The Legend of Baraffo - by Moez Surani (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

In Baraffo, a town gripped by revolutionary fervour, a boy named Mazzu grapples to understand the motivations of Babello, a man imprisoned for an act of arson. When Babello begins a hunger strike and another building is set ablaze, tensions mount among the citizens and Mazzu considers a risky solution.

Within an extraordinary world, this sweeping and mythical story asks prescient questions about the nature of social change: is it better accelerated by those who seek total transformation or attained by those trying to work within the system?

Review Quotes

"The Legend of Baraffo captures the flames of dissent, revolt, and uprising that are always simmering beneath the surface of outwardly stable political climates. It is a novel of and for our time, and one I fear will become more and more relevant to those of us who feel increasingly ignored by the systems of governance meant to take care of us." --Ampersand Review

"The Legend of Baraffo is a lucid dream of a novel, a fable fierce in its moral clarity and gorgeous at the line level. In the town of Baraffo, Moez Surani has created a place so rich in sensory detail, so wonderfully alive, as to be unforgettable... This is a beautiful book, written by a bright literary talent." --Omar El Akkad, Scotiabank Giller Prize-winning author of What Strange Paradise

"The Legend of Baraffo is about revolution and love, political will and will not, hunger striking, friendship, and tender romance. It's about imprisonment, charisma and wit, wordplay and poetry, and the unrelenting search for what is just... This novel is like a lamp underground--it's absolutely brilliant." --Lisa Moore, author of This Is How We Love

"Seamlessly pivoting from fairy tale to one of caution, Surani's novel is a sly exploration of power and all that's crushed to maintain it. His language is hypnotic and lush from beginning to end." --Monique Truong, author of The Sweetest Fruits

"Seamlessly pivoting from fairy tale to one of caution, Surani's novel is a sly exploration of power and all that's crushed to maintain it." --Monique Truong, author of The Sweetest Fruits

About the Author

MOEZ SURANI's writing has been published in Harper's Magazine, Best American Experimental Writing, Best Canadian Poetry, and The Globe and Mail. He has received a Chalmers Arts Fellowship, which supported research in India and East Africa. He has been an artist-in-residence in Finland, Italy, Latvia, Myanmar, Switzerland, Taiwan, the Banff Centre for the Arts in Canada, and at MacDowell in the US. He is the author of the novel, The Legend of Baraffo, and various poetry books, including Are the Rivers in Your Poems Real and Operations. Surani lives in Toronto.