written artwork - things fall apart

I have always, and probably always will, love books set in Africa.  I've read a few now, and they are always very gripping.  Unfortunately, most of them are gripping because they are centered around tragedy, but, gripping nonetheless.  Some of my favorites include What Is The What and The Poisonwood Bible. 

Things Fall Apart is also set in Africa, and also focuses heavily on tragedy.  The story is roughly about a man who lives in an African village and is well respected.  He has a family, friends, and honor.  This man eventually encounters several distressing situations in his life that bring his demise.  

I think the reason these books are so interesting to me is because they are such wonderful anthropological studies.  Africa is a place I have never been, but hear a lot about.  It is one of those worlds that couldn't seem more opposite the world I live in.  But there are still amazing ways to relate to each story.  I enjoy stories that bring me into new worlds, and, in a cliche way, expand my horizons. 

I would never say I know what it is like to be African because I've read a few books.  But it does make me want to ask more, learn more, and experience more.  And I think that is a marker of a great book.

A list of what's to come, and what has already been explored.
My Written Artwork Journey Explained here

1. Animal Farm - George Orwell
2. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. Emma - Jane Austen
4. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
5. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof - Tennessee Williams
6. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
7. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson
8. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
9. The Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer
10. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
11. Nineteen Eighty-four - George Orwell
    
12. Death of a Salesman - Arthur Miller
13. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
14. The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne
15. The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
16. Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson
17. Pickwick Papers - Charles Dickens
18. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
19. The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
20. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
21. Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
22. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
23. Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut
24. The sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
25. Their Eyes Were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston
26. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
27. Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
28. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
29. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
30. Crime and Punishment - Fedor Dostoyevsky
31. Watership Down - Richard Adams
32. Doctor Zhivago - Boris Pasternak
33. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
34. All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque
35. Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
36. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
37. The Red Badge of Courage - Stephen Crane
38. Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
39. Tales - Edgar Allan Poe
40. Diary of a Madman and Other Stories - Nikolai Gogol
41. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
42. A Farewell To Arms - Ernest Hemingway
43. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen