Two Debut Reviews

Esme Weijun Wang's debut novel The Border of Paradise captivated me from the first few pages.  Set in mid twentieth century Brooklyn, Taiwan, and a high Sierra town in California, it explores the impact of mental illness on multiple generations of the Nowak family, and portrays how it brings the family close together and tears it apart.  Taking the first person perspectives of the different family members is not a new approach but is done in such a fresh and intimate way in Wang's deft hands.  I was curious about this very talented young writer, so I went to her website which is quite unlike other author websites I have visited.  She describes how the three themes on her mind in recent times are creativity, resilience, and legacy, all of which are touched upon in her novel.  It's evident after reading the novel and visiting her website that she someone bristling with creative ideas, and has published many essays and embarked on other artistic projects.  Highly recommended!

Yaa Gyasi's debut novel Homegoing has been hailed as a revelation - some have even gone so far as to suggest it is and will be the best book published in 2016.  This is one of those books (and I've had this feeling before, for example, when Zadie Smith published White Teeth and Chimamanda Adichie published Purple Hibisicus) in which I wonder what I was doing when I was 26 years old!  What Gyasi has achieved at such an early stage of her age is very impressive.  She's written a gorgeous, heartbreaking novel that spans eight generations and multiple geographies (coming full circle to Ghana, with many stops in between including Harlem and Alabama). What I find particularly interesting about her novel is that despite its breadth, each chapter almost stands alone as a vignette that explores deeply the characters' lives.  To achieve both breadth and depth is rare.  It's an essential read on slavery and its legacy.  

Seeking Shelter

I have had The Sheltering Sky on my "to read" list for many years.  I finally got around to reading it and found it utterly fascinating.  It tells the story of three American travelers to North Africa after WWII, and focuses on their alienation, isolation, and ultimately, despair as they navigate life in a different culture of which they have little knowledge and much naivete.  The novel takes a shocking turn at the end, highly unexpected.  Definitely a classic and well worth the read, despite somewhat of a slow start. 

A New Nigerian Voice

Chinelo Okparanta's debut, Happiness, Like Water, focuses mainly on African women navigating intimate relationships and hard choices.  Raised in Nigeria and an immigrant to the U.S. (with an MFA from the Iowa Writers' Workshop, no less), Okparanta is a fresh, strong voice in fiction.  These stories are simply and deftly constructed.  I look forward to a novel from Okparanta!

A Writer to Watch

We Need New Names is the first novel from NoViolet Bulawayo, who was born and raised in Zimbabwe and is currently a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University.  As I was reading the novel, certain other works came to mind, such as Dave Eggers' What is the What and Americanah by Chimananda Ngozi Adichie, which also explore the theme of being an immigrant from Africa and navigating two different worlds and assimilating into an unknown culture in which the reality doesn't match up with the expectations.  Bulawayo has a voice entirely her own and she brings her characters to life in this unflinching, spirited, witty novel that introduces us to 10-year-old Darling and her band of friends, who we first meet stealing guavas from the wealthy neighborhood called Budapest.  Darling is eventually given the opportunity to live with an aunt in America, and ends up in Michigan amidst snow, isolation, and low paying jobs.  An interesting read indeed.

Hurrah, Chimamandamericanah!

I have read all four of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's books, and Americanah, her latest novel, does not disappoint.  Unlike my favorite of her works, Half of a Yellow Sun, which is taut, explosive, and passionate, Americanah is more meandering and sweeping.  Set in the United States, Nigeria, and London, Adichie explores race, love, and identity that spans across continents and time.  The story centers around Ifemelu, a young woman who leaves Nigeria to study in the United States, and leaves behind her first love, Obinze, who, after living undocumented in London, gets deported back to Nigeria, where Ifemelu eventually lands as well.  The novel traces their separate lives and families, and is infused with great dialogue as well as a refreshing directness, mainly conveyed through Ifemelu's blog.  Adichie is one of my favorite contemporary writers!

Boyd's Brazzaville Beach

I was such a fan of William Boyd's novel Waiting for Sunrise that I decided to read one of his earlier novels, Brazzaville Beach, as my first book to read in 2013.   Boyd did not disappoint!  Brazzaville Beach's protagonist is the gutsy Hope Clearwater who lives and works in Africa, studying the behavior of chimpanzees.  After making a game-changing and unsettling discovery about her subjects, this sets into motion various forms of intrigue.  Complete with love stories, civil strife, kidnappings, and sabotages, the story moved at a fast pace and was full of the bright and dark sides of humanity. 

This was a very engrossing, smart, easy to read novel, and shows off just how versatile Boyd is as a writer, having picked a totally different subject matter, era, and backdrop than Waiting for Sunrise.  Highly recommended, and might be interesting to pair with Ann Patchett's State of Wonder as another far flung tale featuring a female protagonist navigating her career and relationships. 

Review: The Last Brother

The Last Brother, written by Nathacha Appanah, a French-Mauritian of Indian origin, is an exquisitely written novel.  I was captivated from the first word to the last by Appanah's poetic but accessible language.  There were many sentences I read over and over again.  Appanah writes of extremes - unfathomable poverty and unrelenting violence, selfless friendship and fierce motherly love.  Just when you think the story is going to leave you broken, Appanah infuses the scene with an unexpectedly quiet or serene moment.  To give you a sense of Appanah's unique and strong voice, she writes, "I went and sat down by the vegetable plot and breathed in the forest with all my lungs, the green, ravaged scent of it, its strength as yet hardy resurgent following the cyclone, throwing my head back to open up my chest, and it seemed to me that I was inhaling the sky as well, the cloudless blue extent of it."  The simple act of a nine year-old boy breathing becomes a moment of grace and peace, and we as the reader breathe along with him.  Another sentence that I was struck by is "Silent tears coursed down his face in such a brutal manner that I was afraid this would never stop."  Brutality and tenderness in just a few words.  Appanah has written a small masterpiece.  I wouldn't miss this one.

Flying High with Beryl Markham

 

"It is really this that makes death so hard - curiosity unsatisfied," wrote Beryl Markham in her autobiography West with the Night.  Markham was British-born and raised in Kenya, where she had a childhood filled with freedom and an adulthood brimming with adventure.  She is considered a pioneer in aviation, as she was the first person to successfully cross the Atlantic Ocean from east to west.  Markham's writing is simply stunning.  She writes beautifully about the natural landscape, the wild animals she encounters, and the loneliness and exhilaration she feels flying over miles and miles of undeveloped Africa.  This is a beautiful book that held my attention from the very first page to the last.  Highly recommended!

Review: The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is an autobiography written by William Kamkwamba. Kamkwamba tells the story of his childhood in Malawi, growing up hungry and poor.  Since his family was not able to afford the school fees necessary to keep him enrolled in school, he began visiting a small library in his town and stumbled upon books about energy and physics.  The books inspired him to build a windmill.  With his resourcefulness and determination, Kamkwamba was able to build a windmill out of scrap metal and bicycle parts.  His hope was to bring electricity and running water to his town.  Having survived famine, Kamkwamba realized that a windmill could rotate a water pump which would allow for irrigation.  In addition, only 2% of Malawians have electricity, meaning that most Malawians are not able to be work or study after dark. Kamkwamba knew that if he could help to bring electricity to his town, it would increase productivity.

Kamkwamba's first windmill was able to light four light bulbs and power two radios in his home.  Soon, word spread of his invention, and Kamkwamba was invited to attend the annual TED (Technology, Environment, Design) conference, which brings together innovators from all over the world.  

This is a well-written, unflinching account of the power of innovation even in the face of seemingly impossible circumstances.  Kamkwamba now attends Dartmouth College.  His inspiring book reminds us that one person's ideas have the power to transform the world. 

Author spotlight: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

   

This year I have had the pleasure of reading all three of Adichie's books - Half of a Yellow Sun, Purple Hibiscus and most recently, the short story collection The Thing Around Your Neck.  Adichie has received many accolades, including winning the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2007 and being named one of the New Yorker magazine's "20 under 40," this past summer.  At just 33 years old, Adichie is a literary hotshot, but if you watch her on YouTube you'll likely be impressed with her humility. 


I enjoyed all of her books, but my favorite was Half of a Yellow Sun, a story about two sisters and what happens to them around the time of the Biafran War in Nigeria.  This is a book that is bursting with vivid detail and impassioned characters.  Be forewarned that there is civil unrest and violence described in the narrative.


Adichie masterfully captures both quiet moments and loud ones, the dynamics of political movements and the dynamics of family.  Her books are fresh, bold, and written with a gracefulness that belies the effort it must take to write such wonderful stories.