Select language, opens an overlay

Comment

Jan 19, 2015WVMLStaffPicks rated this title 4 out of 5 stars
Adichie has written a harshly beautiful first novel of life in Nigeria during troubled political times. Kambili, a 15-year-old girl, impressionable and desperately quiet, lives with her brother, Jaja, who is her hero, and her complicated and troubled parents. The disturbing faithfulness that her father demands from each of them, and the resultant punishments at their so-called laxness, becomes too much to bear. Especially when they realize how different family life can be after visiting their father’s sister’s family in Nsukka. Their dread of returning is finessed by their mother’s act of desperate maternal love.