Tram 83

July 27, 2015
In this visceral, fast-paced debut novel, acclaimed Congolese poet Mujila examines life in a central African state plagued by instability. Set initially in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lucien journeys from the “Back-County” to an unnamed city-state (outside the Democratic Republic of Congo) with greater opportunities. Lucien moves in with Requiem, a conniving former friend and rival, and together they frequent Tram 83, the most popular bar in the city-state. At Tram 83, Lucien meets Ferdinand Malingeau, a celebrated book editor offering a chance for Lucien’s work to be published. When Lucien’s ambitions as a writer, Requiem’s schemes, and Ferdinand’s desires begin to conflict, the trio garners negative attention from a powerful and dangerous rebel general. Rapid and poetic, Mujila depicts a province where “every day is a pitched battle.” It’s a brutal landscape with regular blackouts and unreliable running water, where many hungry denizens hunt house pets and vermin for food with the same vigor they use to excavate diamonds and minerals. The central characters fight to change the paths laid before them, desperate to rebel against a fate imposed by life in a consumptive environment. Mujila succeeds in exploring themes of globalization and exploitation in a kinetic, engaging work.

July 15, 2015
Stylistically quirky and unorthodox fiction from Africa. Perhaps contrary to one's expectations, the title refers not to a British streetcar but to a seedy nightclub in an unnamed African country referred to only as the City-State. Tram 83 is the locus of those driven by ambition, desire, greed, or pleasure-and in this underworld we meet quite a cast of characters. Gathering at this disreputable watering hole are "inadvertent musicians and elderly prostitutes and prestidigitators and Pentecostal preachers and students resembling mechanics and doctors conducting diagnoses in nightclubs and young journalists already retired and transvestites..."-and the list goes on for more than 40 entries. The women who go to Tram 83, all of whom "struggle fiercely against ageing," range from the "baby-chicks" (younger than 16), the "single-mamas" (between 20 and 40), and the "ageless-women" (41 and older). Mujila also has a propensity for allegory, as is clear by the names he assigns those involved in the narrative. Lucien, an aspiring author, is one of the named characters, but more typical are types like the General, Mortal Combat, Requiem, and the Diva. While the novel has several narrative threads, Mujila is not working in the George Eliot tradition of realistic fiction. Instead, incidents lurch from one thing to another-sexual encounters to blackmail to the mineral-rich Hope mine. Much of the dialogue is repetitious and antiphonal, as recurring phrases such as "Do you have the time?" and "I hate foreplay" help create and define the atmosphere at the nightclub. One's admiration for the novel will be highly influenced by one's tolerance for experimental, relatively plotless fiction.

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Starred review from September 15, 2015

Somewhere in Africa, in the City-State, a region in secession, wheeling-dealing Requiem joins with writer friend Lucien, freshly home from Europe, at a down-and-dirty bar called Tram 83. In an atmosphere drenched in sex and music, drugs and blackmail, Requiem slickly tries to negotiate the publication of Lucien's recent stage-tale with weasly publisher Malingeau. The writing, which has all the edgy darkness of the best street lit, sometimes mimics the bar's background jazz in its syncopation and the occasional quick-burst, broken-sentence, run-on format, with the bar regulars feeling like a Greek chorus. VERDICT Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mujila has turned out a multiaward-winning debut that's decidedly cool and juicy.

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