DANGEROUS LOVE

Though it mirrors Okri's deep love for his African motherland, the tragic love story in "Dangerous Love" isn't the point of the novel. Omovo's troubled life is a metaphor for the myriad problems facing the African continent. The green scumpool Okri's hero paints could be the picture the author has of Africa in his mind. Quite apart from the dirt, the grinding poverty, and the soul destroying corruption underlying the system at all levels, Okri rails against the "thought police" who are out to muzzle the press and the free expression of artists, as well as the deliberate inefficiencies and regular cover-ups by the law enforcement agencies. You can also feel his pain and anger in the passages describing how blacks are reduced to obsequious monkeys sucking up to their supercilious white superiors in their own country. The tragic ending to the love story brings us full circle. The mysterious dead girl Omovo discovers in the swamp earlier on becomes like a bad omen, a premonition. But it's more than that. The girl is also a symbol of the problems that are swept underneath the carpet and conveniently forgotten.Okri's prose is full of poetic images that fill the senses. His characters occasionally withdraw into themselves, reinforcing the contemplative nature of the novel. Though his social commentary is far more rivetting than the love story, the latter is nonetheless essential and an integral part of the novel. He does get a little lost in the final pages but that doesn't make "Dangerous Love" less than a fine, fine novel by a great African novelist.

I bought ten books to read during my recent trip to NZ. The best of these books, was Dangerous Love, and not only was it the best book I bought in that small batch, it was the best book I read last year. I read all my ten books, except one, which I threw in the bin, notwithstanding that it had been bought as a holiday read, so my standard is a lot less than usual. The books I bought were taken from the shelves of airport book shops, where standards can vary enormously. I thought most of the books were average reads, one as I say, I threw away, and out of the ten, two were good. I relate this story, because for me, Dangerous Love will always be a one in ten book, though in reality, I consider myself fortunate indeed, to have accidentally chosen this book without knowing anything about it, just reading a few lines of the first paragraph. Same thing happened to me with Angela's Ashes, I guess sometimes, you just get lucky. A very worthwhile read, and terrific insight into parts of the world I had never been before nor thought much about until Dangerous Love.

This is a very raw book, which draws you into the stench of poverty, which rests over a poverty stricken part of Lagos, Nigeria. With the stench in your nostrils, you follow the heart-ache of a young artist, who is caught in a political hell-hole filled with corruption.This story is not for the sensitive reader, who might want to escape from reality. Leaves you with so much to think about and a desire to read more from this amazing author. One of the best books I have read in a long time

Ben Okri is one of those writers who appears only once in a generation to enchant with his magical, engagingly lyrical prose - or should I say Poetry as Prose, and Dangerous Love qualifies as such in every respect.I find that so many excellent black writers hail from Nigeria. It certainly is a credit to that African nation and its people to produce such great literary minds from Soyinka to Achebe, to Okri, et al. It just goes to show that no one culture (or race) can lay sole claim, either directly or indirectly, to sophistication, intelligence, or indeed, literary excellence.