From Jamestown to Jamestown-Letters to an African Child, is a thoughtfully refreshing account of African history that pensively reflects the ancestral wisdom of our African forebears that urges lions to tell their own stories instead of relying on stories that hunters always tell to glorify themselves, at the ruinous expense of lions. In a word, Efo Kojo tells the lions’ tale of African history to a young African ( and to older ones as well), Ayesha - she who lives; and it is only when Africans can tell their own stories from their perspective that they can amply safeguard their ever-abiding consciousness and substantial identity.

Centuries of other peoples’ narration of African history has beclouded the truth about Africans and their history, and in this case the truth about Africans and their history may be said to have become skinny, but the Kenyan proverb stoutly affirms, “The truth may become skinny, but will never perish!” And the truth that was seemingly lost in the morning has started to come home in the evening in From Jamestown to Jamestown, which tells the story of Africa as the cradle of humans and human civilization, through the various epochs in African history to the present and demonstrating clearly that our truth is undeniably different from the opinions of others.

The admirably skillful way in which the author manages to tell the story in the form of letters, manageable doses of life-sustaining historical information, and all in language that is not perceptively intimidating, should appeal, especially, to Ayesha and her generation. And the value of the information contained in the book may be found in the question, “what would become of our children if they possessed the information contained in this book?” This is a must reading for Ayesha and her contemporaries as well as their parents and grandparents.

Kofi Asare Opoku

Young people of all races are mostly oblivious to the reality of the struggles of “African people” historically and contemporarily. They do not know because there has been a conscious effort to eliminate this history; and, they have been deceived in such a way to suggest that “it” [the history] never existed. Mr. Yankah, in his book, From Jamestown to Jamestown: Letters to an African Child, has chronicled the true history of Africa and the Diaspora during a critical period in a manner that will gain the attention of folk across races, across continents, and across generations. His unique approach to sharing history though letters is sure to create a readership that is more informed about the history of African people throughout the Diaspora. This is a “must read” book which traces the African people from Jamestown, Africa to Jamestown, Virginia highlighting their journey and their challenges along the way.

In telling this history, Kojo Yankah links the great African luminaries and leaders and the African American luminaries and leaders and their writings to the Bible and other mainstream literature. In doing so, he points out the truth and the contradictions when the various sources are juxtaposed to each other. Only when the truth is told, as is done in this book, will people realize that the first British and the first Chinese were of African descent. The DNA does not lie! What else has been hidden from the world? Read the book and find out! Remember as one writer stated: “A half truth is a whole lie.” Going forward, the world needs the “whole truth.” From Jamestown to Jamestown: Letters to an African Child, is an attempt to inspire further inquiry into critical matters that have been shaped by the perspectives of people other than Africans and those in the Diaspora.

Joseph H. Silver, Ph.D, Atlanta, USA