Disturbing the Peace

Emmanuel Achu

Description

If Minna has a successful career, a loving husband, wonderful children - all well-deserved - is it compulsory that she must also toil for a reckless sister who has diametrically opposed priorities? Her biased mother thinks so. What if the sister dumps her child on Minna's veranda and vamooses and in trying to find the sister to give back her child, there appear some strange persons and a cult intended on grabbing the child? A decision has to be made and made fast. How could Minna ever envisage that in trying to help her careless sister and baby while taking care of her own family she would end up antagonising everyone in spite of her desperate battle to spread love to all? Just where are her priorities? How prepared is she for the unexpected conclusion to her simmering travails? Hell definitely breaks lose in this emotionally charged family saga in which Emmanuel Achu carves a world where such opposites as love and hate, sympathy and apathy, despair and hope, fear and courage, friendship and enmity reside as bedfellows. Disturbing the Peace is definitely a lyrical treat where you would be shocked to discover that being responsible can equate to being cursed.

Sujets

• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Langaa RPCIG
• Date de parution: 15 mai 2008
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9789956715046
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 12 Mo

Extrait

Disturbing the Peace Emmanuel Achu
If Minna has a successful career, a loving husband, wonderful
children - all well-deserved - is it compulsory that she must also
toil for a reckless sister who has diametrically opposed priorities?
Her biased mother thinks so. What if the sister dumps her child
on Minna’s veranda and vamooses and in trying to find the sister
to give back her child, there appear some strange persons and a
cult intended on grabbing the child? A decision has to be made
and made fast. How could Minna ever envisage that in trying
to help her careless sister and baby while taking care of her
own family she would end up antagonising everyone in spite
of her desperate battle to spread love to all? Just where are her
priorities? How prepared is she for the unexpected conclusion
to her simmering travails? Hell definitely breaks lose in this
emotionally charged family saga in which Emmanuel Achu
carves a world where such opposites as love and hate, sympathy
and apathy, despair and hope, fear and courage, friendship and
enmity reside as bedfellows.
Disturbing the Peace is definitely a lyrical treat where you would be
shocked to discover that being responsible can equate to being
cursed.
Born in December 1965, Emmanuel Achu studied at Presbyterian Secondary
School Mankon, CCAST Bambili, ENSET Douala, and University of
Leeds, UK. He is a Pedagogic Inspector and Civil Engineer. From 2004 to
2006, he undertook mentoring programme on Writing organised jointly by
the British Council and the University of Lancaster. Disturbing The Peace is his
second novel. The first was Wrong Target published in 2003.
Langaa Research and Publishing
Common Initiative Group
P.O. Box 902 Mankon
Bamenda
North West Province
Cameroon Cover: Abidemi Olowonira
5.50 x 8.50 5.50 x 8.50.423




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Disturbing the Peace



Emmanuel Achu















Langaa Research & Publishing CIG
Mankon, Bamenda



Publisher:
Langaa RPCIG
(Langaa Research & Publishing Common Initiative Group)
P.O. Box 902 Mankon
Bamenda
North West Province
Cameroon
[e-mail]
http://www.africanbookscollective.com/publsihers/langaa-rpcig







ISBN:9956-558-84-2





© Emmanuel Achu 2008
First Published 2008









DISCLAIMER
All views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect
the views of Langaa RPCIG.






Content


1. The Bias 1
2. Grandma`s Plea 7
3. Club Life 18
4. Anniversary Gift 32
5. Poisoned Gift 40
6. Passing the Buck 60
7. Bliss But Just a Bit 68
8. The Crucial Journey 75
9. Back to Sender 82
10. An Unwanted Friend 93
11. The Deaconess 102
12. Raising the Stakes 114
13. Duty and Sacrifice 121
14. Family in Crisis 129
15. Reckless Daughter 136
16. Tihjtening the Noose 143
17. The Real Patriot 154
18. The Wrong Child 159
19. Facing the Enemy 169

1The Bias

t was the start of another new year. Minna left the school premises immediately she
finished her last lesson for the day. She had planned to stay on until 3:30 pm, the I normal closing time and mark a pile of test papers. But, she would have to do that
some other time for Tetang had called pleading with her to prepare lunch for some special
guests. She would have looked for some very convincing excuse to stay on had Tetang not
revealed that the guests were some rich people he was trying to pamper into giving him a
contract. Any extra franc into the family purse was always welcome.
They were civil servants but everybody knew civil servant salaries were nothing more
than slave wages and to make ends meet, people just had to moonlight. Besides his normal
duties as an architect at the Public Works Department, Tetang had private deals to draw
plans and manage building projects, which contributed quite significantly to the family
income.
On her part, Minna gave part-time lectures in some community schools, especially
during holidays. This often aided in covering some unplanned family forays into leisure and
luxury as well as some basic needs. They needed money to take care of four children, build
and maintain their own home, run an averagely nice car and live a modest lifestyle. Nothing
very fanciful but enough to make even Minna’s own mother believe they could be more
generous in helping other members of the family.
‘Selfish people!’ that was what Minna’s mother called them the last time she visited.
That was some four years ago and it still felt as if it was just the previous day. And Ma had
not stopped issuing the same condemnation through letters which were coming this time
with bewildering frequency.
‘Selfish? No!’ said Minna unconsciously in the taxi that was taking her home. The other
passengers jerked their faces in her direction. She grinned and turned her face in shame. She
was not mad. No chance there. She was just worked up with her mother’s unfair judgement.
Minna could not understand why her mother kept saying they were selfish. She and her
husband gave more to the family than any other family member. Her mother and father
were on a regular allowance paid exclusively from Minna’s salary. She had paid fees for
cousins, half-sisters and half-brothers and always sent presents to her uncles and aunties.
Why could Ma never acknowledge that she and her husband were more of assets than
liabilities to the family?
‘Madam you never reach?’ shouted the taxi driver, jamming his brakes with some anger.
He had stopped midway between the Hospital Roundabout and Azire Presbyterian Church
Junction as Minna had requested. That was just opposite the incomplete storey block of a
Pentecostal church.
‘Sorry,’ said Minna with embarrassment. She had been so hooked up with her thoughts
that she had forgotten she was not in their car but in public transport. And that was not all
of the exhibition she was making of herself. When she got out of the taxi, she slammed the
door with some force and immediately started rushing across the road. She did not even
hear the driver shouting after her. It was when she heard tyres screech on the tarmac just
close to her feet that she realised her attention was urgently needed. She actually had to
jump across the gutter to the Presbyterian Church side of the road.
‘Tief woman,’ screamed the driver. ‘Give ma money.’
Minna felt her head grow triple fold. ‘Na forget,’ said she in embarassment while
scrambling in frenzy with her handbag. It was an old enormous piece of leather with as
many compartments as there were people on the face of the earth. She loved this bag which
had an independent space for every aspect of her life as teacher, mother, wife, and fashion
connoisseur of sorts. It had compartments for groceries, money, handkerchiefs, extra
scarves, her cell phone, greasy snacks and miscellany.
1 Tetang hated the bag and had once attempted to chuck it away but Minna had clutched
onto it as if her life depended on it. Here she was wishing Tetang had succeeded for she
was finding it difficult to get to the money compartment. When she at last got there, it was
empty. That had never happened before and all of a sudden she thought one of the
passengers had thrust a hand in her bag. She should check carefully first before throwing
any accusations. The passengers were already eyeing her with frosty looks and she just knew
the slightest false move on her part would lead to another world war.