Meet Kano teen who wants her novel published

Born 18 years ago in Kano, Murjan Sadiq, who began her writing project in June last year rounded off her secondary school education in 2012 at Top Quality College, a private school in the Tukuntawa area of Kano city. Murjan  had her 114-page novel printed in three copies with a catchy title ‘The Pursuit’. It […]

Born 18 years ago in Kano, Murjan Sadiq, who began her writing project in June last year rounded off her secondary school education in 2012 at Top Quality College, a private school in the Tukuntawa area of Kano city.
Murjan  had her 114-page novel printed in three copies with a catchy title ‘The Pursuit’. It tells the story of a girl, Raham, who experiences a painful childhood because of the serial abuses she suffers alongside her mother and three siblings in the hands of her father.
In the face of the violent abuses, Raham and her siblings are able to endure the pains until their mother dies, leaving them in a desperate and helpless situation that makes them lose hope in life.
Raham tries to work very hard to keep life going until she becomes a lawyer and marries a supportive husband who restores her hopes, but she still had to live with an internal emptiness created by the death of her mother.
  Murjan told Bookshelf that she tried to pass a message to victims of similar situations to always develop the attitude of patience and hope and to always believe that no condition is permanent.
The young author, who also lost her mother in March last year, said she discovered her flair for writing at the age of 11 when she started reading a lot of books from her mum’s collections.
“I used to read a lot from my mum’s collections and that was how I learnt to write,   though my writings were not about very serious issues. Whenever I did something wrong or just wanted to express myself, I tried to write it down.
“When I was in secondary school, one of my teachers always encouraged me to become an essayist, but my mum suggested that I should be a writer. At first, I was scared because I was like ‘I’m not Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche, so I can’t really write a book’. I was afraid of the mistakes I will make, but my mother always told me that ‘if you don’t make mistakes, you’ll never learn. But the most important thing is that we learn from our mistakes.
“I wanted to continue with my studies to the university, but I missed the chance when my mother became ill. So, instead of staying at home doing nothing I started teaching at a secondary school and later at a primary school. It was when I lost my mum that I realized it was possible for me to write.
“I might not be Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche, I am Murjan Sadiq and I want to interest people and do something really different,” she said.
Asked about the challenges she might have faced in the course of her work, the teenage writer said: “When you look at the country, you see a lot of people who suffer abuses by members of their own families. I think I wanted to bring out a story that would sound real, a story that people would read and feel like it’s talking to them. So, I didn’t face any serious challenge because it’s a familiar story that people encounter every day. My only challenge is how to get my work published.” 
Talking about her ambition, the upcoming writer said she intends to pursue writing as her career. “My mum’s death has become an eye opener for me and I believe that if I can do this, then I can do more. All you need is encouragement. At a point I wanted to give up writing, but my father and sister helped keep my spirit high. They reminded me that there will be no gains without pains.” 
Murjan said she is seeking support from the public to publish her work, adding that she has dedicated the book as a compliment to her late mum who provided the encouragement that made the work possible.
Some observers told Weekly Trust that Murjan’s book has provided a compelling reason to support the cause of female education which has recently been threatened following the abduction of over 250 schoolgirls by gunmen from a school in Chibok Local Government Area of Borno state on April 14.