely untold – is one we all need to know. For it is one in which Africans are not just changing their own lives, but those of us all.

BUY NOW

Save