Cheryl S. Ntumy

Songs for the Shadows

Paperback

A lyrical, immersive story of time and life and grief, set in the gorgeous depths of the Sauútiverse.

Also in audio, read by the author.

$14.95

Or purchase from these retail sites:

ISBN: 978-1-961654-16-7 Categories: , , Tag:

Description

Your feelings are of no consequence.

Shad-Dari has escaped her past, her dreams now in reach. An excavator of the valuable old sounds of Órino-Rin, she steals tiny, unheard fragments of the sacred songs to erase the painful echo of her home planet, Ekwukwe. In one rebellion too far, she sets off a chain of events that severs her from time itself, forcing her, without another way forward, to face her past.

Media

Harare Review of Books

Reviews

“Set in the Sauúti universe and tightly packed with rich worldbuilding, Songs for the Shadows is crafted in beautiful prose and depth, meditating on silence and sound and song as powerful cultural entities—a magic system of sound excavation and the folding and manipulation of time that blew me away!”–Tlotlo Tsamaase, Caine Prize Finalist and author of Womb City

“In Songs for the Shadows, Ntumy continues the work of the Sauúti Collective, in immersing the reader into an expansive and complex world in which the magic and power of the oral—prayers, wails, chants, songs, words, and therefore stories—have been elevated to the most valued cultural artifacts. I was mesmerized by this world and by the rule-breaking, self-inventing Shad-Dari who, in seeking to drown out the echoes of her past loses everything she thought she needed.” –Gothataone Moeng, 2024 Whiting Award winner for Call and Response: Stories

“Cheryl’s writing is magical, lyrical and breath-taking. Imagine a world created by and out of sound – and that sound is linked to our very beings. Plus the beautiful evocations on the non-linearity of time and how we deal with the voices from the past. Bravo!” –Joyce Chng, author of Fire Heart

“Vivid, immersive and otherworldly. Songs for the Shadows takes us on a journey into the depths of shifting sound and reality, and connecting with that which can both destroy and heal us. Time shaped by sound, sound out of time, this is a novella that builds to an emotional crescendo.” –Stephen Embleton, 2024 Best Novella Nommo Award Winner

Cover Illustration by Akintoba Kalejaye

Cover Design and Cover Typography by Stephen Embleton

Cheryl S. Ntumy

Cheryl S. Ntumy is a Ghanaian writer of short fiction and novels of speculative fiction, young adult fiction and romance. Her work has appeared in FIYAH Literary Magazine; Apex Magazine; World Literature Today; Best of World SF Vol. 3 and Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction 2022, among others. Her work has also been shortlisted for the Nommo Award for African Speculative Fiction, the Commonwealth Writers Short Story Prize and the Miles Morland Foundation Scholarship. She is part of the Sauúti Collective, which created a shared universe for Afrocentric speculative fiction, and a member of Petlo Literary Arts, an organization that develops and promotes creative writing in Botswana.

cherylsntumy.wordpress.com

Additional information

Author

Cheryl S. Ntumy

Available Format