From Publishers Weekly
The daunting emotional challenge of living up to an almost mythically famous parent is the subject of Wiwa's brutally candid memoir, which explores his psychological tug-of-war with his father, Nigerian writer and human rights activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa. Asking "My father. Where does he end and where do I begin?" Wiwa recalls his troubled childhood growing up in the shadow of a world-renowned man who simultaneously took on a powerful military regime and the mighty Shell Oil conglomerate, only to be executed by the Nigerian dictatorship in November 1995. Writing this book, according to Wiwa, who is now a journalist in Canada, was an attempt to understand the complex bond between his father and himself, a relationship so difficult at times that it compelled him to legally change his name. Resentful at his father's mood swings, absences and infidelities, he was angry at being pressured to continue the older Wiwa's work and legacy until he fully reassessed the man's untiring fight against tyranny. Wiwa's impassioned and detailed memoir provides a superb overview of the Nigerian political landscape, as well as an excellent behind-the-scenes look at his father. In addition to his own story, the concluding segments about other children of prominent human rights heroes Nelson Mandela, Steve Biko and Bogoyoke Aung San are revealing and informative. Agents, Bruce Westwood, Westwood Creative Artists, and Derek Johns, AP Watt. (Sept. 1) Forecast: This book is almost certain to attract media attention, given the international celebrity of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the irresistible family angle. Its eloquence promises a wide readership among those who care about international human rights and those who love family memoirs.Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Wiwa's complex memoir is both an account of the history, corruption, and politics of modern Nigeria and an inquiring biography of his father, Ken Saro-Wiwa. Saro-Wiwa was a renowned human rights activist and vibrant critic of the Nigerian military dictatorship who was instrumental in publicizing the environmental and human rights abuses of the Shell Oil Company. His 1995 execution by the Nigerian military regime made him an international martyr and a symbol for the Nigerian opposition. While detailing his childhood and his strained relationship with his controversial father, Wiwa vividly portrays the struggle between a traditional way of life in Nigeria and multinational corporate interests. He shows how, in his worldwide appeal for justice for his father, he was able to come to terms with his father's life and execution. This insightful, clearly written work is recommended for those interested in African society and politics, the dangers of environmental pollution by multinational corporations in developing countries, and human rights abuses throughout the world. Edward G. McCormack, Univ. of Southern Mississippi Lib., Gulf Coast Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
What's it like to be the son of a martyr? Ken Saro-Wiwa was a Nigerian resistance leader who was tried on trumped-up charges and executed by the military regime in 1995. The world outcry about his death continues, and he has become a global symbol of the struggle for social justice. But his eldest son, born in Nigeria and educated in England, had always resented how his father's politics invaded family life. He had parted from his father in anger. His grief at the execution was mixed with guilt, confusion, and resentment. In this candid, gripping memoir, the son weaves together the politics of Nigeria with his personal struggle to know his father. Occasionally, he overplays the metaphor that the search for his father is also a search for his own identity. But he's never pompous. Rather, he writes with eloquent simplicity about the daily particulars of his family and his country and the universals of coming of age. In bearing witness to his father's cause, he finds his own voice. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Review
"Your book is rivetting, searingly honest and deeply moving.It is a splendid monument to an outstanding man, warts and all." —Desmond Tutu

"Ken Wiwa leaves no holds unbarred in his account of his father's remarkable life and appalling death. It's a searing personal and political document." —Harold Pinter

“His book is at once a tough indictment of the Nigerian government and the oil industry, and an intense and moving tale of a young man’s struggle to make peace with his father….Exceptionally — sometimes bracingly — frank.” —Toronto Life

“In The Shadow of a Saint is a stirring work that will resonate with you long after you close the book and a reminder on the anniversary of Saro-Wiwa’s death that the word really can be more powerful than the sword.” —Eye

“The straightforward honesty of Ken Wiwa’s account is the book’s shining merit. Not only is Ken Wiwa searching for the man his father was, he is also striving to unearth the truth of his own fraught relationship with him….And it is entirely fitting that it is by an act of writing that Ken Wiwa finally slips out of the long shadow that Ken Saro-Wiwa cast, to become his own man and , moreover, someone of whom I am sure his father would have been intensely proud.” —The Globe and Mail

“The story of his final hours is one of the most memorable in the book, not only because it is written by his son, but because it is written with a detachment and calm that amplifies both the horror of the death and the dignity and defiance of the victim. It must have taken great strength to write those pages. Ken Saro-Wiwa would surely be proud.” —The Edmonton Journal

“Ken Wiwa has written a powerful and thought-provoking account of his father. It is, above all, an extremely honest book, with no attempts to conceal the warts.” —The Financial Times (UK)

“Ken Wiwa does not spare himself in this story. He reveals self-truths he is not proud of. You feel for him. You feel for his father. His elegantly written book is a weave of Nigerian and family history, both turbulent, both tragic, neither without hope. The book is also a song of the Ogoni people, a tribute to their struggle, their endurance…. Poignant.” —The Guardian

“[An] inquiring biography…Wiwa handles plenty of confusion and guilt with aplomb…Wiwa’s childhood recollections are ambivalent: he describes his nervousness and self-consciousness around his father, his sense of always trailing in his footsteps…until this biography, that is — its voice very much his own, as is its political verve. Insightful chapters on the children of Nelson Mandela and Stephen Biko add poingnancy and depth to Wiwa’s personal exploration.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"In the Shadow of a Saint is a memoir, a biography, a political history, a tribute to a political martyr and a love letter to a father." — The Toronto Star

"[Wiwa] has produced a fascinating account of his troubled homeland, and a touching portrait of his talented father." — Maclean's


Book Description
The writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was executed by Nigeria's military dictatorship in 1995. An outspoken critic of military rule, he helped bring the environmental and human-rights abuses of Shell Oil and the Nigerian military before the world. The name Ken Saro-Wiwa became synonymous with the struggle between a traditional way of life and the juggernaut of global commercial interests. In the Shadow of a Saint comprises a history of modern Nigeria, a biography of an activist, and a frank depiction of the author's childhood and relationship with his controversial father. The book shines light on how Wiwa made his way in the shadow of his father's expectations, how he came to terms with his father's imprisonment and execution, and how he coped under international scrutiny.


From the Inside Flap
In late 1995, the little-known Ogoni region in Nigeria became a fable for our times. Ken Saro-Wiwa, a renowned poet and environmentalist, was campaigning to protect his Ogoni people against the encroachments of Shell Oil and a brutal dictatorship. He was imprisoned, tortured, brought to trial on trumped-up charges, and executed.

At the heart of the public campaign to save Ken Saro-Wiwa was another Ken Wiwa—the author's son—who travelled the world lobbying world leaders and mobilizing public opinion, so that his father was recognized as a hero and a symbol of the struggle for environmental justice. The Saro-Wiwa name became global currency for righteousness.

Ken Wiwa has embarked on a book that tells the story—from a human, anecdotal perspective—of what it means to grow up as a child in the shadow of such extraordinary men and women. In the end, it's about Ken's attempts to make peace with himself and his father—following his journey as he reaches toward a final rendezvous with the father who was snatched by the hangman.


About the Author
Born in Nigeria and educated in England, Ken Wiwa now contributes to newpapers, including The Globe and Mail, the National Post, the Ottawa Citizen, The Toronto Star, The Guardian, Sunday Telegraph, the Independent, the Independent on Sunday and the Observer. Internationally his journalism has appeared in South Africa, Holland, Germany and Spain and in a weekly column for Vanguard in Nigeria. Ken was also Internet editor for The Guardian for nearly two years. He now lives in Canada with his family and is Senior Resident Writer at Massey College in the University of Toronto.


Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
My father. Where does he end and where do I begin? I seem to have spent my whole life chasing his shadow, trying to answer the questions that so many fathers pose to their sons. Is my life predetermined by his? My future defined by my past? Is his story repeating itself through me, or am I the author of my own fate? Is he my father, or am I his son? Where does he end and where do I begin?

I was always my father's son. His influence was visible in just about everything I did: my career, the woman I chose to marry, why I shortened my name, the books I read, the way I speak, the way I write, my politics. I used to fantasize about his death, imagining it as the moment when I would finally be free to be my own man, to make my own way in life without having to consider how he would react.

He was hanged in Nigeria on November 10, 1995. On the morning of his execution, he was taken from his prison cell in a military camp in Port Harcourt, on the southern coast of Nigeria, and driven under armed escort to a nearby prison. It took five attempts to hang him. His corpse was dumped in an unmarked grave; acid was poured on his remains and soldiers posted outside the cemetery.

Ken Saro-Wiwa's execution triggered a tidal wave of outrage that swept around the world. John Major, then British prime minister, described my father's execution as "judicial murder" and the military tribunal that sentenced him to death as a "fraudulent trial, a bad verdict, an unjust sentence." Nelson Mandela declared that "this heinous act by the Nigerian authorities flies in the face of appeals by the world community for a stay of execution." World figures, including Bill Clinton and the Queen, joined the worldwide condemnation of Nigeria's military dictator, General Sani Abacha. Nigeria was suspended from the Commonwealth; countries recalled their diplomats, and there were widespread calls for economic sanctions. There were candlelit vigils and demonstrations outside Nigerian embassies and at Shell Oil stations and offices. My father's death was front-page news around the world. Letters and tributes poured in from every continent, and Ken Saro-Wiwa was canonized in hastily prepared obituaries that were often littered with errors. A man whom few people had heard of twenty-four hours earlier was suddenly invested with a mythic quality, and his campaign against Shell Oil and a ruthless military regime was being touted as a morality tale for the late twentieth century.

But there were ugly footnotes to the saga. The quicklime had barely calcified around my father's bones when dissenting voices began to question the public's perception of Ken Saro-Wiwa. In The Times, one commentator wrote, "People are comparing Ken Saro-Wiwa to Steve Biko, which of course he isn't." A society columnist in The Sunday Times insisted that "Ken Saro-Wiwa may have got the short end of the stick but he was no angel." Shell Oil, the company my father had accused of devastating the environment and abusing the human rights of our people, responded to questions about its role in the affair by launching a public-relations campaign that spread doubts about his character and his reputation. The multinational distanced itself from the execution, insisting that it was being used as a scapegoat to deflect attention from the real issues in the trial. In a television interview, the head of its Nigerian operations claimed that Ken Saro-Wiwa had been executed for murder.

General Abacha declared war against Ken Saro-Wiwa, spending $10 million to counter the negative publicity his regime was attracting because of the execution. Washington lobbyists and public-relations consultants were hired to sell the line that Ken Saro-Wiwa had incited his followers to commit murder. An advertisement in the Washington Post graphically illustrated the sequence of events leading up to the trial and the execution. In London, the Nigerian High Commission took space in The Times to explain "the truth about Ken Saro-Wiwa." Newspaper editors were pressed to report "the other side of the story," and in The Guardian, where I was working at the time, one of my father's former associates described him as a "habitual liar." Punch magazine claimed that Ken Saro-Wiwa had duped gullible liberals and had used his friends in the media to "fool the world."

FROM THE PUBLISHER

The writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was executed by Nigeria￯﾿ﾽs military dictatorship in 1995. An outspoken critic of military rule, he helped bring the environmental and human-rights abuses of Shell Oil and the Nigerian military before the world. The name Ken Saro-Wiwa became synonymous with the struggle between a traditional way of life and the juggernaut of global commercial interests. In the Shadow of a Saint comprises a history of modern Nigeria, a biography of an activist, and a frank depiction of the author￯﾿ﾽs childhood and relationship with his controversial father. The book shines light on how Wiwa made his way in the shadow of his father￯﾿ﾽs expectations, how he came to terms with his father￯﾿ﾽs imprisonment and execution, and how he coped under international scrutiny.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

The daunting emotional challenge of living up to an almost mythically famous parent is the subject of Wiwa's brutally candid memoir, which explores his psychological tug-of-war with his father, Nigerian writer and human rights activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa. Asking "My father. Where does he end and where do I begin?" Wiwa recalls his troubled childhood growing up in the shadow of a world-renowned man who simultaneously took on a powerful military regime and the mighty Shell Oil conglomerate, only to be executed by the Nigerian dictatorship in November 1995. Writing this book, according to Wiwa, who is now a journalist in Canada, was an attempt to understand the complex bond between his father and himself, a relationship so difficult at times that it compelled him to legally change his name. Resentful at his father's mood swings, absences and infidelities, he was angry at being pressured to continue the older Wiwa's work and legacy until he fully reassessed the man's untiring fight against tyranny. Wiwa's impassioned and detailed memoir provides a superb overview of the Nigerian political landscape, as well as an excellent behind-the-scenes look at his father. In addition to his own story, the concluding segments about other children of prominent human rights heroes Nelson Mandela, Steve Biko and Bogoyoke Aung San are revealing and informative. Agents, Bruce Westwood, Westwood Creative Artists, and Derek Johns, AP Watt. (Sept. 1) Forecast: This book is almost certain to attract media attention, given the international celebrity of Ken Saro-Wiwa and the irresistible family angle. Its eloquence promises a wide readership among those who care about international human rights and those who lovefamily memoirs. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

Wiwa's complex memoir is both an account of the history, corruption, and politics of modern Nigeria and an inquiring biography of his father, Ken Saro-Wiwa. Saro-Wiwa was a renowned human rights activist and vibrant critic of the Nigerian military dictatorship who was instrumental in publicizing the environmental and human rights abuses of the Shell Oil Company. His 1995 execution by the Nigerian military regime made him an international martyr and a symbol for the Nigerian opposition. While detailing his childhood and his strained relationship with his controversial father, Wiwa vividly portrays the struggle between a traditional way of life in Nigeria and multinational corporate interests. He shows how, in his worldwide appeal for justice for his father, he was able to come to terms with his father's life and execution. This insightful, clearly written work is recommended for those interested in African society and politics, the dangers of environmental pollution by multinational corporations in developing countries, and human rights abuses throughout the world.-Edward G. McCormack, Univ. of Southern Mississippi Lib., Gulf Coast

Kirkus Reviews