Co-wives, Co-widows
SynopsisPlot
This is the story of Ndongo Passy and Grekpoubou, the two widows of Lidou. Following their husband’s sudden and unexplained death, they find themselves fighting tooth and nail for all that is important to them. A playful, bittersweet, story full of dry wit and local color, set against a backdrop of political instability, corruption, and the friction between the old and the new in Bangui in the Central African Republic.
Story
About this book
Co-wives, Co-widows follows Ndongo Passy and Grekpoubou, two women who shared the same husband, Lidou, and now share his absence. When Lidou dies suddenly and without clear explanation, the two widows are left to contend with each other and with the circumstances surrounding everything he left behind. The novel is set in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, a city situated on the banks of the Ubangi River near the border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Adrienne Yabouza uses the conflict between the two women as a frame for broader tensions in Bangui itself, where political instability, corruption, and the friction between older customs and newer pressures shape daily life. The tone is described as playful and bittersweet, carried by dry humor and close attention to local detail rather than heavy drama. The story is noted as the first adult work of fiction from the Central African Republic to appear in English translation.
Bangui serves not only as a backdrop but as a social landscape where questions of inheritance, loyalty, and survival press on both widows at once. Their competing claims and shared grief run through the narrative side by side.
