Today we have a wonderful guest post from Jeff Gardiner, who tells us how he came to write his latest novel.My new novel, IGBOLAND, is a tale of passion and conflict set in Nigeria during the Biafran War. I was born out in Nigeria in Jos, and even though I haven’t had a chance to go back and visit my country of birth, I still consider Nigeria my spiritual home.
The stories and photographs of my parents, who lived out
there for six years, inspired the novel. My Mum’s diary was an essential
resource for context, background and interesting details. I’ve made it very
clear in my introduction that the novel’s protagonists, Lydia and Clem are NOT
my parents.
My parents lived in Idoma, not Igboland, and neither of my
made up characters reflect the personalities of my wonderful parents. The basic
premise comes from the idea of a young couple whose first home together is in a
bush village in West Africa, but any other similarity ends there. There are
some episodes clearly inspired by their anecdotes and particularly by my Mum’s
diary, but each event or occurrence is changed to create a different dynamic or
made to become far more dramatic than the reality. My characters respond to
those events very differently.
With my Mum’s generous permission, I can now reveal – for the
first time – excerpts from her journal, to give you a taste of some of the
inspiration behind IGBOLAND. These are some of Mum’s early responses to living
in a strange new country, and moving into a house that hadn’t been lived in for
months.
Excerpts from the diary of Janet Gardiner (1964 -70)
“The people are very
friendly and smiling – the custom is to ask about your family greeting you. We
saw a dancing display to rhythms made by drums and instruments – dressing up
with head dresses and masks, with some on stilts.”
“I’m finding it hard
to get used to being continually hot and sticky, damp with perspiration ... We
are having to get used to sweating all the time with any physical effort. It’s
an effort to walk any distance, especially in the afternoon. It’s even an
effort just to bend down. Insects are all over the walls. We have seen a
praying mantis, there are lizards and geckoes, which eat insects and moths, and
all sorts of flying insects around the lamps in the evenings.”
“Our house is made of plastered blocks, and
the roof is corrugated aluminium. The inside is a frightful mess! Dust, damage
to soft furnishings, back bedroom ceiling down – sitting room floor needs
re-cementing. Scorpions nests and lizard eggs are scattered liberally around …
We are alone in our bungalow, the only white people for 9 miles … We have a
small bathroom with a bath, but of course no running water. The hand basin
drainage is through a bicycle inner tube out through a hole in the base of the
wall into a drainage pit. No shower but we can hoist a bucket with holes in the
base if we desperately want a shower. Baths consist of a large bowl of water
heated up on the wood stove with cold added – and shared.”
“I’m finding that
people have started coming to the manse asking for medical help – I feel very
unsure about this as I’m not trained, but have decided to just do what I can. I
do have access to simple medicines, which they do not, after all. The nearest
national authority clinic is about 10 miles away.”
“Villages are motley
collections of huts and often miles from anywhere out in the bush. All roads
here are unmade and after heavy rain get flooded and very muddy. Bridges over
streams and rivers are often very rickety and made of branches lashed together
– scary to cross, especially if you have to carry your own bike, but the locals
are quick to help carry your loads however heavy and nip across any bridge as
if it were the widest and firmest bridge in existence.”
When the Biafran War broke out in July 1967, my parents were
living in Oturkpo and had a one-year-old boy (my brother) to look after. The
country was in turmoil after a number of military coups and counter-coups. But
that is another story …
For further updates follow my blog tour and ‘like’ my Igboland Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Igboland/595879100465696
Jeff’s website: http://jeffgardiner.com/
Jeff’s blog: http://jeffgardiner.wordpress.com/
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Thank you so much for hosting my blog. All the best with your writing projects,Lorraine.
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