Zoo City

Zinzi has become a master at writing topical phishing emails, from pleas for help by Chechnyan refugees to odes from Somali pirates who want to lay down their rocket launchers. In her Former Life (FL), she was a lifestyle journalist who never had to pay attention to world events. Now, circumstances necessitate a more lucrative line of work: “Normal people don’t have to pay off their drug debts by writing scam letters” (35).

In her inbox, she finds one strange response to her latest phishing email—“When you eat, you are eating things from planes. The plastic forks they leave a mark on you” (36)—and a request to Skype her handler, Vuyo. Vuyo tells Zinzi to meet him at the Rand Club disguised as one of her phishing personas, Frances, a wealthy refugee from Côte d’Ivoire who is trying to access her parent’s accounts. Zinzi pastes the mysterious message into a Word doc before deleting the email.

At the Rand Club, they meet Jerry and Cheryl Barber, two Midwesterners who have already spent most of their savings “helping” Frances. Vuyo provides forged Reserve Bank certificates for reserved funds the Barbers will allegedly receive after forking over a final payment. The setup works, even after the Jerry lifts up the bag that holds Sloth, causing Sloth to tumble to the floor.