A visionary major novel, at once political and social.

A cook at the Victory Palace Hotel in Pointe-Noire, Republic of the Congo, Liwa Ekimakingaï lives with his grandmother while waiting to meet the right woman. On an evening of August 15th, he dresses up to the nines and goes to a nightclub, where he meets the beautiful Adeline. She seems unapproachable on the dance floor, yet accepts his advances, thus signing his death warrant. The novel takes readers into the young man’s life and last hours. No sooner is he buried than he climbs from his grave and attends his own four-day-long wake and funeral. The graveyards of Pointe-Noire are a backdrop: the Cemetery of the Rich, with its expensive plots, and Frère-Lachaise, which takes all comers.