Ladder Of Bones [TRADE PAPER ]

In intertwined stories,A Ladder of Bonestells a series of narratives that take place in West Africa, Canada, the United States and the Caribbean. Siaka becomes a child soldier in Sierra Leone after being compelled to shoot his six-year-old brother. Melvin witnesses the murder of his parents by young Liberian soldiers. As a toddler, Timothy survives by sucking at his dead mothers breast, while Iona, a rebellious Jamaican girl, narrowly escapes rape at the hands of her drug-addicted mothers lover. And then there is Enilolobo: a mysterious child who appears on a Canadian street one day with two navels. Their lives become interwoven, but this tapestry unravels as the characters move back to West African soil as young adults. They are forced to relive the nightmare of their earlier existence when one of the characters joins others to hunt them, seeing not human beings but a repository for rage.

Bunmi Oyinsan is a Nigerian/Canadian writer. From novels to scripts for radio, television, and the theatre, she has contributed to both the nonfiction and fiction canons of African literature. Oyinsan gained her MA focusing on orature and literature from Saint Mary's University and a Ph.D. from York University. Beyond her literary practice, she is the writer, producer, and presenter for the Sankofa Pan African Series, which has over 100K subscribers and over 5 million views. She is a winner of the Matatu Prize for her YA novelFabulous Fourand has been nominated for THEMA's Best Film Script. Her novelThree Womenwas nominated for the Flora Nwapa PrlCa