Death to America

By Ayaz Pirani

In Ayaz Pirani's debut collection of stories, Death to America, he doesn't try to straighten a dog's tail. His stories are the frays on Empire's fringe, and his colored characters navigate a perennially perfidious Albion.

In the first story, 'Battle of Waterloo, ' Danju is obliged to choose sides in the struggle between disco and rock and roll, and in the last story, 'Brief Survey of Coloreds in the Rift Valley, ' Nunu's feeble crush on his grade-school librarian spins out a second post-colonial yarn. The youngster Aqbal, in 'The Lyric, ' is rescued by racism, and in 'They've Forgotten That I'm Not There, ' the small-time fence, Mohan, observes the narrow path. And sometimes you get to start over, as Gently discovers in 'Kitchener, n e Berlin.' Other characters include Arf, Fruq, Eerfal, Salty, the East African dandies Sur and Nur, and the sparring teenagers Umed and Frenni.

With economy and a taste for the oddball's angle, Ayaz Pirani makes the peculiar quotidian. He draws from Ismaili ginans and granths, and the Indo-Pak heritage of story-telling, oral poetry, and old-fashioned one-liners.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 088984478X
• ISBN13: 9780889844780
• Release Date: November 2024
• Publisher: Porcupine's Quill
• Length: 100 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.4" x 8.7"