The Selfless Act of Breathing, JJ Bola
“I’m often reminded that I come from a place at war”
Michael Kabongo is a British-Congolese teacher who, on the face of it, lives a good life in London; his students admire him, he is surrounded by thoughtful friends and colleagues, and his mother, who emigrated with her son from the Congo, is irrefutably proud of everything he has worked to achieve. And yet, behind closed doors, he's struggles with despairing conclusion that he ‘doesn’t belong anywhere’.
Caught between memories of his fathers' violent death, his ineffectual efforts to change the lives of promising students who become implicated in violence and drug-dealing, and a whole host of familial and social pressures – Michael is lost. In an attempt to escape his own mind, Michael plans to travel around America until his money runs out ‘for no reason but romance, poetry’.
As Bola interweaves a first-person narrative recounting events in London with slightly more disassociated chapters that follow his transformative American journey, readers are given a deeper understanding of the reasons why Michael is, heartbreakingly, unable to truly experience love or feel appreciated.
Capturing the all-encompassing nature of our fragile mental health and the impulse to escape, The Selfless Act of Breathing is a powerful novel that examines the codes and performances of masculinity, the pervasiveness of systemic racisms, and the humble human need for love and community.
