In the bookstore: English books in Ghana

I have four new books.

It feels like freaking Christmas.

I’m preparing to head back to Burkina and Mali, so I’ve had to stock up. So I hopped a tro from Adum to “Tech” and went to the Kingdom bookshop on the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) campus.

I was hoping it would be like the University of Ghana Legon bookshop, where there would be a beautiful selection of hearty, thoughtful used paperbacks for 5 cedis (CAD $2). Here I had picked up Fall on your Knees by Anne-Marie MacDonald, a Canadian novel set on Cape Breton Island. I am reading it now for the second time, both because I have nothing else to read, but also because it was just that intriguing. I missed a lot the first time around.

But I don’t think I’ll be up for a third reading, back to back. So off I went to find me some new literature. I knew it was wishful thinking, to hope for Accra, when I know I’m going to get Kumasi, but I was still a bit disappointed to find that it was mostly textbooks. Stationary, though… Yay, new pen!

Note: for anyone in Ghana looking for books, my favourite was the Black Star Bookshop in Cape Coast. A lot of crap but some real gems, in this miniature version of an at-home used bookstore.

Finally, though, I found a small section at the back that had a random assortment of new paperbacks, most for 10 cedis each. I’d never heard of most of them, and in general they seemed a bit fluffier than I was looking for (though of course, desperate times call for desperate measures!)

So I decided on Birds Without Wings by Louis de Berniéres and Waterland by Graham Swift. They look like they could be promising. And they were of the biggest there, so hopefully I can make them last.

The final book I purchased was Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert, which is not exactly a novel, but I am sooo excited! I love his work and it’s so random to find this here! I stumbled on happiness 🙂

For my fourth book, I traded in something I had for something by John le Carré, which comes very highly recommended by the trader, but which looks like airport paperback to me, at best.

Beggars can’t be choosers.

I’m so excited.