Our Beautiful Darkness
Our Beautiful Darkness
Written by Ondjaki
Illustrated by António Jorge Gonçalves
Translated from Portuguese by Lyn Miller-Lachmann
A blackout leads two teens to discover the intimacy and vulnerability that can only be shared in darkness in Our Beautiful Darkness, a fully illustrated YA novella from celebrated Angolan author Ondjaki and illustrator António Jorge Gonçalves.
The light goes out suddenly. And in this absence of light, a pair of teenagers bare their souls. Into the warm silence of the night, they share a conversation filled with their stories and dreams… and maybe even a first kiss.
Set against the backdrop of the civil war that ravaged Angola in the 1990s, this book weaves the country’s history with a teenage boy’s family stories. But when a power outage shrouds the neighborhood in darkness, everyday realities fade away… As the boy and a girl sit talking in the backyard, memory gives way to imagination and vulnerability, and the space between them becomes charged with emotional electricity.
Their resulting conversation is both a meditation on the storytelling impulse and a gripping narrative of first love that, through its particulars, ascends to the universal.
ISBN: 978-1-59270-410-1 • 5” (W) x 8.5” (H) • 126 pages • HCJ with double gatefold
REVIEWS
A Children’s Book Council Hot Off the Press Selection, August 2024!
★ “Miller-Lachmann does a remarkable job of making this rich piece accessible to an English-language readership. Ondjaki’s poetic prose draws an achingly potent picture of two young people reaching for each other during a sudden moment of possibility, while the white text on the black pages and Gonçalves’ rough, white-on-black illustrations help create an immersive experience. As the best art does, this collaboration makes a very specific story—two young people, one night—feel universal. A brilliantly elemental exploration of the light that darkness can bring.” —Kirkus Reviews
STARRED REVIEW! ★ “Arresting… The author’s spare storytelling focuses intensely on feelings and specific sensory experiences such as touch and limited sight. The reader is provided only enough visual information to ground them in the moment: a canopy of stars above a darkened skyline, the starlit silhouette of an owl in a tree, a vague interpretation of the eyes of the person the protagonist longs to kiss. Ondjaki’s prose is imbued with a touching sense of existential whimsy… This artful romanticism carries the characters through the darkness… in which they experience laughter, a light show, and at last, an end to their yearning.” —Publishers Weekly
STARRED REVIEW! ★ “An existential exploration of the heart... While the boy and girl discuss their pain and the cruelty of war, they rejoice in the little things the darkness has brought them: closeness, silence, time with nothing else to do and a determination to make this night together as beautiful as possible. With such a stunning representation of not only pain and conflict, but also the joy that is still able to make its way through, Our Beautiful Darkness is sure to leave readers considering, appreciating, and reflecting on the world around them.” —Bookpage
“This lyrical book follows two teens who are sitting and talking—about the sublime and the everyday—amid a blackout in Luanda during the the Angolan civil war. The stunning white-on-black art enhances the story’s intimate atmosphere. This work is both profound and accessible; it highlights the power of human attention and connection, of simply sitting and being together.” —Laura Simeon, Kirkus Reviews Young Readers’ Editor, on the Fully Booked Podcast
"Capturing a fleeting moment of blossoming love, this graphic novel is a simple, poetic distillation of youth and hope amidst war... Ondjaki's language is simple, with not a word feeling wasted, and it is all the more evocative for it. His poetry feeds into the lilting, dreamlike quality of his fiction... There is a whimsy to his writing that Lyn Miller-Lachmann's translation from the Portuguese has kept intact... António Jorge Gonçalves' energetic illustrations streak their way across each page or double spread in an abstract, expressive way. As with the prose, the art is minimalist in style yet bold in execution. Constructed entirely in white against a black background, the artwork serves as a perfect visual embodiment of the story's core theme of finding light in the dark.... A singular, heartfelt offering that captures a quiet moment in time and celebrates its beauty." —BookBrowse