The Last Nomad: Coming of Age in the Somali Desert, by Shugri Said Salh

“My ancestors traveled the East African desert in search of grazing land for their livestock, and the most precious resource of all - water. When they exhausted the land and the clouds disappeared from the horizon, their accumulated ancestral knowledge told them where to move next to find greener pastures. I am the last person in my direct line to have once lived like that.”

Salh, the fourth daughter in her family, was sent to live with her ayeeyo (her grandmother) at six years old to learn the nomadic lifestyle and help her ayeeyo. The rest of her family lived in the city of Galkayo in Somalia.

Salh now lives in Northern California and her memoir details her journey, her stories, her incredible understanding and learning. She masterfully blends personal experience, cultural details, political and familial upheaval, and her perspective of all of those things as she reflects on those experiences.

Memoir is always an exploration in honesty, and Salh’s honesty is solid and unflinching. She describes experiences that might be triggering, so read up on the content, but I felt that all of the things she details she does so with precise care, and nothing unnecessary is included.

The Last Nomad left me feeling a great amount of admiration for all the many lives it feels like Shugri Said Salh has lived. Salh shares so much joy and beauty in every type of culture she was and is a part of, she navigates openly the transitions and difficult pieces of her journey in going from the desert of Somalia to Northern California, and writes with the clarity that is needed in this time when so many people fear what is unknown or strange or different.

Salh’s memories are saturated with love for land and people and family.

She speaks with love and acceptance of the places and peoples that she belongs to. She, and her story as she tells it, spill over with a quiet self-acceptance, love for ancestral skills and lifestyles, and an unyielding ability to be resilient, to find delight, and I found it incredibly inspiring. And still, she is able to acknowledge hardship, challenges, and pivotal moments in her understanding.

This is a great read for book clubs, for anyone who feels like they have lived in several different worlds, for those who want to keep and share their own ancestral history, and for everyone who has wondered what it would be like to live a nomadic life.

I’m impressed, so inspired, and grateful Salh acted on the feeling to write down her stories, to keep, preserve, and detail her ancestral history and hope she writes more. Her voice is lush and wonderful with a sense of inner contentment and gratitude that I long to be near and feel more often in my reading and in my own life.

The Last Nomad: Coming of Age in the Somali Desert, by Shugri Said Salh, will be released tomorrow, August 3rd 2021, and is well worth your time, attention, and book dollars.

**Thanks to NetGalley and Algonquin books for the free review copy of this memoir. All opinions are my own.