Oil On Water, By Helon Habila

Rufus is a keen cub reporter cutting his teeth at a newspaper in Port Harcourt, when he is sent on an assignment to find and interview the kidnapped wife of a British oil engineer.

His endeavour becomes that of an everyman detective on a life-threatening journey into the oil rich region of the Niger Delta, a chaotic wilderness in which militants and kidnappers reign.

He witnesses the cycles of greed, injustice and rage that fuel the factional fighting and wincing brutality, and notes with a quiet heroism:"I couldn't turn my face away for long... My job was to observe."

Habila, a prize-winning author, offers a vivid, unsettling story that has the pace and mystery of a detective drama, and the panoramic breadth of a state of the nation novel.