Set in modern Johannesburg or eGoli, which is isiZulu for “the place of gold” David Dison’s book, The Good Nigerian, for those familiar with “Jozi” - is akin to a love letter to the city. It is all at the same time filled familiarity, warmth and danger, fear and opportunity – the myriad of contradictions that is Johannesburg, and South Africa itself.
TITLE
In naming his book “The Good Nigerian”, Dison ‘mischievously’ and directly takes on problematic tropes of representation as they pertain to the so-called other. Interestingly, The Good Nigerian isn’t about Nigerians at all – quite far from it in fact. However in choosing such a title he immediately grabs the reader’s attention as the story unravels.
THE STORY
In Jerome Nossel (also featured in other works by David Dison namely Death in a New Republic and The Boxer), the private investigator one encounters someone with the tired “European-colonialist-expatriate attitude” – who has “fallen in love” with “Africa”, and who is still ‘fascinated’ by what he encounters each day unlike the locals!
In Ngozi, who happens to be Nigerian, Dison portrays a person who is neither a victim nor damsel in distress through she ‘works the city’ - strong, alluring, even when surrounded by a motley crew of characters, dangerous men with questionable backgrounds - she exhibits and retains a certain grace throughout and runs the plot with Jerome Nossel.
The Good Nigerian is fast paced, and reads like an action movie, complete with car chases as gangster and pimp Yuri Kramerov’s goons play a dangerous game of cat and mouse with Nossel and Ngozi. The story lays bare the city’s inner and not-so-hidden workings especially those of its underworld. Crime bosses, pimps, prostitutes, drug dealers, politicians, private investigators, corrupt police, and nationals from different countries are all thrown together in this hodgepodge.
CONCLUSION
In an literacy podcast with David Batzofin Dison said about the book, that it is about familiar places like Doornfontein, Houghton, Hyde Park, Alexandra and Hillbrow. In this rollercoaster of a story "the key character is the city: Johannesburg."
Tonderai Chiyindiko is a voracious reader who is addicted to the intoxicating smell of new books and loves attending book launches (because of the free-flowing wine, cheese and snacks). He lives and works in Johannesburg.
MORE INFORMATIONEN
This review is the second in the new Book of the Month series from the Goethe-Institut South Africa.
A new review by South Africans for South Africans will be published every month, please check regularly.
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