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Chronicler of the Winds

Name: Chronicler of the Winds
Author: Henning Mankell
ISBN: 9780307280442

by Henning Mankell, Tiina Nunnally

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Overview

On the rooftop of a theater in an African port, a ten-year-old boy lies slowly dying of bullet wounds. He is Nelio, a leader of street kids, rumored to be a healer and a prophet, and possessed of a strangely ancient wisdom. One of the millions of poor people ''forced to eat life raw,'' Nelio tells his unforgettable story over the course of nine nights. After bandits cruelly raze his village, he joins the legions of abandoned children living in the city's streets. An act of the imagination, an effort to prove to his comrades that life must be more than mere survival, cuts short Nelio's life.

Synopsis

A haunting and powerful story about war-torn Africa, a mystical orphan boy, and the power of narrative to give a chaotic world order.

In the hot African night a single gunshot cracks the silence. José Antonio traces the sound to the stage of the local theatre company, where he finds Nelio, the young prophetical leader of the city’s street kids, crumpled in blood. Nelio refuses to be taken to the hospital but instead tells Jose his life’s story: how bandits raided his village, his daring escape, and his struggle to survive on the streets. José is irrevocably changed. He becomes the Chronicler of the Winds, revealing Nelios’s magical tale to all who will listen.

Publishers Weekly

Mankell's evocative, quietly powerful novel, first published in 1995, tells the unbearably sad story of 10-year-old Nelio, a mortally wounded street kid in an unnamed African port city. After revolutionary soldiers kill his family and most of the people in his village ("to show us they were serious in their struggle to liberate us and help us have a better life"), Nelio makes his way to the city where he joins a gang of homeless orphans, eventually-and reluctantly-becoming their leader. They have "only one mission in life: to survive," but that's essentially all they can hope for. Mankell, best known for his Kurt Wallander mystery series (The Dogs of Riga, etc.), vividly depicts in this heartbreaking fable the ongoing tragedy of Africa's disenfranchised. At times the narrative strays too far from Nelio's story and the tone slips into a kind of magical realism, but it's impossible not to be moved by the tale of Nelio's short and painful life. (June) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

About the Author, Henning Mankell

Best known for his series of police procedurals featuring the adventures of Swedish detective Kurt Wallander -- selling over 10 million copies worldwide -- Henning Mankell has become a mystery master garnering critical acclaim in both the U.K. and U.S.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly

Library Journal

A departure for Swedish crime novelist Mankell, this work takes place in an African country after the overthrow of its longtime dictator by revolutionaries. In the ensuing confusion, bandits terrorize the countryside and conscript young boys into their ranks, among them the child Nelio. Nelio escapes and journeys to a big city, where he joins up with a group of street children. When Nelio is shot, he is cared for by a baker named Jos and tells Jos his story, ending with the gunshot that leads to his death. Nelio's tragic tale changes Jos 's life, and he decides to spend his own life telling Nelio's story, thus becoming known as the "Chronicler of the Winds." Mankell's novel is about the broken legacy of colonialism and the greed and violence that follow in its wake. The heroes (and victims) of this chaos are boys like Nelio and Jos who refuse to succumb to the brutality that surrounds them. Timely and well worth reading, this is highly recommended for all libraries.-Rebecca Stuhr, Grinnell Coll. Libs., IA Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Mankell departs from his distinguished Kurt Wallander crime series (Before the Frost, 2005, etc.) for the strange, sad tale of an African country boy who suffers too much and dies too young. His name is Nelio, and bandits have wiped out his family and village with acts of inhuman cruelty. He can save his life, he's told, if he kills his cousin, a playmate. Instead, he turns the pistol on his grinning captor, then runs. After interludes with a choleric albino dwarf and an ancient woman he first mistakes for a lizard, Nelio arrives in the city, friendless and frightened. But he's a resourceful child. Before long, he prevails upon a street gang to accept and protect him (not easy); eventually, he becomes its leader. He also finds a home, a snuggery inside the hollow belly of a giant equestrian statue. Nelio is remarkable in every sense, declares narrator Jose Antonio Maria Vaz, the eponymous Chronicler of the Winds: Though only ten, he has "the experience and wisdom of someone who had lived to be a hundred." Jose happens on Nelio, bleeding badly after being accidentally shot, takes the boy to the roof of his bakery and nurses his charge diligently, though both of them understand that the wounds are fatal. For nine nights, the Sheherazade-like Nelio tells the baker about his life in the streets, what he's done, what he's endured, what he's learned. By the end, the enraptured Jose is imbued with a sense of mission, as if the child had known all along that the man was born to be his disciple. Only for those who can believe in a wise, courageous, sensitive, ten-year-old visionary. Skeptics can bypass.