Good Read: Dangerous Love By Ben Okri

A very risky love story centered on Omovo and Ifenyinwa filled with poems, sadness, frustrations, lost dreams and death. This story depicts a  day in the life of a jungle city dweller. Welcome to the world of Omovo, a young restless man whose life is swayed on his paintings, his complex love life with Ifenyinwa (If-A-Yin-Wah), the beautiful wife of a frustrated Takpo, as he contemplates his future all in the Government Rejected Area (G.R.A) of Ajegunle (Her-Jay-Gun-Le) in the hearts of Lagos, Nigeria. 

Escapism of excess thoughts did nothing to alleviate the deep rooted pains in Omovo's world, Ifenyina was a woman he could only love secretly, the paintings that were interrupted with swarms of blood-thirsty mosquitoes and the intrusion of disturbing neigbhours; not forgetting his father who basked often on a bottle of local gin called  ogogoro(Oh-Go-Go-Row) whilst fighting his own demons, failures, and pretences to the amusement of his neighbours in the face-to-face compound all within a wretched slum surrounding. 

This novel acts as a back-down-memory-lane to those who have lived in such a vicinity or know people who have. Dreams, complains, and misplaced anger only contorts one's physique. I found it a bit depressive to read due the harshness of the environment the characters found themselves in, but they all seem to be immersed in it as fate. Dangerous love will leave you in suspense, till the very end.

Have you read this novel, and what was your take on it? Feel free to share your thoughts.

Now, who really killed Ifenyinwa? Was it her husband Takpo or the ravages of war in her village? WHODUNNIT!!!