Mirghani Hassan

In a Sub-Saharan African country vulnerable to the whims of its dyslexic and tyrannical ruler, a young man named Abdulmoneim Ghoriesh, enrols in the countrys famed university, laden with the scars of a recent family tragedy. On his first night on campus, as he falls asleep on the lawn, Abdul has barely nodded off before he is jolted awake by hundreds of frogs croaking in eerie unison. And so begins Abduls satirical campus journey with five other desperately poor yet immensely motivated students, collectively known as Les Misrables. As the nation chokes under the haze of dictatorship, campus residents must endure the theocratic chauvinism of a students union controlled by radical Islamists. Trapped in the labyrinths of political repression, religious dogmatism and the horrors of final exams, the skeptical and talented Les Misrables cultivate an extraordinary capacity for transforming despair into dark and hilarious tall tales. Amid the turbulent chaos of their existence, the six survive an uprising against the dyslexic tyrant while achieving academic distinction. Even so, a gruesome murder of a friend casts insufferable sorrow at the end of a remarkable odyssey.

The General and the Frogs is a tale of the incredible power of humour and of the triumph of the human spirit at a time lived most dangerously.