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The House at Sugar Beach
Helene Cooper
Memoir, 2008
Memoir of a privileged Americo-Liberian childhood in Monrovia, ending with the 1980 coup and the start of the civil war.
Books set in Liberia
Six books by writers from Liberia, set there, that give a real sense of the place, starting with The House at Sugar Beach and The Dragons, the Giant, the Women.
About the literature of Liberia
Liberia's best-known authors include two winners of the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Leymah Gbowee, who have both written memoirs. Most published writing is in English, a legacy of the freed Black Americans who settled there; the country became independent in 1847. The Vai people have their own syllabary, a script devised in the 1830s. Sirleaf's This Child Will Be Great traces her political life from the years of settler-descended rule through war and recovery.
Gbowee's Mighty Be Our Powers describes the women's peace movement that helped end the civil war. Bai T. Moore's Murder in the Cassava Patch, a classic, is a novel of village life, love and murder in rural Liberia. Wayétu Moore's She Would Be King returns to the founding era, mixing Vai country, settlers and West African folklore. Memories of the civil war and the settler past recur across Liberian writing.
By writers from Liberia
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The Dragons, the Giant, the Women
Wayétu Moore
Memoir, 2020
Memoir of a family's escape from Monrovia at the start of the civil war, with vivid scenes of everyday Liberian life.
She Would Be King
Wayétu Moore
Novel, 2018
Historical novel of Liberia's founding era, weaving together Vai country, freed Black settlers and West African folklore.
Mighty Be Our Powers
Leymah Gbowee
Memoir, 2011
Memoir of the civil war years and the women's peace movement that helped end the conflict in Monrovia.
This Child Will Be Great
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
Memoir, 2009
Memoir by Africa's first elected female head of state, covering Liberian politics from the Americo-Liberian era through war and recovery.
Murder in the Cassava Patch
Bai T. Moore
Poetry, 1968
Classic Liberian novel of rural village life, with traditional customs, love and murder.
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