(Photos: Stittsville Central)
From the first fragment of their story told in The Ceasefire War, Angel and Mercy continue their mission in life in this new novel — The Ebola War. The book provides the reader with many twists and turns and was co-authored by John W. Egan, of Stittsville and Bakar Mansaray, of Edmonton, Alberta.
The novel was launched this week to a crowd filling the Grace Thompson meeting room at the Stittsville Library. RJ Partington of the Stittsville Creative Writing Group, provided the introductions and performed emcee duties for the evening.
Both authors were in attendance to share their experiences of writing and editing the novel while residing in separate cities and accepted questions at the end of their presentations. John took us through the history of the situation in Sierra Leone at the time the original story took place in 2001 to how the lives of Angel and Mercy had progressed to the time of the ebola epidemic in 2014. John read some passages from the new novel, while Bakar took us through a short reading of one of his non-fiction works – Muslims in Canada: A Microcosm.
The ebola epidemic quietly infiltrated into the Sierra Leone population from Guinea. It took a gripping hold three months after entering the country. With a decade-long civil war still festering on the back burner, the country was ill-prepared to handle such an outbreak.
The girls both survived the civil war, but a twist in the promising lives of Angel and Mercy comes into play as they help their countrymen deal with the epidemic. As in every novel, there is a bad character who influences throughout. You will just have to read it to find out more.
The books were available for sale with John and Bakar personally signing each copy. Copies of the books are available for loan from the Stittsville Library and available for sale on Amazon.
Congratulations Bakar and John…
Good work