ABOUT THE BOOK
This is the story of an enthusiastic young man who after his University education went to serve his country under the National Youth Service Corps scheme as a teacher in a girls' school. His Head Teacher fell in love with him but the unsuspecting young man was outlandish and fatuous. He misinterpreted his boss' preferential treatment as an acknowledgement of integrity and moral soundness. He fell a victim of unrequited love, and went through horrifying experiences. This is a story of love, romance, temptation, intrigues, suspense and torture. It all goes as it is said, that there is no limit to what a woman can do to obtain redress for unrequited love.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Victor Okechukwu Anyaegbuna, popularly known as VOA by his peers, was born on November 11, 1951 atAba in Nigeria Government Secondary School American College
Victor Okechukwu Anyaegbuna, popularly known as VOA by his peers, was born on November 11, 1951 at
Many other works are at various stages of completion and will be published soon. Some titles are "OKU N'AGBA OZALA and other Poems", "WIDOW IN THE WOODS OF BLACK AFRICA", "HOW AFRICAN WOMEN KILL THEIR HUSBANDS." "THE HERITAGE AND LEGACIES OF CHIEF LEOPOLD OKOJI ANYAEGBUNA - ROOTS."
PREVIEW:
“For instance, you know that two of us are the only University graduates in this school...” Her eyes were becoming sheer less and dim, apparently the effect of alcohol. She was becoming uncontrollably emotional and doting. I was becoming scared of the possibility of being roped into a fantasy. Perhaps it was simply a figment of my imagination; wishful thinking, maybe. I composed myself.
“Have a drink” Mrs. Duta offered again and raised her two legs unto the table clearly exposing her pink under wears and inciting smooth well oiled laps. I looked at the door and outside to see if someone was watching. There was no one. I tried to conceal my discomfiture and pretend that there was nothing new or strange about the on going. I tried to convince myself that I was now a mature adult, no longer a boy. After all I was now a teacher, no longer a student under parental or scholarly supervision. Mrs. Duta was also a teacher; but something in me was revolting. My father brought me up under strict Christian moral discipline. Would I now, so early, betray this upbringing? As a young and independent graduate teacher, I could now freely relate with the opposite sex in any way I chose. After all, my next concern might be to get married. Mrs. Duta was elegant, ardent, seducing, enticing, girlish, but something in me quickly prompted a danger signal in two words “...BUT MARRIED”. Adultery was desecrating and profane, at least so I thought from my background. That put me off quickly, and I fearfully erased all the untoward thoughts as figments of my own imagination. I remembered Oscar Wilde’s musing that ‘there is no such thing as morality or immorality in thought’. I also remembered in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, “The attempt and not the deed confounds us to the sticking place.” I tried to forgive myself, and regained my composure once more.
I curtly and nervously congratulated Mrs. Duta once again for the promotion and replied that the party was an occasion to look forward to. She smiled affectively, and sluggishly opened her side table drawer. She brought out a bundle of barbecued meat on sticks wrapped with an old newspaper.
“You won’t have a drink with me. Why not have some suya,” she offered. I was hesitant but she urged me on. “You appear too tensed. Why don’t you relax a bit? All work and no play makes Mr. Ezennia a dull guy.” She said and held out the several sticks of suya that she had unwrapped. “Come on, she urged on. It’s fresh! It’s hot! I just got it and it contains delicious sweet spicing... you may have heard of Bashiru’s suya in Idah...” she smiled.
“No, I haven’t” I replied.
“Then have a taste of it. You’ll like it. Come on!” She urged me on and took a bite of one to show me it was safe. I fell for it probably more out of my bashfulness than conviction, and to show I did not necessarily suspect or resent her. I courteously took a little bite of the tasty spice infested barbecued meat and thanked my boss. She was excited like one who had successfully executed a mission.
“How do you like it?” she asked.
“Fine, and very tasty!” I replied politely.
“Then have more! Now you can relax well and we can have a lot of good fun.”
I took another stick, stood and quickly repeated my request for permission to travel for the Christmas holidays.
“Oh no! Mr. Ezennia, you are a young man. You stay here with us. I promise you a good time better than you’ve ever had, better than those girls out there can offer you.” Mrs. Duta replied. I felt shot across the bows. Her charming exposed laps on the table caught my attention again, and I got somehow kindled. It was an incredible reality. I was tossed between emotive fealty and moral agitation. Minute by minute I was convinced I was in an exciting dream. I tried to exercise self control derived from fear, but I was beginning to have a strong penile erection.
COMMENTARIES
"Unrequited Love, the second book of Victor Anyaegbuna, is an unput-down-able debut novel in the committee of best sellers in global books market, as it arrests the reader from the beginning to the end with mesmerizing suspense, flashbacks, enthralling descriptions and poetic chemistry well presented with flowing sugary diction."
- Blessed Mudiaga Adjekpagbon on Saturday, September 18, 2010 at 3:47pm
AVAILABILITY
In addition to being available through AuthorHouse, customersupport@authorhouse.com the book is also available to purchase or order through many different retail outlets. These include, but are not limited to http://www.amazon.com, http:/www.tesco.com Barnes & Noble, and Borders.
It is also available in Nigeria at University of Lagos UNILAG BOOKSHOP at Akoka Lagos, THE APAPA CLUB BOOKSHOP at 13, Park Lane, Apapa, Lagos; and GOLDEN TULIP Amuwo-Odofin, Mile 2, Festac Lagos.
CONVENIENT LINK:
BOOK REVIEW: UNREQUITED LOVE
- A romantic thriller every reader worth is or her salt should read
Unrequited Love, the second book of Victor Anyaegbuna, is an unput-down-able debut novel in the committee of best sellers in global books market, as it arrests the reader from the beginning to the end with mesmerizing suspense, flashbacks, enthralling descriptions and poetic chemistry well presented with flowing sugary diction.
The 125-page book tells the story of an enthusiastic young man, Okey Ezennia, who after his University education went to serve his country, Nigeria under the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, at a girls’ school in Idah, Benue State. His head Teacher, Mrs. Duta fell in love with him, but the unsuspecting and highly disciplined young man misinterpreted his boss preferential treatment as an acknowledgement of his integrity and moral discipline, before the scales later started falling from his eyes.
His ordeal began when he was posted to serve as a teacher in an all-girls school known as Governor Girls Secondary School, Idah. Though he had been earlier cautioned by his uncle, Alhaji Zakari, who knows a lot about Mrs. Duta’s problematic character, Okey thought he had the antidote to her challenges. "That woman no good-o… that woman e too wicked… The woman no get friend. If she likes you, na trouble; if she no like you, na trouble," Zakari had told Okey.
However, the novel begins with a poem as its prologue titled "Idah and the Beast," and accompanied by twelve chapters with the following headings: Pre-Emptions; Idah; The Beginning; Back to Square One; Mass Expulsion; The Party; Police Girls; The Punishment: Grills; Diana; and Revelations. Its epilogue is also a poem, titled Aristocratic Whore.
Any reader that is familiar with Benue State, will be very much carried along in homely familiarity with the settings and storyline of the novel. Those who are not indigenes of Benue State but have traveled there will not also miss the familiar names of Gboko, Katsina Ala, Makurdi, Otukpo, Dekina and Idah, which the author used to usher-in the reader from the first chapter that sets the romantic atmosphere of the book unfolding with cataclysmic engagement.
Though the central characters of the story are Okey and Mrs. Duta, other issues raised by Anyaegbuna, the author, include the medical and health hazards being faced by under-age girls betrothed and given out for early marriages in the northern part of Nigeria. The author speaks as a medical expert who knows much about the health risks such young girls face through early pregnancy that afflicts them with Vesico Vagina Fistula (VVF) disease. The girls suffer from the disease after childbirth, which makes them pass urine without control from the vagina and begin to smell. The author uses Okey to enlighten Yaji, a character in the story to see reason why he should not engage in having early sexual intercourse with his bethroted fiancée, who was a pretty little shy girl barely fourteen years old.
Another area of concern Anyaegbuna, systematically used the novel to tackle is that of poor administrative discipline in some boarding schools. Okey who had been warned to be careful in his dealings with Mrs. Duta, was surprised during the first teachers meeting she had with him and his other corps members, Mrs. Odo, Samco Dee and Apah, posted to the school to teach. "We have had some nasty experiences in the past…Last year a member of staff impregnated a class two student…That was one of our woes and we don’t want a repetition… So that is why we are housing you far away from the school," she had told the youth corpers who are bachelors. It is however, ironical that it is the same Mrs. Duta who claimed to be sincere and open, that Okey later became a victim of molestation and oppression from, when her desire to colonise him as her bed-mate was unfulfilled. Okey recalled his send off party in the University he graduated from. He said the Head of Department he finished from, Professor Ugobaba made a speech he so much cherished during the party and memorized thus: "As students you see the world from a Utopian point of view. You have enthusiasm about everything and you are protected in the enclave of academic freedom. In the new world, you are about to enter, you are going to be exposed to dangers, frustration, insincerity, intrigues, conspiracy, injustice, contradictions, betrayal and what have you. They will all come to you first under the cloak of sincerity. Do not be caught unawares."
The medical novelist also describes in a blue film cinematic style how some of the under-age girls of the school seduced the male youth corpers, by exposing their pants while sitting in unlady-like manner in class. They made jest of the corpers after their seductive and open invitation for sexual relation to the corpers were rebuffed. The novel is surely a good reading material for all stakeholders in the educational system in any society that wants positive change in academic performances of students. From the happenings in the romantic thriller, it is clear that the author wrote it from omnipresent point of view as Okey, the hero of the novel, Anyaegbuna says "Mrs. Duta frowned and shook her head. At first she seemed lost for words but she was a schemer… She stared at me like a hypnotist and was sort of urging me on and prompting, with penetrating eye contact… Mrs. Duta looked at me sleepily and dawned an attitude of helplessness or is it hopelessness…"
The author is a marvelous story teller. He describes scenes with suspense and quixotic electricity that makes the reader very eager to know what the next line of action would translate to. Sometimes, the way he describes scenes makes you angry with Mrs. Duta, especially when she falsely accused Apah, a stammerer, of negligence of duty. Any reader who does not control his or her emotion would certainly laugh loudly when absorbing the various unfolding dramas in this romantic thriller, laced with great humour that keeps one giggling. The scene where Mrs. Duta had a showdown with Apah, is among one of such hilarious happenings in the novel.
Samco's experiences with the young secondary school girls is another rib cracking one too, as he narrated his ordeal to Okey and Apah after their first classroom lesson with the teenagers. "These girls are bad! Kai!" He exclaimed..."Can you imagine such very small girls like these deliberately exposing their laps and under wears just to catch attention of their teachers?" Samco further added in exasperation. He recalled how he reprimanded them to sit well to no avail. One of them had asked him "Are you not a man or are we too small for you?"
This is a clear picture of moral decadence among many teenagers of nowadays, which has been resulting to many unwanted pregnancies, spread of HIV/AIDS virus, abandoned babies and premature deaths caused by abortion quacks. However, it is quite amazing that Mrs. Duta the hypocritical Jezebel was happy with the moral decadence in the school, despite her carriage as a responsible married woman. The questions that comes to mind are, does marriage really make every man or woman truly responsible? Is it all married persons that are responsible? The way Mrs. Duta raised her two legs unto a table, clearly exposing her pink under wear and inciting smooth laps to Okey's view in her office begs the questions. She later opened her drawer and brought out a whorish perfume and sprayed it on his back. She placed her arms on his groin and tried to get his hands over her shoulders, after giving him a special barbecue meat, known as "Bashiru Suya," to chew. The Suya was spiced with 'burantashi' a sexual performance or libido booster, very common among the Hausas. But all her plans to get Okey to lay her were in vain. Scenes like this are replete in the novel, well delivered by the author with metamorphic erotic jingoism and fluid display of good English command. This reminds the reader about Wale Okediran's "Tenants of the House," which has similar erotic flavours.
The plots in each chapter are very intriguing like a true woman's skirmishes to trap any man she loves or want to get money from. Though Mrs. Duta's bobby traps to nail Okey were unsuccessful, he went through emotional hell. He stood his ground as a highly disciplined man. This type of uprightness is an uncommon quality in many men. Her behaviour is a true mirror of how many desperate women could go to any length to get what they want illegally. She even went to the extent of trying to poison him with juju after her seductive mysticisms fell before her face like a pack of cards, after several times trying to trap him. As God would have it, through Diana, a new female student-teacher, who was later posted to the school to work, Okey discovered loads of revelations about all the diabolical things Mrs. Duta had done to punish him for refusing her sexual advances. From the foregoing, it is clear it is not only women that face sexual harassment from the opposite sex. Many women are culprits of this offense too, but nobody seems to listen to this type of harassment Okey experienced, when the offender is a female. Many men would even jump at such opportunity, thanking their stars. The story is incontrovertibly tantalizing and humorous. It underscores Anyaegbuna as a very entertaining, educative and insightful romantic writer.
Born in Aba, Abia State, 59 years ago, Anyaegbuna holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Biochemistry, from the University of Nigeria Nsukka. He also bagged Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degrees from the University of Lagos. He is a member of the American College of Physician Executives, and a former Editor-in-Chief of the Medilag Journal. Many of his articles have been published in various newspapers. The Skeleton Says It All, is his first complete novel, as most of his early works got lost during the Nigeria-Biafra fratricidal war.
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