Peter Orner The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo

The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo

Peter Orner

Little, Brown, Apr 2006, $23.95

ISBN: 0316735809

In 1991 Cincinnati, Ohio resident Jewish idealist Larry Kaplanski accepts a position to teach English and history in Goas, Nambia at a boys' only Catholic School. Larry like the other four male volunteers already working there Larry finds the desert climate unbearable and the locale lonely and tedious with little to do.

Not long after Larry arrived in Nambia, Mavala Shikongo, the sister-in-law of the school's principal, shows up for a short while. The former female civil war soldier does not stay long before vanishing only to return soon afterward with a small boy accompanying her. She becomes a teacher at the school. Her peers are bewitched by Mavala and so are many of her students perhaps because she is the only available game in town. Still while the other male teachers seek female companionship in a nearby village, she and Larry begin rendezvousing; however like the vanishing sheep she disappears again leaving her lover to wonder if his beloved will ever return to him.

The vivid portrayal of the climate (endless drought), the symbolism of the vanishing sheep and the failed farm turned church school, and the aftermath of a bitter civil war make this a poignant but not easy to read complex tale. The harshness rightfully so permeates the cast and subsequently the audience. Larry seems like a fish out of water as he realizes he cannot teach, fumbles at lovemaking, and has not adapted to the environs except when he is with Mavala. She is an enigma, coming and going in at first thought like a wisp, but is actually much deeper. Though the support cast never seems fully developed, THE SECOND COMING OF MAVALA SHIKONGO is a deep look at Nambia at a time of hope and despair.

Harriet Klausner