Nathaniel Bivan set to read from ‘Boys, Girls and Beasts’ in Abuja January 18

By Editor
FORMER Arts Editor of Daily Trust newspapers Nathaniel Bivan is scheduled to open the new year with a book chat that spotlights his debut novel Boys, Girls and Beasts (Masobe Books Nigeria) at Spine and Label Bookstore, Kado, Abuja on January 18, 2025. The event, scheduled for 3:30pm at Rhema Mall, opposite NAF Conference Centre, Kado promises to be one of the new year’s gathering of Abuja’s literati.
Responding to questions about his expectations, Bivan said: “I’m fully charged and pumped up for 2025. Spine and Label Bookstore is one of Abuja residents’ favourite bookstores and I look forward to having an engaging and insightful reading session and conversation with the host, Abdulkareem Baba-Aminu.”
Readers who have viewed the cover of Boys, Girls and Beasts and read the book’s synopsis have wondered what to expect from the work being that Bivan had forayed into reporting conflict resolutions after he left Daily Trust. But Bivan has already made it public that his reporting conflict and solutions in terror zones in Niger, Plateau, Kaduna and Maiduguri played a huge role in the development of his novel.
“BGB (short for Boys, Girls and Beasts) is a reflection of the conflict situation in Nigeria, Africa and the world with a sprinkling of the fantastical,” he said. “It isn’t your ordinary war. The characters and the plots are all a metaphor for something much bigger that only the readers should have the pleasure, or terror, of unravelling.”
The event, which would be hosted by editor, writer and illustrator Mr. Baba-Aminu, will include book signings, as copies of BGB will be on sale, as well as gifts for the first five guests to walk in. There would also be a presentation of Spine and Label’s famous cake, which will be served alongside light refreshments. Bivan specialised in writing features and served under Daily Trust’s Arts desk for about eight years until he joined HumAngle Media in March 2021 where he sharpened his conflict resolutions reporting skills for four years. Before BGB, he wrote other books, which include a chapbook 20 Love Letters to the Christian Fiction Writer (2024), a memoir titled My Time as Chaplain: An Account of Venerable Obioma (2022) on the former Senior Special Assistant to former President Goodluck Jonathan, and a children’s picture storybook Flower Blind.
Set in 2068 and beyond in the United Nations of West Africa, Boys, Girls and Beasts follows the story of Jaka, a boy who has to come to terms with the inhuman powers he wields. While he reconciles himself with that, he has to do the same with another—the fact that he has become a pun in a war bigger than earth itself.

Nathaniel Bivan and cover of his debut novel, Boys, Girls and Beasts