Jessica
Perhaps the tragedy of Adichie's writing is that [b:Half of a Yellow Sun|18749|Half of a Yellow Sun|Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327934717s/18749.jpg|1651408] is so brilliant that if that's the first of her works you read, everything else ends up disappointing. And doubly disappointing because I really like Adichie, the political comments she makes and such, and I really wanted to like this book... but it fell flat for me.
I've mentioned in a number of previous reviews that I get uncomfortable when a novel is a thinly veiled political polemic. Mostly, I get uncomfortable when the narrative gets twisted and contorted to fit an agenda (even if I agree with that agenda!!) because I appreciate good story-telling too much. Anyway, I don't think Americanah is as bad on that front as some other people have made out, but it has some issues. At least half the book is random characters (many of which appear once or twice) discussing issues of race, which isn't really a problem, until the climax of the book is derailed by a group of random, never-before-seen businessmen discussing the problems of the Nigerian economy. Or I mean, I guess it's a slight problem in that the plot of the book ends up feeling very thin, even though it isn't really, just because the plot gets dealt with so fleetingly and sparingly just so more space can be given over to these observations. And it's not that the observations aren't interesting, or even uninterestingly written. They just get in the way of the telling of the story.
Then some of the characterisation is very weird. There are some characters (ahem, Shan) who are just bizarre – superficial reproductions of an archetype, I guess (in this case, the self-absorbed academic), and in Shan's case she has some weird magnetic pull that makes everyone in her presence worship her, so not only is she annoying herself, but she makes every single character who shares a scene with her annoying too! Magic.
As for the star-crossed lovers of the blurb, they bothered me for different reasons too. I agree with someone else who's reviewed this book who said that Obinze just does not have the personality of a wealthy businessmen. No one in the real world would “make it” having a conscience like that. Ifemelu on the other hand might (if only she weren't a woman...!); I started to intensely dislike her when, from the moment she returned to Nigeria, she revelled in her upper-class status and started to treat every service worker she met like shit. I would like to think that Adichie's politics are good enough that Ifemelu's characterisation was deliberate – that she was including some subtle commentary on class in a very unsubtle treatise on race. (Lack of subtlety not necessarily being a bad thing – I agree with one of her characters (even though it was probably Shan, ugh) who thought the insistence on “nuance” was usually a way of pandering to the fragile feelings of the privileged.) Anyway, hopefully that was indeed the intention, rather than a weird blindspot when it comes to the reality of class society.
It is a mystery to me why the blurb is what it is (i.e. misleading); Ifemelu and Obinze rekindle their romance 88% of the way through the book, and it's safe to say that the so-called “toughest decisions of their lives” are not the crux of the story. Nor existent, in Ifemelu's case. It looks like the paperback's blurb is better. Still, this isn't really a story about love; it's a story about globalisation and race. There are some lovely quotes about how those things intersect. At one point late in the book, Ifemelu comments that if her American boyfriends had come from the same cultural background as her, she's not sure they'd have had anything to say to each other. That had some resonance with me, although not fully.
Hmm, I got really distracted from this and I'm not sure how to wrap it up. I would still say it's worth reading, especially if you don't have a Tumblr and don't read similar observations on race all day every day. (Speaking of which, I'm surprised I haven't seen Americanah quotes floating around on there!) Just don't get your hopes up, because if you're not expecting brilliance like I was, you'll probably enjoy this much better.
Perhaps the tragedy of Adichie's writing is that [b:Half of a Yellow Sun|18749|Half of a Yellow Sun|Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327934717s/18749.jpg|1651408] is so brilliant that if that's the first of her works you read, everything else ends up disappointing. And doubly disappointing because I really like Adichie, the political comments she makes and such, and I really wanted to like this book... but it fell flat for me.
I've mentioned in a number of previous reviews that I get uncomfortable when a novel is a thinly veiled political polemic. Mostly, I get uncomfortable when the narrative gets twisted and contorted to fit an agenda (even if I agree with that agenda!!) because I appreciate good story-telling too much. Anyway, I don't think Americanah is as bad on that front as some other people have made out, but it has some issues. At least half the book is random characters (many of which appear once or twice) discussing issues of race, which isn't really a problem, until the climax of the book is derailed by a group of random, never-before-seen businessmen discussing the problems of the Nigerian economy. Or I mean, I guess it's a slight problem in that the plot of the book ends up feeling very thin, even though it isn't really, just because the plot gets dealt with so fleetingly and sparingly just so more space can be given over to these observations. And it's not that the observations aren't interesting, or even uninterestingly written. They just get in the way of the telling of the story.
Then some of the characterisation is very weird. There are some characters (ahem, Shan) who are just bizarre – superficial reproductions of an archetype, I guess (in this case, the self-absorbed academic), and in Shan's case she has some weird magnetic pull that makes everyone in her presence worship her, so not only is she annoying herself, but she makes every single character who shares a scene with her annoying too! Magic.
As for the star-crossed lovers of the blurb, they bothered me for different reasons too. I agree with someone else who's reviewed this book who said that Obinze just does not have the personality of a wealthy businessmen. No one in the real world would “make it” having a conscience like that. Ifemelu on the other hand might (if only she weren't a woman...!); I started to intensely dislike her when, from the moment she returned to Nigeria, she revelled in her upper-class status and started to treat every service worker she met like shit. I would like to think that Adichie's politics are good enough that Ifemelu's characterisation was deliberate – that she was including some subtle commentary on class in a very unsubtle treatise on race. (Lack of subtlety not necessarily being a bad thing – I agree with one of her characters (even though it was probably Shan, ugh) who thought the insistence on “nuance” was usually a way of pandering to the fragile feelings of the privileged.) Anyway, hopefully that was indeed the intention, rather than a weird blindspot when it comes to the reality of class society.
It is a mystery to me why the blurb is what it is (i.e. misleading); Ifemelu and Obinze rekindle their romance 88% of the way through the book, and it's safe to say that the so-called “toughest decisions of their lives” are not the crux of the story. Nor existent, in Ifemelu's case. It looks like the paperback's blurb is better. Still, this isn't really a story about love; it's a story about globalisation and race. There are some lovely quotes about how those things intersect. At one point late in the book, Ifemelu comments that if her American boyfriends had come from the same cultural background as her, she's not sure they'd have had anything to say to each other. That had some resonance with me, although not fully.
Hmm, I got really distracted from this and I'm not sure how to wrap it up. I would still say it's worth reading, especially if you don't have a Tumblr and don't read similar observations on race all day every day. (Speaking of which, I'm surprised I haven't seen Americanah quotes floating around on there!) Just don't get your hopes up, because if you're not expecting brilliance like I was, you'll probably enjoy this much better.