To me, before reading this novel, Lagos wasn’t terribly more than a name and a reference in my mind. It’s clear that the author has a love of the city, warts and all, and it comes through in her writing. Throughout, the writing is engaging, bright, and enthusiastic.

We get a full sense of the city, at the precipice of, and head over heels into the changes that the arrival of the aliens bring to it, by means of this network of characters, hopes, dreams, schemes, and actions. The even more clever thing that Okorafor does is the fractal and outward expanding web of relationships and characters that she introduces based on these initial three characters. They make for a diverse and complicated set of protagonists, providing a variety of perspectives and reactions to a shape-changing alien in their midst. All three are crucial in their own spheres when they meet Ayodele, the first alien Ambassador from the alien craft that has parked at the bottom of the harbor. Anthony (De Craze) is from Ghana, and a famous rapper with a large following. Adaora is a biologist with a turbulent domestic home life. There are many stories contained within Lagoon, a spectrum of short point of views, but the main threads run through three characters.

Lagoon, by Nnedi Okorafor explores that exact first contact scenario. But why would aliens, if they would come, necessarily park their ship above London, or crash into New York Harbor outside the U.N., or send troops into Los Angeles? Why wouldn’t they pick, instead, say, Lagos? What would a first contact be like if shapeshifting aliens who decided to come to stay on Earth for a while decided to skip the usual suspects and land in the lagoon outside the city of Lagos?

Its geography, its nature, and even the languages spoken there (did you know the first language for many in Lagos is a Pidgin language and not English?) do not readily come to mind. It’s one of the most populous cities in the world and yet it is a city that is relatively mysterious to most Western audiences.

Lagoon by nnedi okorafor