Three Egg Dilemma, by Morabo Morojele

An extremely intriguing manuscript. It is beautifully written, firstly: soulful, philosophical, heart wrenching, a vivid portrait of a hard world. Despite its length I found myself compelled. The touches of phantasmagorical horror, as well as the all too real horror of societal breakdown and the ravages of poverty, are vividly and immersively described. Mota’s ghost is a terrifying creation. Ex and Pearl are full, flawed, deep characters. – Henrietta Rose-Innes, author.

Three Egg Dilemma is a visionary novel. Morojele has built worlds and characters that are unforgettable. This audacious novel is set to become a classic work of South African fiction.

This is the story of Ex (short for ‘Example’), who lives in a small township on the outskirts of a town in Lesotho. He stays in his dead parents’ house, decorated with all his mother’s things, where he subsists off renting out back rooms. He drinks – too much – at Mada’s down the road, and has two friends: Sticks, who sells eggs on the street, and Latrine, so called because of his meagre digestion.

Although Ex used to have broad horizons, his life now is limited by the street he lives on. Once he had a meaningful job, he travelled, had money and hope. Life, and Lesotho, have been badly knocked: the country has suffered droughts, and is periodically thrown into turmoil by violent soldiers, or attacks by roving bandits such as the vicious Zuluboy. Poverty is rife.

Early on, we are introduced to a recurring vision, or supernatural phenomenon, that haunts Ex – ‘Mota’s ghost’, a ghastly demon-like being, ghost or representation of death or fate. It first appears to presage the death of a friend, and later returns when death visits his town.

The second important figure in the story is Phuleng / Pearl, an innocent young woman who arrives as a refugee when the soldiers are rampaging, and stays in Ex’s house – in his mother’s room. Ex, though much older, predictably enough falls in love with Pearl, but she has other ambitions. She works in a hotel in town, and eventually we learn that she has been impregnated by a white guest. Before the end, Ex will frighten her away, attempting to sexually assault her in the house. She will eventually end up a refugee again, homeless and on the streets outside Ex’s house, after soldiers and gangs have torn the area apart.

Major incidents in Ex’s life include an abortive love affair during his time of plenty, when he meets a woman from Botswana at an international aid conference, falls in love with her and travels across South Africa to join her – only to realise that he has misunderstood the signs, and that she is marrying a white man. The other formative moment is when he is tricked into believing that a street child is his son. Each of these moments of hope ends with him, to different degrees, being deceived, humiliated and exploited.

The novel ends with Ex back in his house after Zuluboy’s ravages, running the old shop and bar and being counselled in acceptance by the hideous Mota’s ghost.

Morojele has written a dystopian masterpiece: one which takes the reader on a darkly comic journey.