A Mouth Full of Salt

The Nile brings them life, but the Nile also takes away.

A small farming village in North Sudan wakes up one morning to the news that a little boy has drowned. Soon after, the animals die of a mysterious illness and the date gardens catch fire and burn to the ground. The villagers whisper of a sorceress who dwells at the foot of the mountains. It is the dry season. The men have places to go, the women have work to do, the children play at the place where the river runs over its own banks. Sixteen-year-old Fatima yearns to leave the village for Khartoum.

In Khartoum, a single mother makes her way in a world that wants to keep girls and women back. As civil war swells, the political intrudes into the personal and her position in the capital becomes untenable. She must return to the village.

A Mouth Full of Salt uncovers a country on the brink of seismic change as its women decide for themselves which traditions are fit for purpose - and which prophecies it’s time to rewrite

Reem Gaafar is a writer, physician and
filmmaker. Her writing has appeared in African Arguments, African Feminism,
Teakisi Magazine, Andariya and 500 Words Magazine, among others. Her
short story ’Light of the Desert’ was published in I Know Two Sudans
(2014) where it was awarded an Honourable Mention. Her short
story ’Finding Descartes’ was published in Relations: An Anthology of
African and Diaspora Voices (HarperVia, 2023). A Mouth Full of Salt
is her debut novel and Winner of the Island Prize 2023. Gaafar lives in Ontario, Canada
with her husband and three sons.