I read this one two years after it came out, and it became an instant favourite, one I still return to and recommend without hesitation. I actually still have my original review from back then, and I can't help but smile at how excited I was:
"It was so entertaining and I learnt a lot... I learnt too much, you must read it."
Younger me wasn't wrong, even if she was a little short on words for it.
Chimamanda does something remarkable here. The novel went on to win the Orange Prize for Fiction, and it's easy to see why: the writing is sharp, accessible, and impossible to put down, the kind of book that pulls you in from the first page and doesn't let go.
At its heart, this is a deeply personal story set against the backdrop of the Biafran War, love, betrayal, desperation, and the fragile bonds that hold people together when everything else is falling apart. What struck me most was how it opened my eyes to what that war truly meant, not just as a historical event, but as something that reshaped ordinary Nigerian families across every class, in ways both devastating and quietly resilient.
This is a book I recommend to absolutely everyone. If you haven't read it yet, start here.
This novel has also been reviewed in Spanish, over at Literafrica by Sonia Fernandez. You can read that review here.
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ReplyDeleteI've read some of this story in the book Gods and Soldiers: The Penguin Anthology of Contempoaray Africa Writing by Rob Spill man. I thing its a good example of Africa's post-colonial capitalistism; still breaking down the fabric of the Africa. -Yolanda Green
ReplyDeleteHi Lonnie, the story you read in Gods and Soldiers of which I also have read is an independent short story from the novel. All the same you would love the novel.
DeleteSorry not from the novel, same title but different story!
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