No Edges: Swahili Stories

Calico Series #6

by Sarah Coolidge (Editor), Lusajo Mwaikenda Israel, Mwas Mahugu

The first collection of Swahili literature of its kind, No Edges introduces eight East African writers from Tanzania and Kenya as they share tales of sorcerers, Nairobi junkyards, cross-country bus rides, and spaceships that blast prisoners into eternity. Here we’re encouraged to explore the chaos of life on a crowded Earth, as well as the otherworldly realms lying just beyond our reach.

Through language bursting with rhythm and vivid African-futurist visions, these writers summon the boundless future into being.

Genres: Short Stories, Africa, Fiction, Tanzania, Anthologies, Kenya, African Literature

112 pages, Paperback

First published April 11, 2023

Reviews

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

I continue to love what Two Lines Press is doing with their Calico series. This one highlights short fiction and novel excerpts of authors from Tanzania and Kenya, translated from Swahili. All are imaginative and enjoyable in different ways.

My favorites:
"The Guest”
"A Neighbor’s Pot”
Excerpt from the novel "Walenisi"

[Lukasz · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting, and short, anthology of stories originally written in Swahili). I felt some stories lacked high stakes or more poignant endings, but, overall, I found them all interesting for a slightly different approach to storytelling.

In all, it's worth a try, especially as an audiobook that contains a sample of the original story in Swahili and translated text. The audiobook is less than 4 hours long and if, like me, you listen to audiobooks at higher speeds (my choice is between 1.85 - 2.15) you'll be done in around two hours.

[Alex Juarez · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first short story collection translated from Swahili to English. Some of the stories are translated with a more natural flow than others.
Some of my favorites were “The Guest” which is about a young woman who invites over her lover to meet her family
“A Neighbor’s Pot” which is a fantastical story where a girl trips on a pot shard and ends up in a demonic realm
And “Attitudes” which is about a woman traveling on a bus of people who just don’t like her vibe (and she has some tummy issues!)

Overall, I recommend to get a glimpse into other cultures (the authors are mostly Kenyan or Tanzanian) and to see the ways that stories are told (More of a fable vibe, character heavy, etc)

[Miki · Rating 2 out of 5]

No Edges: Swahili Stories, part of the Calico Series published by Two Lines Press, 2023

I have a (BIG) bone to pick with Two Lines Press and how they’ve mislabelled this collection as short stories. Half of these individual works are not stories—short or otherwise. They are excerpts, and these excerpts don’t read like they’ve been revised or rewritten as a shorter work of fiction which can be classified as a story, something that you would expect when these are labelled “stories.” At first, I thought it was my fault that I was reading these excerpts and expecting stories, but no, “stories” is one half of the subtitle, No Edges: Swahili Stories. Furthermore, there’s a review on Two Lines Press’s website that they’ve posted in which a reviewer calls the collection short stories. To add to this, I know someone who reached out to Two Lines Press for clarification about these pieces of writing and was told it is indeed a compilation of short stories.

Two Lines Press, I don’t appreciate the outright lies and bad marketing, and it is for this reason that I’m going to rant because I expected more from you. You are an indie press and as such, I hoped that, unlike many big publishers, you’d have integrity. Do you think it’s acceptable to mislead readers who are trying to read books from smaller, independent presses? Independent presses that, you would think can’t afford negative PR—especially after what has recently happened with SPD. I would expect this type of ridiculous PR stunt from a large publisher, but not from a small one.

Two Lines Press, I don’t care why you dishonestly marketed your collection of excerpts which, half of the time don’t make sense because they weren’t rewritten/revised to be short stories. And it’s not as if you can’t revise an excerpt so it’s an exceptional shorter work of fiction. In fact, Lit Mag News has published an article about why it’s important to revise an excerpt so that it is a story. Read the article here. The long of the short is that “A reader must be able to understand the piece without any outside information [ . . . ] the piece must be its own story.” Which is definitely not what you’ll read in this “short story” collection because these aren’t (all) stories. The excerpts are confusing snippets of writing that always feels like something is missing.

Here's the last of my rant. Two Lines Press, I don’t appreciate that I my hard-earned money paid for only four actual short stories. You know what the worst part is? The actual short stories were pretty darn good, and the excerpts had potential. You, Two Lines Press, have done the writers a disservice. What a shame. You had the opportunity to highlight and introduce voices which I wouldn’t have otherwise had access to. I cannot, in good faith, ever recommend No Edges: Swahili Stories nor purchase it for a fellow booklover.

[Physical, purchased from Chapters/Indigo]

[Daytona Fotney · Rating 4 out of 5]

These Excerpts were so good! I wish i could get some of the whole books translated!!!

[Brenna · Rating 4 out of 5]

***Thanks to Goodreads, the authors and translators and the publishers for a chance to read and rate this book in exchange for the book.***

[Kesu · Rating 4 out of 5]

A translated short story collection gives voice to the Swahili writers to reach their words to the world. 'No Edges' primarily focuses on the Swahili people's culture, traditions, living, emotions, and wisdom through some chilling and intriguing short stories.

8 short stories, 8 distinctive themes, and characteristics.

From Schizophrenia to Allegory, from Magical Realism to Oneirophrenia 'No Edges' has everything. There is reality and there is fantasy in the stories. While one has metaphor and symbolization, the other directly portrays the rawness of humanity. There are parallel lines drawn between humour and anger. The final story from Nagona gave the essence of the allegory in 'Waiting for Godot'. The cultural and philosophical points of view in some of the stories can be helpful for scholars who want to research the cultural studies of the Swahili people. A perfect blend of everything to feed your brain cells.

Thanks Tilted Axis Press for the digital copy of 'No Edges'.

[Tristan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of East African authors’ short stories translated from Swahili. My favorite part of this book is that it opens the reader up to a whole new world of idioms in the English language. I would imagine idioms are often hard to translate, but they gave energy and life to each story. Some of these stories felt like fables, legends, or myths, and I enjoyed some of the authors’ abilities to immediately set the stage for mysticism in this short format.

Favorite quotes:

“Youth is nothing but boiling water, and a deaf ear can’t hear its own cure.”

“It’s just like the Swahili say: human in sight, but not at heart. Or: the thing that’s eating you is inside your own clothes.”

“For history is an indelible reality, one that is shaped in the minds of humans through narratives, understood through neither critical thinking nor logic.”

“The nature of creation is to hide; that of humanity, to expose.”

[Mattie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was disappointed by this one. Reading some of the other Calico series - Through the Night Like a Snake and That We May Live (both EXCELLENT) - I’d come to expect extremely high quality short stories.

The first 2-3 stories of No Edges don’t disappoint; The Guest and A Neighbor’s Pot are poetic, magical bursts of writing with a strong feel of spoken/oral storytelling that makes them extra captivating. Unfortunately, half of the remainder of the collection is made up of excerpts from longer novels rather than being short stories, and therefore lack truly effective dramatic structure. Some of these excerpts introduce dramatic tension without any resolution, others include exposition before cutting off abruptly.

Overall, the beauty in the pros here is lovely. These are incredible authors; it’s just that, perhaps, this wasn’t the best format for sharing their work.

[Molly · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are not enough stories in this world, I have often thought, of people shitting themselves on buses. I know a guy who got food poisoning from a pizza hut in India directly before getting on a bus for thirty hours, and had to puke and shit out the window for twenty hours or so. I myself puked from food poisoning in Nepal while on a short bus ride to the plane, and nobody seemed to think it was a big deal. In Africa they are not so tolerant, but shitting yourself on a bus is still way better than being a witch.
I have to say that none of these stories made me want to visit Kenya or Tanzania but at the same time I was delighted by the oddity of each of these strange tales. It is like you sit down in a forest, leaves rustle, and you see a striped tail and later on a shiny ear and woosh each animal is gone and you are like, huh, what the fuck was that?

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

CN: Death of a spouse, domestic abuse, death penalty in a sci-fi context, incontinence, interpersonal violence, corruption, missing child, vigil over dying grandparent, infidelity

A mixed bag as is the usually the way with anthologies, but I've found some new authors that I'd like to read more from.

About half of these are excerpts from longer works rather than stand alone short stories. This makes more sense for some than for others.

There is also a lot less that I would think of as speculative fiction than the blurb on the back had led me to expect. It contains more snapshot of a life or a community style pieces with a couple of sci-fi/fantasy stories. I generally prefer that ratio of realism to genre but others may not.

[Caitlin O'Sullivan · Rating 4 out of 5]

As with all collections of short stories, some were better than others and only some will stay with me. I loved this insight into Swahili storytelling, and life in Kenya and Tanzania. I am sure there is so much more depth I am missing because I lack much of the cultural context, but nevertheless I found most of the stories quite profound. My top two were “From Walenisi” and “From Selfishness”.

With some of the stories the translations seemed a bit inconsistent. One in particular had the most beautiful literary language in some parts and then some jarringly colloquial language in others. Probably this was intentional and was part of the original text, but I found it didn’t land for me.

[Olga Zilberbourg · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most acute pleasures (and challenges) of reading fiction in translation from a language of an unfamiliar culture is that I never know how the story is going to turn, where the plot is heading. I often can't even tell whether the implied author supports the narrator's perspective or questions it in some way. A story holds so many surprises! It's a bewildering and exhilarating experience. I'm so grateful to Two Lines Press for publishing this delightful book of contemporary stories translated from Swahili. I've been really enjoying the creativity of their Calico anthology series.

[Shannon (That's So Poe) · Rating 3 out of 5]

These stories provide really interesting insight into Kenyan & Tanzanian culture and storytelling, showcasing a number of shorts stories and excerpts translated from Swahili. The stories, especially the excerpts, didn't necessarily engage me or stick with me as much as I would have wished, but they were still very interesting to try.

Content Warnings:
illness, kidnapping, torture, violence, injury, death, death of a family member, alcoholism, infidelity, loss of bodily autonomy, sexism, corrupt judicial system

[Anne-Marie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was just an okay collection for me. Based on the description, I thought there'd be more scifi elements in the stories but most of them are contemporary-feeling.

I liked a couple (though several weeks later I can't recall the details of most - just one with a kidnapped child to another dimension and the other of a recently widowed woman whose relatives take over her home while she's grieving) but most of the stories weren't memorable enough. I am glad to have read a bit more from Eastern Africa, however (these were translated from Swahili specifically).

Gorgeous cover though.

[this_eel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I haven’t read a lot of East African writing so this was definitely interesting and there’s some good stuff in here. I will note however that the publisher is setting the authors up a little with the promotional copy, which seems to suggest that this is mainly a speculative anthology. Most of the stories aren’t noticeably speculative, so perhaps bear that in mind if you want to enjoy them on their actual merits.

[Ed Erwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This may be the first collection of stories translated from Swahili to English, and thus I give it five stars for simply existing. The stories have very little in common. None would be a must-read, but I'm glad to have read the collection.

[Meli · Rating 3 out of 5]

”But ever since I lost my soul, I’ve stopped worrying about it.”
“How did you lose it?”
“I was ordered to clean it at a specific spot in the River of Eternal Life. It got away from me and the current carrier it off to the great ocean where dreams end.”

[Laura Sackton · Rating 4 out of 5]

The stories were a mixed bag for me, but I really appreciated the collection as a whole. There were a few standouts, the first story in particular.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderful collection of stories that made me eager to read the next, and the next. Until the book was done and I was wishing it were much longer.

[Nadirah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: 3.75

[Cheri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book Group- stories translated from Swahili

[Lacy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short stories translated from Kiswahili. Enjoyed the variety of stories.

[Leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun to read the stories Matt is teaching this summer!

[Dhruvit · Rating 2 out of 5]

The stories were too short. I need longer to feel connected to the plot. Some of them felt the right size for completing something though and I did like those!

[Ally Johnston · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book so much because the concept is very cool, but none of the stories really grabbed me. I wish there was more of a through line/common theme with the short stories.

[Brendan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is yet another fantastic entry in this series of translated works; this one contains Swahili stories.

[Hannah Shoard · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Bbrown · Rating 3 out of 5]

This latest Tilted Axis Press book is a sampler of Swahili fiction, certainly not something you see translated into English very often, and I appreciated the opportunity to try out something new. Unfortunately Tilted Axis made a couple of editorial decisions that I really can't wrap my head around, and the works themselves ranged from sub-par to fine and no higher, though many of them are hard to judge since they are merely excerpts from longer works.

That's right, while there's nothing in the book's description to inform you of the fact, only half of the eight works in No Edges are short stories. The other half are snippets of novels, with no indication as to where in the novel the piece was pulled from. I found the segment from Euphrase Kezilahabi's novel Nagona to be quite difficult to follow, but is that a real flaw, or was it just that the chapter was from the middle of the book and it would have been easy to follow if I'd read it in sequence? I enjoyed the piece of Katama G. C. Mkangi’s Walenisi I read, but it was over just when it got to the good stuff. Maybe Clara Momanyi’s Nakuruto becomes more than a rambling dream narrative, but from this collection it’s impossible to say. Finally, the section of Lilian Mbaga’s Selfishness included in No Edges is too short to meaningfully engage with, the rest of the book could be any level of quality. Tilted Axis should make clear that half of this short collection is excerpts, with that information ideally communicated to potential purchasers before they buy the book, but at the very least plainly stated somewhere in the collection itself so that readers don’t have to figure it out themselves.

This isn’t the only strange choice by Tilted Axis either, as each of the eight pieces in this book start with a paragraph of untranslated Swahili. Now, as you might have guessed by the fact that I picked up a book of stories translated from Swahili into English, I don’t read Swahili. I expect this will be true for the vast majority of people that decide to purchase No Edges. As such, it would have been nice for the book to include translations of the eight paragraphs that serve as epigraphs for the pieces of this collection.

The last strange choice I’ll harp on is Tilted Axis’s choice to describe the works in this collection as “vivid Africanfuturist visions” and mentioning sorcerers and space ships. This made me think that No Edges would be a speculative fiction collection, and, while a couple stories can be accurately described as such, others are completely grounded. This isn’t a big deal, but just wanted to lay it out so as to stop anyone else from going into the collection with the wrong impression.

With all that out of the way, of the four complete short stories included my favorite was Timo and Kayole’s Chaos by Mwas Mahugu, which I thought provided a good snapshot of K-town in an intentionally fragmented way that worked well. Fatma Shafii’s The Guest was a fine subverted fairytale that I wish had been a bit more complex. I didn’t care for Lusajo Mwaikenda Israel’s slang-filled writing at all (though of course it might have been Richard Prins’s translation), thus I didn’t particularly like A Neighbor’s Pot. That one, though, was a heck of a lot better than Fadhy Mtanga’s Attitudes, a terrible story that read like the writer's barely-disguised fetish and ended with an unearned dollop of moralizing that doesn’t even make sense.

I’m all for more English translations being made, but the only specific things No Edges made me interested in were a full translation of Katama G. C. Mkangi’s Walenisi and more stories by Mwas Mahugu (and neither of these interests are even particularly strong). The rest of the pieces left me unimpressed or worse, and a 2/8 success rate isn’t great. Still, the collection didn’t leave me bored, and it has the great virtue of not overstaying its welcome—No Edges is so brief you can easily read it in two hours. I hope Tilted Axis considers some changes if they release subsequent editions of this one. 2.5/5, rounding up.

[QQJJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Striking cover and interesting stories in the moment, but I don't think they will stick in my memory. I was excited to read writing translated from Kiswahili, however half of the 'stories' were excerpts from longer works which is never something I really enjoy.