She Would Be King by Wayetu Moore is the story of a young African woman named Gbessa, struggling to find and define a life for herself in the 1800s during the African slave trade. It is also the story of a pair of young men who find themselves connected with Gbessa and, later in the book, the story of an entire community of people struggling to find freedom from the physical and psychological circumstances of slavery. The magic realism story explores themes relating to mother/child relationships and the presence and power of nature.
