Oil on Water

Author: Habila, Helon

Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)

Published on 1 September 2011 by Penguin Books Ltd in the United Kingdom.

From the desks of Nigeria's newsrooms, two journalists are recruited to find the kidnapped wife of a British oil engineer. Zaq, an infamous media hack, knows what's in store, but Rufus, a keen young journalist eager to get himself noticed, has no idea what he's let himself in for. Journeying into the oil-rich regions of the Niger Delta, where militants rule and the currency dealt in is the lives of hostages, Rufus soon finds himself acting as intermediary between editor, husband, captive and soldier. As they follow the trail of the missing woman, love for the 'story' becomes about much more than just uncovering her whereabouts, and instead becomes a mission to make sense of their own muddled lives. In a cruel twist of fate, Rufus finds himself taking on Zaq's role much more literally than he ever anticipated, and as the body count rises, and the environment burns, he learns that truth can often be a bitter pill to swallow.