Book Review: Ahead of the Shadows by A.B.Kyazze

 

After the eventful debut of Into the Mouth of the Lion, London-based British-American writer and photographer A.B.Kyazze continued her storytelling based in conflict areas with a new book - Ahead of the Shadows. 

In an unique way, Kyazze underlines through her storytelling moral choices and ethical remorses, while creating a catching story with relatable characters. Lena is an international photographer whose photography is mostly covering conflict areas in Central and Eastern Africa. She is getting involved with her boss, Kojo and their professional lives and challenges are often reflected into their relationship and their personal interactions. 

Lena is tormented by the hopeless and sadness of her subjects she is covering through her photographic pictures. Is her phototaking enough to change the world? Or rather it is her infatuation to take an advantage, of any kind, of someone else´s miserable condition to turn it into and uses is as a professional opportunity. 

Another important point raised in the story underlines the generational trauma that does generates in individuals having survived or went through dramatic experiences like war. Life under duress in general determines a different kind of human interactions and the perception of what does it matter, with the choices between life and death looming in the background. Both the characters and the situations they are into it in Ahead of the Shadows are moulded by those extreme conditions, therefore possibly judged beyond the good and evil.

Especially for those who do have a direct experience of being alive and reporting in conflict zones, this book offers a lot of relatable food for thought as well as situations easy to figure out in real life. I am personally glad that such books exist because outlining the complex ethics of the journalistic profession rarelly happens and outsiders to the profession may be easily tempted to utter judgements without acknowledging what the exact circumstances may be. 

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the author in exchange for an honest review.