Silence Is My Mother Tongue by Sulaiman Addonia
Silence Is My Mother Tongue by Sulaiman Addonia There are three things I love about this book. The chaos, clarity, and conviction all rolled into one and explored through the fiercest character I’ve ever met in a book—Saba. I have known displacement; it is both mentally and physically chaotic. It renders the future hazy, and […]
No Perfect Love by Adesuwa O’Man Nwokedi
No Perfect Love by Adesuwa O’man Nwokedi No Perfect Love is a poignant novel about Gina, a woman torn between the comfort of her marriage and the rekindled passion of a past love. As old feelings resurface, Gina must confront what it means to love, to settle, and to seek fulfilment in a life that’s […]
Hungry Ghosts by Kevin Jared Hosein
“…she loved him more in death than she ever would in life. The living deferential to the sins of the dead. As if love was a flightless bird in life — and only truly soared when it sprouted angels’ wings upon death.” A haunting, intense, and utterly breathtaking read. Hungry Ghosts is set in 1940s […]
Esperance by Adam Oyebanji
An Unexpected Delight: Esperance by Adam Oyebanji When was the last time a book surprised you? And I mean, had you beaming, questioning, and lamenting. For me, that book was Esperance by Adam Oyebanji. I’ve never read anything by him and to tell the truth, I kinda thought this was his debut. It is not. […]
Paradise Once by Olive Senior
Paradise Once by Olive Senior Paradise Once is everything that I could have ever wanted in a story that brings to life a people that have left their mark, however small on my island. Here, we see a people who have their own heirarchy and practices, awareness of environment, trade relationships, political structures, and belief […]
An Elegy for Easterly by Petina Gappah
An Elegy for Easterly by Petina Gappah It’s an outstanding collection of 13 short stories set in Zimbabwe. The settings shift from squalid townships to affluent suburbs, giving a vivid picture of how these environments shape the characters’ experiences. The opening story, At the Sound of the Post, is a brilliant introduction to Petina Gappah’s […]
Days Come And Go by Hemley Boum
Days Come and Go by Hemley Boum, translated from French by Nchanji Njamnsi “When a story begins to move inside me, I never want it to stop.” I read Days Come and Go recently, and I haven’t been able to forget how it made me feel —anger laced with overwhelming sadness. The first part of […]
The Middle Daughter by Chika Unigwe
The Middle Daughter by Chika Unigwe: The Plight of a Girl Abandoned Before attending the book reading at RovingHeights, Lagos, I had heard of Chika Unigwe but hadn’t read any of her novels. What piqued my curiosity was the title of her book: The Middle Daughter. As a daughter myself (albeit not the middle one), […]