Akata Woman

Akata Woman, the third installment in the Nsibidi Scripts series, follows fifteen-year-old Sunny Nwazue, a Nigerian American girl with albinism who is a "free agent": a Leopard Person (someone with magical abilities) born to a non-magical "Lamb" family. In previous books, Sunny discovered her powers, formed an Oha coven (a bonded four-person magical group) with her boyfriend, Orlu, and her friends Chichi and Sasha, and faced the terrifying masquerade Ekwensu. Now a long-deferred obligation from the spider deity Udide threatens everything Sunny loves.

Sunny trains under her mentor Sugar Cream, an elderly scholar in Leopard Knocks, a hidden community for Leopard People. Sugar Cream teaches Sunny to "hold," the ability to stop time by placing a personal talisman on the ground. Sunny chooses her zyzyyx comb, crafted by Della, a magical wasp artist. Meanwhile, Sunny's physical strength grows as her Nimm warrior identity manifests. Nimm warriors belong to an ancient bloodline of powerful women. Her friend Chichi, also a Nimm woman, passes Mbawkwa, the second level of Leoparden (the Leopard People's advancement system). Shortly after, Sasha, Sunny's American coven member, also passes Mbawkwa but encounters Udide during his test. Udide is the Great Spider Artist, a deity the size of a house. Her appearance signals that a demand she made over a year earlier is urgent: She ordered Sunny and Chichi to retrieve a stolen ghazal, a scroll of poetry on a Möbius band made of the same material as Sunny's juju knife. Between these events, Orlu's uncle is killed by security forces during a violent pro-Biafra demonstration.

Udide materializes at Sunny's home with a seven-day ultimatum: If the ghazal is not returned, she will destroy the Nimm Village, the secluded homeland of Nimm women, and extend devastation beyond it. Anyanwu is Sunny's spirit face, a spiritual counterpart that normally resides within a Leopard Person. Due to Sunny's rare "doubled" condition, Anyanwu exists as a separate being and defiantly challenges Udide. As a warning, Udide kills the palm tree outside Sunny's window with a single stamp.

The four friends set out for the Nimm Village in the Cross River National Park. Along the way, Sasha performs an ancestral ritual at the spot where Udide revealed his ancestors were sold into slavery, pouring the contents of an antique gin bottle onto an iroko tree. His ancestors appear as golden figures. The friends struggle onward after Chichi's hostile Nimm cousins sabotage their transport. Sunny writes Nsibidi, the mystical script, for the first time, creating a navigational symbol that guides them despite causing her ears and eyes to bleed.

The Nimm Village bars males before sunrise, so Sasha and Orlu wait outside. Sunny glides into the great baobab tree called Never Fall and meets Queen Abeng, who reveals the ghazal is somewhere along The Road, a spiritual highway. Abeng etches Nsibidi directions onto baobab wood. While stranded in the forest, Chichi recounts her mother's story: In the 1990s, the Nimm queen sent Chichi's mother and two cousins to steal Udide's ghazal to protect the village. They succeeded because Udide was away visiting her beloved, the Great Crab. On the return, the cousins betrayed the mission, planning to sell the ghazal to dictator Sani Abacha. When they attacked Chichi's mother, she killed them in self-defense. The village branded her a murderer and exiled her.

Back home, Sunny's father slaps her for disappearing overnight. Anyanwu says "No" aloud and flees. Sunny partially reads the Nsibidi directions, which Sugar Cream identifies as an invocation for The Road, also called Uzo Mmuo (the Spirit Highway). That night, the friends gather at Orlu's house, where Orlu has just passed Mbawkwa. Sunny reads the full invocation, then uses her hold to stop time, safely transporting all four into the wilderness (the spirit world). She buries her zyzyyx comb as her talisman.

A Nsibidi path leads them through the wilderness to the border of Ginen, a technologically advanced jungle world existing alongside Earth. There Sunny discovers her juju knife is made from "kala glass," the molted exoskeleton of kala beetles; objects from the same beetle resonate when struck near each other.

The friends reach The Road, a vast highway where spirits, masquerades, ancestors, and deities travel in both directions. Orlu disguises them as an ewedu wolf, a camouflage creature of vegetation. When the disguise fails, The Road rises into the Bone Collector, a towering beast of melted asphalt that demands a fight from Anyanwu. During the confrontation, Sunny receives a revelation: She is an ogbanje, a "come and go" spirit who was born first as a boy who died at birth. Her father had wanted to name the child Anyanwu, after a name from his own father's dream. When Sunny was reborn as a girl, her father's grief took root. The three fireflies following her through the wilderness are her ogbanje spirit friends, who never pressure her to return because she visits the spirit world so frequently. The Bone Collector allows them to pass.

The Nsibidi path leads to the Power House, a structure of massive beast bones. A masquerade called Danafojura warns Sunny that she will not emerge human and allows only her and Chichi inside. There Sunny confronts Ajofia (Evil Forest), a towering masquerade. She glides into the void surrounding its true face, snatches its purse of herbs, and becomes a "masquerade peer." Sunny taps her juju knife against a wall, and the ghazal lights up green: Both are made from kala glass. The ghazal is a two-foot Möbius band of crystal-green glass etched with living Nsibidi. A tiny crystal chittim, a form of magical currency accepted by masquerades, falls at her feet.

Holding the ghazal, Sunny realizes she has risen to meet Anyanwu rather than expecting Anyanwu to descend to her. A vehicle carries them along The Road, and Sunny secretly memorizes a juju called "Over All Things" from the ghazal. She retrieves her comb and releases the hold, returning everyone to Orlu's driveway at the exact time they left.

Nigeria enters COVID-19 lockdown. Sunny's father pulls her into a hug and apologizes, admitting he will never understand but affirming he sees all of her. That night, Sunny and Chichi bring the ghazal to Udide, who demands that the Nimm women who used its secrets be delivered. Chichi refuses. When Udide attacks, Sunny activates "Over All Things," spiriting Udide to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean where the Great Crab resides. Anyanwu argues that Sunny has given Udide the gift of a second visit with Udide's beloved. The Crab persuades Udide to honor her word. Udide reveals the threatened destruction of the Nimm queen was fabricated, mere incentive.

On the soccer field, Sunny and Anyanwu reconcile. Sunny acknowledges that everyone expected Anyanwu to diminish herself when it was Sunny who needed to rise. They agree to name themselves on their own terms. Sugar Cream then takes Sunny for her Mbawkwa test. After being pulled underground, Sunny emerges in a desert cave at night. Reciting an Igbo proverb about fire intentionally given to a child not hurting, she corrects the pronoun from "him" to "her" and then to "me," making the words her own. Grasping the crystal chittim, she walks confidently toward five enormous figures seated around a fire.