I found this book to be truly entertaining and a must read for all people of African descent. This is definitely a novel that should rank among the ten best in African literature.

The writer puts a face on the suffering of a people. His writing is simple, yet highly intelectual.He helps us understand why African people still suffer today - throughout the diaspora. A must read for all 16 and older. TIP: Save the prologue for last. It's much too intense to begin with. Besides, you'll comprehend it a lot better later.

If you're lucky enough to get a hold of this book-Treasure It!. It's currently out of print, but it is by far the most important book I have ever read.

I have just finished reading this book a few hours ago, and although I have barely had time to digest its contents, it has to be considered a modern literary classic. I read it for a Western African history class, and although I think it helps to have a rudimentary understanding of Ghana's post-independence history, this novel definitely stands on its own literary merit. "The Man" (as he is referred to) is an honest and introspective individual torn apart by the corruption and greed of his society. This creates conflict between not only him and the majority of the world around him, but also between him and his family. This book speaks volumes of the nature of a society that has been decimated by the repressive rule of an entirely different culture. Ayi Kwei Armah weaves beautiful poetry, intellectual insight, and explicit (and at times repulsive- but that is the desired effect) imagery into his story. The reader can truly feel the struggle and search for balance of the man. Humorous at times, depressing at others, "The Beautyful Ones" is a moving masterpiece. "As he went down a shadow rose up the bottom wall to meet him, and it was his own."

Beautiful Ones was required reading at secondary school. I didn't quite understand it, all the same it left an impression, and early this year i sought it out. It is an amazing book. Two weeks of careful reading, my copy is left heavily lined and dog-eared.

I strongly recommend it to all budding social revolutionaries.

It is one lone man's struggle against seemingly inescapable corruption and filth. A "settled mind"/resolved principles triumphs in the face of hunger, severe poverty, a nagging wife and his own conscience.

His stance is eventually justified when the corrupt government along with his much envied politician friend falls.

There is a lot of filth- environment, human nature, even language. Nothing is spared. Its easy to get caught up in its general ugliness. This is ironically the beauty of the book and does not rob it of its essence. For those who have not been exposed to widespread corruption, rotteness or had to struggle with "doing the right thing" and against all the odds, it may seem a "sick book".

I had to read this my freshman year of college many moons ago, and its imagery has always stuck with me. Set in Ghana, shortly after its independence, we see how the poor classes live in the abject poverty that marks many Third World nations (a poverty level much more profound than that in the USA). Meantime, thos ein power, i.e. government workers etc, live in relative affluence and job security. In this instance, they are not terribly different from many Westernized nations!

One sentence I always remember is when one character looks at the severe, hard government worker and wonders how this man before him had once been a boy, with a childhood, and if he remembered ever laughing and flying a kite. Another is when a very proud man, in order to escape some people after him, is forced to make an escape route out of his toilet and comes out the other end smelling like feces. It is a fitting and poetically just scene.