One small East African country embodies the battered history of the continent: patronised by colonialists, riven by civil war, confused by Cold War manoeuvring, proud, colorful, with Africa's best espresso and worst rail service. Michela Wrong brilliantly reveals the contradictions and comedy, past and present, of Eritrea. * A stunning new work of non-fiction from the critically acclaimed author of In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz * In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz has sold over 12,000 copies to date and continues to sell on three years after initial publication * Major review and feature coverage assured in the wake of former acclaim * Competition: Philip Gourevitch
Michela Wrong has been a foreign correspondent since joining Reuters after University and has worked extensively in Africa for the BBC and has also worked for the Sunday Times. She now writes for the Financial Times.
Praise for I Didn't Do It For You: 'Contemporary history on the grand scale. I was entertained, informed and angered. Wrong has given us another essential contribution to the post-colonial scramble for Africa.' John le Carre 'Vivid, penetrating, wonderfully detailed. Michela Wrong has written the biography of a nation and more - she has excavated the very heart and soul of the Eritrean people and their country.' Aminatta Forna 'I found it engrossing, vividly written in the style of the best thrillers, while portraying real-life dramas and characters larger than life. It brought to life all the cruelties and and distortions of the cold war in Africa, as seen from a helpless victim-country, with its stories of grotesque interventions by Americans and Russians and the excesses of the African leaders. But it's also thoroughly well-informed, and I've read nothing that's told me as much about either Eritrea or Ethiopia. It should become the standard work on the region.' Anthony Sampson 'If you thought Eritrea was some exotic flower you heard mentioned on a gardening programme this book will tell you something different. It tells the tale of a small group of Africans so despised and trampled by successive foreign occupations that they fought back and after 30 years of war, they became a nation. It is an astounding story packed with tales of the worst - and the best - of human behaviour.' Richard Dowden, President of the Royal African Society Praise for In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz: 'A stylish account of the absurd as well as the tragic.' Sunday Times 'A brilliant account of Africa's most extraordinary dictator told with wry wit and delicious irony... this book will become a classic.' The Economist 'Michela Wrong made the so-called 'Heart of Darkness' much less opaque to me when I visited the Congo. She can do the same for you if you read this brave and witty book.' Christopher Hitchens 'Michela Wrong nimbly balances absurdity and outrage in her portrait of Mobutu Sese Seko and the wreckage he visited -- with steady Western sponsorship -- on the country he called Zaire. Her book is charged with pity and terror, and with the sort of sustaining humour that she rightly admires in Mobutu's former subjects.' Philip Gourevitch, author of We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We will be Killed with Our Families
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