Equatorial Guinea
La Bastarda, by Trifonia Melibea Obono, 2018
This is the first book by a woman from Equatorial Guinea to be published in English. I thought it was great. The writing feels very spare, or plain, and I think that at first I overlooked some of the themes and meaning because of that. The afterword to this book was really good and helped me think about it more deeply. The book is about a young girl whose mother died in childbirth and whose father has not formally recognized her as his daughter. Therefore she is considered a bastard. She lives with her grandparents but is trying to find her father. She makes friends with the outcasts in her village, her gay uncle and a group of lesbian girls. It was really interesting to see this perspective from queer Equatorial Guinea. In the end she finds solidarity with this group.
I loved role of the forest in the story. In a lot of books the forest is a scary place, where danger lurks, but in this book the forest is their haven. Whenever she travels through the forest she notes that the animals are watching her, but it doesn't feel threatening. As someone drawn to the woods and nature I loved this aspect of the story.
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