Audiobooks by Namwali Serpell

"Brought to you by Penguin. The essential companion to Toni Morrison's work, written by Namwali Serpell, ‘one of the most innovative and intelligent writers today’ (Financial Times) A giant in American letters, and one of our most beloved writers, Nobel laureate Toni Morrison has inspired generations. But her artistic genius is often overshadowed by her monumental public persona, perhaps because, as Serpell puts it, ‘she is our only truly canonical black, female writer—and her work is complex.’ In On Morrison, Serpell brings her unique experience as both an award-winning writer and a professor of literature at Harvard University, to illuminate Morrison’s masterful experiments with literary form. This is Morrison as you’ve never encountered her before, a journey through her oeuvre—her fiction, poetry, dramatic works, and criticism—with contextual guidance, archival discoveries, and original close readings. At once accessible and uncompromisingly rigorous, On Morrison is a primer not only on how to read one of the most significant Black American authors of all time, but also on how to read great works of literature. Stylish, edifying, and electrifying in its intelligence, this dialogue on the page between two artist-readers is literary criticism at its very best. 'Stunning reconsiderations of Morrison… incisive, tender, and also honest and unsparing’ HANIF ABDURRAQIB, author of A Little Devil in America © Namwali Serpell 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026"

Namwali Serpell (Author), TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Furrows: From the Prize-winning author of The Old Drift

"Brought to you by Penguin. I don't want to tell you what happened. I want to tell you how it felt. Cassandra Williams is twelve; her little brother Wayne is seven. One day, when they're alone together, there's an accident, and Wayne is lost forever. Though his body is never recovered, their mother can't stop searching. The missing boy cleaves the family with doubt: How do you grieve an absence? And how does it feel? As C grows older, she relives and retells her story, and she sees her brother everywhere: in cafes, airplane aisles, subway cars. Here is her brother's older face, the light in his eyes, his lanky limbs, the way he seems to recognise her, too. But it can't be, of course. Or can it? And then one day, there's another accident, and C meets a man both mysterious and familiar, a man who's also searching for someone, as well as his own place in the world. His name is Wayne. Namwali Serpell's piercing new novel captures the ongoing and uncanny experience of grief, as the past breaks over the present, like waves in the sea. The Furrows is a bold exploration of memory and mourning that twists unexpectedly into a masterful story of mistaken identity, slippery reality, black experience, and the wishful and sometimes willful longing for reunion with those we've lost. © Namwali Serpell 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022"

Namwali Serpell (Author), Dion Graham, Kristen Ariza, Ryan Vincent Anderson (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Old Drift

"Random House presents the audiobook edition of The Old Drift by Namwali Serpell, read by Adjoa Andoh, Richard E. Grant and Kobna Holdbrook-Smith. Electrifying, playful, ambitious, brilliant – a Zambian debut novel that follows three generations of three families, telling the story of a nation, and of the grand sweep of time 'It’s difficult to think of another novel that is at once so sweepingly ambitious and so intricately patterned, delivering the pleasures of saga and poetry in equal measure. The Old Drift is an endlessly innovative, voraciously brilliant book, and Namwali Serpell is among the most distinctive and exciting writers to emerge in years.' Garth Greenwell On the banks of the Zambezi River, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls, there was once a colonial settlement called The Old Drift. Here begins the epic story of a small African nation, told by a mysterious swarm-like chorus that calls itself man’s greatest nemesis. The tale? A playful panorama of history, fairytale, romance and science fiction. The moral? To err is human. In 1904, in a smoky room at the hotel across the river, an Old Drifter named Percy M. Clark, foggy with fever, makes a mistake that entangles the fates of an Italian hotelier and an African busboy. This sets off a cycle of unwitting retribution between three Zambian families (black, white, brown) as they collide and converge over the course of the century, into the present and beyond. As the generations pass, their lives – their triumphs, errors, losses and hopes – form a symphony about what it means to be human. From a woman covered with hair and another plagued with endless tears, to forbidden love affairs and fiery political ones, to homegrown technological marvels like Afronauts, microdrones and viral vaccines – this gripping, unforgettable novel sweeps over the years and the globe, subverting expectations along the way. Exploding with colour and energy, The Old Drift is a testament to our yearning to create and cross borders, and a meditation on the slow, grand passage of time."

Namwali Serpell (Author), Adjoa Andoh, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Richard E. Grant (Narrator)

Audiobook