This Motherless Land

"A Mansfield Park retelling featuring coming of age and scathing social critique."

"I have a high bar for new takes on classic novels, and this book transcended it with ease. Wahala author Nikki May reimagines Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park as a cross-cultural family drama complicated by race. Nine-year-old Funke Oyenuga’s childhood in Lagos wasn’t perfect, but she was safe and deeply loved until a car accident spun Funke’s world off its axis. Suddenly, her beloved mother is dead, her Nigerian father’s family thinks she must be a witch for surviving, and her brilliant father is a wreck. So she’s shipped off to her mother’s English family, which assumes she must be a savage. The one bright side is her exuberant and loving cousin Liv. This keenly observed reimagining delivers perceptive twists and its own unique thrills."