A Grain of Wheat

Mugo is a novel by Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o that tells the story of a group of villagers whose lives have been affected by the Emergency, set in the aftermath of the Mau Mau insurrection and on the eve of Kenya's independence from Britain. The village's chosen hero and a man tortured by a horrible secret, Mugo is at the center of it all. A masterful story unfolds as we learn of the villagers' tangled histories in a narrative interwoven with myth and peppered with allusions to real-life leaders, including Jomo Kenyatta. ‍