by Maaza Mengiste
I may have enjoyed this more if I had known a bit more about Ethiopian history beforehand. As it was, I did get drawn into this story about the Italian invasion and occupation of Ethiopia in the late thirties. The story revolves around a woman called Hirut and a soldier called Ettore who becomes the photographer of a sadistic general. Hirut becomes a resistance fighter and ends up a prisoner photographed by Ettore. I found the characters a bit flat and difficult to relate to but by the end I was desperate to know how they all ended up. The shadow king of the title is a character in the resistance army who posed as the emperor to rally the ethiopians. 6/10
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