Written By: Nicole Parker-Jones—Looking for a good mystery? How about Kwei Quartey's debut novel Wife of the Gods? The premise: in a small town in Ghana's Volta Region (Ketanu), a young promising medical resident working with Ghana's Ministry of Health's AIDS program is found dead under suspicious circumstances. Eager to close the case, the local police have arrested a poor teenage boy and charged him with murder. The police are less than thrilled when an outside force—Detective Inspector Darko Dawson—arrives from the big city of Accra to lead an inquiry into the mysterious case.Inspector Dawson is an excellent detective armed with remarkable insight and a healthy dose of skepticism; with family ties to Ketanu, he is a perfect fit for the investigation, but nothing about his investigation is simple. In Ketanu, Inspector Dawson finds that his cosmopolitan sensibilities clash with age-old customs, including a disturbing practice in which teenage girls are offered by their families to fetish priests as "trokosi," or "Wives of the Gods." Katanu is also filled with emotional landmines for Inspector Dawson: an estranged relationship with the family he left behind and the painful memory of his own mother's sudden, inexplicable disappearance. The growing rift between Dawson's modern police work and a local inspector's refusal to move past traditionally accepted beliefs jeopardizes a successful arrest.
Lyrical and captivating, Quartey's Wife of the Gods brings to life the majesty and charm of Ghana-from the capital city of Accra to the small community of Ketanu where long-buried secrets are about to rise to the surface.
For more information, visit: www.kweiquartey.com.
