Bindi, escorting a pair of troublesome twins on a whale-watching outing, rushes to the scene of a boating accident and comes across an oil spill that could endanger marine life for hundreds of miles.

"'We should have known the end was near.' So begins Imbolo Mbue's exquisite and devastating novel 'How Beautiful We Were.' Set in the fictional African village of Kosawa, it tells the story of a people living in fear amidst environmental degradation wrought by a large and powerful American oil company. Pipeline spills have rendered farmlands infertile. Children are dying from drinking toxic water. Promises of clean up and financial reparations to...