Germano Almeida

Everyone in Cape Verde knew Senhor da Silva Araújo. Successful entrepeneur, owner of the island’s first automobile, a most serious, upright, and self-made businessman, Senhor da Silva Araújo was the local success story. Born an orphan, he never married, he never splurged—one good suit was good enough for him—and he never wandered from the straight and narrow.  Or so everyone thought.  But when his 387-page Last Will and Testament is read aloud—a marathon task on a hot afternoon which exhausts reader after reader—there is shocking news, and not just for the smug nephew so certain of inheriting all of Senhor da Silva Araújo’s property.…