Olufemi Terry
Restless Books
9 September 2025
256
eBook - PDF
Contemporary Fiction
ARC via Edelweiss
To satisfy his father’s sentimental demand that he rescue his drifting cousin, Emil – a young trainee surgeon born into an affluent creole family – sets aside his studies and moves into his aunt's house in a remote multiracial African city, Stadmutter. Among his indifferent relatives, Emil is disquieted by days of unaccustomed aimlessness and by an encounter with Bolling, a wealthy and mystical foreigner who woos him intellectually and sexually. He is seduced by Tamsin, a historian of Sigmund Freud working to define herself against the fading privilege of her background.
Beneath a veneer of indolence, Stadmutter seethes. Bolling is covertly working with Braeem Shaka, an advocate for reparations to creoles, to foment tension that imperils the country’s fragile racial progress. Emil is increasingly diverted from his initial mission into uncharted waters and – as Shaka becomes a wanted man – pulled by his relationships with Bolling and Tamsin toward the impossibility of returning to his former existence as a promising medical student.
Wilderness of Mirrors was an intriguing tale in which we saw Emil gradually drawn in by two strong personalities who lead him, for different reasons, to question his former life and plans. I found the story compelling and the prose highly readable and descriptive without being overblown. I was perhaps a little more engaged in the first half of the book compared to the latter half, but only because I preferred those initial moments of new experiences and discoveries rather than their aftermath. I originally requested this book mainly to get another tick on my goal of reading a book written by an author from every country in the world, but I ended up enjoying it in addition to it fulfilling that role. I am giving it four stars. Recommended if you like thoughtful contemporary tales with a slight psychological bent.
I received this book as a free eBook ARC via Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.
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