Babakar is an African doctor living alone until the child Anaïs comes into his life. Forced to abandon his solitude, he takes her to Haiti in search of her family.
Babakar is a doctor living alone, with only the memories of his childhood in Mali. In his dreams, he receives visits from his blue-eyed mother and his ex-lover Azelia, both now gone, as are the hopes and aspirations he’s carried with him since his arrival in Guadeloupe. Until, one day, the child Anaïs comes into his life, forcing him to abandon his solitude. Anaïs’s Haitian mother died in childbirth, leaving her daughter destitute now Babakar is all she has, and he wants to offer this little girl a future.
Together they fly to Haiti, a beautiful, mysterious island plagued by violence, government corruption, and rebellion. Once there, Babakar and his two friends, the Haitian Movar and the Palestinian Fouad, three different identities looking for a more compassionate world, begin a desperate search for Anaïs’s family.
Industry Reviews
'Condé puts forth the secrets and histories of a fascinating cast, producing a timeless exploration of the wounds that emerge and linger when people lose those who mean the most to them, be it their family, friends, or country. This faithful portrayal of grief and displacement is tough to forget.'
Publishers Weekly
"A love letter to the Caribbean"
The Guardian
"[Conde is] at her signature best: offering complex, polyphonic and ultimately shattering stories whose provocations linger long after [the] final pages. The book is a reflection on the dangers of binary thinking...One is never on steady ground with Conde; she is not an ideologue, and hers is not the kind of liberal, safe, down-the-line morality that leaves the reader unimplicated."
Justin Torres The New York Times
" The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana is a searing literary portrait of the exploitation of immigrants, the corruption of governments, and the powerful emergence of radicalism, with astute commentary on how these elements breed trauma, generation after generation."
Foreword Reviews
"Set during the Charlie Hedbo attacks, this is a fast-paced saga that reveals a seldom-addressed period of African history. Conde's writing is both lyrical and textured, and showcases her tremendous talents."
Booklist
"Conde's scope is expansive: cosmic, global, and deeply personal. The result is a story from the perspective of the Global South that enthralls as it explores the urgent economic and cultural contradictions of post-colonialism, globalization, class, and alienation."
The Arts Fuse
"Told by a charming, lively third-person narrator, the novel evokes its various settings beautifully and takes a penetrating, wide-ranging look at the effects of racism, colonialism, and inequality."
Bookriot
"What an astounding novel. Never have I read anything so wild and loving, so tender and ruthless. Conde is one of our greatest writers, a literary sorcerer but here she has outdone even herself, summoned a storm from out of the world's troubled heart. Ivan and Ivana, in their love, in their Attic fates, mirror our species' terrible brokenness and it's improbable grace."
JUNOT DIAZ
"The breadth, depth, and power of Maryse Conde's majestic work is exceptionally remarkable. The Wondrous and Tragic Life of Ivan and Ivana is a superb addition to this incomparable oeuvre, and is one of Conde's most timely, virtuoso, and breathtaking novels."
Edwidge Danticat
"Brilliantly imagined, Maryse Conde's new novel presents a dual bildungsroman of twins born into poverty in the African diaspora and follows their global travels to its shocking ending. Once again, Conde transmutes contemporary political traumas into a mesmerizing family fable."
Henry Louis Gates Jr.
