Walking with Abel, Anna Badkhen
Walking with Abel, Anna Badkhen
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Walking with Abel
Journeys with the Nomads of the African Savannah

Author: Anna Badkhen

Narrator: Elisabeth Rodgers

Unabridged: 9 hr 21 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 08/04/2015

Synopsis

The Fulani are the largest surviving group of nomads on the planet. In Walking with Abel, Anna Badkhen embeds herself with a family of Fulani cowboys—nomadic herders in Mali's Sahel grasslands—as they embark on their annual migration across the savannah. It's a cycle that connects the Fulani to their past even as their present is increasingly under threat—from Islamic militants, climate change, and the ever-encroaching urbanization that lures away their young. The Fulani, though, are no strangers to uncertainty—brilliantly resourceful and resilient, they've contended with famines, droughts, and wars for centuries.Dubbed "Anna B├ó" by the nomads who embrace her as one of their own, Badkhen narrates the Fulani's journeys and her own with compassion and keen observation, transporting us from the Neolithic Sahara crisscrossed by rivers and abundant with wildlife to obelisk forests where the Fulani's Stone Age ancestors painted tributes to cattle. Together they cross the Sahel—the savannah belt that stretches from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic—with Fulani music they download to their cell phones and tales infused with the myths that ground their past, make sense of their identity, and safeguard their future.

About Anna Badkhen

Anna Badkhen is the author of The World Is a Carpet, Afghanistan by Donkey, Waiting for the Taliban, and Peace Meals: Candy-Wrapped Kalashnikovs and Other War Stories. Her reporting from four continents, including the conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and Chechnya, has appeared in the New York Times, New Republic, Foreign Policy, and other publications.

About Elisabeth Rodgers

Elisabeth Rodgers is an actress and AudioFile Earphones Award–winning narrator. After graduating from Princeton University, she completed a two-year program at William Esper Studio. She has recorded dozens of books for a multitude of publishers.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Arlitia on October 12, 2015

This book is stunning as much for it subject matter as it is for the poetry in which it's written. It's at times brutal and and stark. Other times it is lush and filled with a spirit of life and wonder. I listened to this on audio book, which is rare for me, but I loved hearing the African names out......more

Goodreads review by Nate on April 21, 2018

It was fine. Since I live in West Africa, it made it more interesting to me. The author's personal emotional drama about her lost lover didn't add much to it for me.......more

Goodreads review by Dominika on August 06, 2024

Warta przeczytania......more

Goodreads review by Hayley on April 04, 2022

This book took me a long time to read. It is part history, part anthropological study, part story, part poetry. Badkhen’s vocabulary put me utterly to shame and the thing is fully lacking in narrative structure, which makes it a bit of a slog. I found the language to often obscure the story rather t......more

Goodreads review by Margaret on August 19, 2019

It is so interesting to read about ancient cultures that are continuing to exist in today's world. This story about the nomads walking with their cattle across the West African Sahel from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean and back to follow the rains keeping the grass alive. The reporter that j......more

Quotes

“A rare and extraordinary book…More than a window into an ancient, and possibly doomed, way of life; she digs down to the very core of what it means to be human.” Ben Fountain, National Book Critics Circle Award–winning author

“Displays the skill of a writer accustomed to telling the stories of those living unimaginable lives.” Ms. magazine

“With extraordinarily poetic language, Badkhen captures the Fulani pace that dates back thousands of years: ‘a sound of sorrow and hope and loss and desire: the sound of walking.’” BBC.com

“If you thought commuting to work in Midtown was rough, try Sub-Saharan Africa.” New York Post

“An engrossing look into an alien world from the perspective of a writer with a unique story of her own.” Philadelphia Inquirer

“This lyrical account of that journey eloquently describes the culture of the Fulani and is…[an] exquisitely written book.” Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Badkhen makes intellectual and emotional connections that will appeal to anyone interested in Africa’s nomadic peoples and readers of memoirs such as Cheryl Strayed’s Wild.” Library Journal

“Badkhen’s lyrical, off-the-beaten-path travel memoir also serves as a trenchant sociological study of one of the ‘planet’s largest remaining group of nomads’…[and] vividly captures and communicates an increasingly rare and wondrous experience.” Booklist

“The poetry in Badkhen’s prose demands that readers slow down and savor her gentle, elegant story.” Kirkus Reviews

“Many people listen to audiobooks to recapture the intimate pleasure of being read to by a parent or friend. No one makes that connection better than Elisabeth Rodgers. Her rich alto is almost hypnotic as she tells the story of Fulani nomads moving across the Sahel in Mali, embodying ancient traditions in a world transformed by climate change and war…Rodgers masters the pronunciation of the Sahel and the Fulfulde languages. This is a wonderful audiobook for anyone interested in North Africa.” AudioFile

Awards

  • Barnes & Noble Discover Award
  • Los Angeles Times Best Book
  • Esquire Pick
  • Publishers Weekly Pick of the Week
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