Conradian themes of power and greed characterise Farah Ahamed’s ‘The Helper of Cattle’. Ahamed folds many ideas into this poignant story of corruption, a cursed and silent woman, land and traditions, invasion of foreigners, native beliefs versus modernity. Towards the end of the story one of the character’s says:

The Maasai have a secret … We know when it will rain, when a lion is near, and what kind of a heart a man has.

In her impressively lucid prose, Ahamed crafts essentially a story of a human heart, and the darkness it conceals.