• Serial rights targeting The New Yorker, The Paris Review, BOMB, Los Angeles Review of Books, The White Review, The Drift
• Print and digital publicity targeting the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, NPR, The Atlantic, Public Books, The Rumpus, Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, The White Review, Words Without Borders, World Literature Today, Asymptote, A Public Space, and others
• Promotion at or events pitched for Texas Book Festival, Toronto International Festival of Authors, Brooklyn Book Festival, Winter Institute, Miami Book Fair, PEN World Voices
• Review copies will be sent targeting all major print and digital literary media outlets, reviewers, and booksellers; additional copies available upon request
• Promotion on the publisher’s website (deepvellum.org), Twitter feed (@deepvellum), and Facebook page (/deepvellum); and publisher’s e-newsletter

Following the international success of his debut novel Tram 83, Fiston Mwanza Mujila is back with his highly anticipated second novel, which follows a remarkable series of characters during the Mobutu regime. The Democratic Republic of Congo, otherwise known as Congo-Kinshasa or DRCongo, has had a series of names since its founding. The name of Zaire best corresponds to the experience of the novel’s characters. The years of Mobutu’s regime were filled with utopias, dreams, fantasies and other uncontrolled desires for social redemption, the quest for easy enrichment and the desecration of places of power. Among these events: Zairians’ immigration to Angola during the civil war boycotting the borders inherited from colonization, as if the country did not have its own diamonds, and the occupation of public places by children from outside. The author creates the atmosphere of the time through a roundup of characters: the diviner Tshiamuena, also known as Madonna of the Cafunfo mines, prides herself of being God with whoever is willing to listen to her. Franz Baumgartner, an apprentice writer originally from Austria and rumba lover, goes around the bars in search of material for his novel. Sanza, Le Blanc and other street children share information to the intelligence services when they are not living off begging and robbery. Djibril, taxi driver, only lives for reggae music. As soon as night falls, each character dances and plays his own role in a country mined by dictatorship.