Okey Ndibe’s funny, charming, and penetrating memoir tells of his move from Nigeria to America, where he came to edit the influential—but forever teetering on the verge of insolvency—African Commentary magazine.

Africa -Concept or reality- is an acknowledged continent of extremes and,by the same token,it is hardly surprising that it draws extreme reactions…The increasingly accepted common ground,both for the negativists and optimists,is the admission that the African continent does not exist in isolation,nor has it stood still in a time warp,independent of history. For Many,Africa is more a concept than a bounded space- which means in turn:more concepts than simply one.It is at once part wish-fulfillment and part reality,part projection and part historical distillation,part fiction and part memory.It is of course,generally acknowledged as a warehouse of yet untapped natural resources.Even as Africa exists as a desire for some,so does it constitute a nightmare from which others pray to be awakened…