This remarkable book is unlike anything I have ever read and I really don't know what to make of it or what to say about it. Sony Labou Tansi (I don't even know which is his first and which his last name) was a Congolese author who, in the 70s, wrote what he calls a fable "about" a murderous dictatorship in Congo. As far as I can tell, "life and a half" refers both to people who die but still live on in some way as well as people who are both alive and dead. People come and go and get all mixed up with each other in this satiric novel, which is both totally fantastical in terms of actual events and people and realistic in terms of the horror of brutal, corrupt dictatorships: time periods stretch out and are contracted, lots of impossible things (mostly bad) happen, the human body carries out largely unimaginable functions. Sony Labou Tansi's language is dense and confusing, vivid and shocking all at the same time. The translator (from the French) notes in her introduction that "language itself becomes a field of battle . . . this presents a challenge to the translator." I can't say I enjoyed this book, but I'm glad I read it, especially since it is "regarded as one of the 100 best books on Africa" (at least according to the blurb on the back of my edition).