Physics, mathematics and fiction 

The world is never entirely what it appears to be. Beneath the routines of ordinary life lie mysteries that reason alone cannot fully explain, and within every human encounter may dwell histories, forces and meanings far older than memory itself. What we call reality may simply be the fragile surface of a deeper universe where the visible and the invisible constantly negotiate their place in human experience.

When I.O. Echeruo fed us three years ago, our palates were filled with assorted dishes, dishes that cater to varying needs. He called these dishes ‘Expert in All Styles and Other Stories’ and we were treated to stories teeming with scandals, sorrow, tears, blood, violence and sex. In the collection, both saints and sinner feel seen.

In the first story, “Aisha’s Dinner”, narrated in first person by Hadja Mariam, we see a marriage where love no longer breathes and pretence is now the order of the day.

In the second story, “His Excellency”, we meet a governor, who is in trouble with the US Justice Department over money-laundering issues and is blackmailing the young man who through his help is now a partner in a big law firm in New York.

There is “Communicable Disease”, in which a wife is moving to Nigeria from Washington for an international health job and it is planned that the husband and their two boys will join her later. Two perspectives are provided to make us better appreciate the circumstances: the first is from the husband’s point of view and the second the wife’s.

The fourth story, “Christian Mothers”, is a hilarious tale, about power, power tussle between mothers in a Catholic Church parish in the Southeast of Nigeria.

“The Naming Ceremony”, the fifth of the 12 stories in the collection, is about power, the power of Yoruba tradition that makes a grandfather the centre of his son’s first child’s christening ceremony.

There are other stories such as “A Line of Fold-up Chairs and One Pastor”, “Love and Other Masquerades”, “The Place At A Bend In The River”, “In the Convalescent Ward”, “We Told Wonderful Lies”, and the titular story about a barber who works in a salon whose owner claims expertise in all hair styles.

Now, Echeruo is back, this time with a full-length novel, his debut. He calls it ‘The Comfort of Distant Stars’, a coming-of-age tale about Ezeani who looks every inch like the rest of us, but is different from us in a way better described as otherworldly. Ezeani, right from childhood, sees Anyanwu, the god of the sun in Igbo cosmology.

Anyanwu, threatened by the popularity of Christianity, decides to show himself to Ezeani and recruits him as his ambassador, the one who will worship him so that he will not die. He repeatedly reminds Ezeani that a god who has no people worshipping him will die. So, regularly, he appears to Ezeani. They drink palm-wine and Fanta together and discuss issues around how to keep Anyanwu alive forever.

Ezeani’s parents and siblings are blind to his dalliance with Anyanwu. Though his mother feels there is something special about him, she knows nothing of the regular tete-a-tete he has with Anyanwu in their Umudim and University of Ibadan homes and elsewhere.

Ezeani grows up to become a Physicist, his special nature follows him all the way to America and makes his colleague query his science and his reputation and his sanity. It becomes so bad that his wife files for divorce.

Aside Ezeani and Anyanwu, the novel also follows Ezeani’s dysfunctional family: His mother, who is one day found to have ended it all; his professor father who sleeps with the maid and sees nothing wrong in making her his new wife; his sister, Obiageli, who sees their father as the devil; and his brother, Nnamdi, who takes life as it is.

In this remarkable novel, where many scenes and chapters either open with or contain profound reflections rooted in Physics and Mathematics, the author brilliantly overturns the conventional structure of the coming-of-age narrative. Rather than presenting childhood and adulthood as separate emotional territories, the story intertwines Ezeani’s formative years with his adult experiences, creating a seamless movement between innocence, memory, growth and disillusionment. The effect is both intimate and intellectually engaging. The scientific allusions are not ornamental devices awkwardly inserted to impress the reader; instead, they are thoughtfully woven into the fabric of the narrative. Theories, Physics and mathematical ideas become lenses through which human behaviour and existence are examined. Physics and Mathematics here are not cold academic disciplines. They are metaphors for chaos, balance, motion, uncertainty and human relationships. Remarkably, rather than burden the prose, these references deepen it and the narrative retains its lyrical flow and emotional force while simultaneously inviting readers into philosophical contemplation about the workings of the world and the invisible laws that govern human lives.

Echeruo has written one of those novels that probe reality itself. It is a deeply thought-provoking work, the kind of novel that lingers in the reader’s mind long after the final page has been turned. One finishes reading and begins to look at ordinary life differently, wondering whether some of the people encountered daily on the streets, in classrooms, at marketplaces or inside cinemas are truly ordinary humans or beings carrying mysteries beyond mortal comprehension. The novel thrives in that fascinating space between myth and reality, between the visible and the unseen.

At the centre of this strange and compelling universe stands Anyanwu, the sun god, a character rendered with both mythical grandeur and startling ordinariness. He is not confined to the heavens or trapped within ancient folklore. Instead, he walks among men. He goes to the cinema in Bodija, drinks palm wine and Fanta, laughs loudly while watching Chinese films, quarrels, fights physically with men and runs to fight another day. The blending of the divine with the mundane gives the novel its peculiar energy and originality. The supernatural is domesticated without losing its mystery, collapsing the boundaries between gods and humans, spirits and flesh.

Even more fascinating is the novel’s refusal to keep its mythology geographically confined. Anyanwu appears again in America after Ezeani relocates there, suggesting that migration cannot sever one from ancestral histories, spiritual burdens or metaphysical realities. It makes one wonder: Do the gods travel too? Do they cross oceans and borders alongside their people? Through Ezeani’s experiences abroad and Anyanwu’s continued presence, the novel explores identity, displacement, memory and the persistence of indigenous cosmologies in modern global spaces. The result is a work rich in symbolism, humour, philosophical inquiry and cultural depth.

Echeruo’s achievement in his daring reimagining and interrogation of reality itself. He has produced a novel that is intellectually stimulating, spiritually charged and emotionally resonant, a narrative that challenges readers to rethink the limits of the possible and reconsider the hidden dimensions beneath everyday existence.

My final take: Perhaps this is the enduring truth about existence: the world is never entirely what it appears to be. Beneath the routines of ordinary life lie mysteries that reason alone cannot fully explain, and within every human encounter may dwell histories, forces and meanings far older than memory itself. What we call reality may simply be the fragile surface of a deeper universe where the visible and the invisible constantly negotiate their place in human experience.