Ti | Book Chatter | Page 1085

Note from Ti: I am going to try something new with this review. My reviews will have three parts now: the summary, something that I am calling “the short of it” and then a section for my thoughts.

The “short of it” will be a few sentences about the book. Basically these brief sentences will indicate whether or not I enjoyed the book. Some readers like to know up-front if a book is worth reading so there you go! Consider it a mini-review of sorts.

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Publisher: Random House Inc
Pub. Date: September 2007
ISBN-13: 9781400095209
528pp

Here’s the blurb from Barnes and Noble:

“With astonishing empathy and the effortless grace of a natural storyteller, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie weaves together the lives of three characters swept up in the turbulence of the decade. Thirteen-year-old Ugwu is employed as a houseboy for a university professor full of revolutionary zeal. Olanna is the professor’s beautiful mistress, who has abandoned her life of privilege in Lagos for a dusty university town and the charisma of her new lover. And Richard is a shy young Englishman in thrall to Olanna’s twin sister, an enigmatic figure who refuses to belong to anyone. As Nigerian troops advance and the three must run for their lives, their ideals are severely tested, as are their loyalties to one another.

Epic, ambitious, and triumphantly realized, Half of a Yellow Sun is a remarkable novel about moral responsibility, about the end of colonialism, about ethnic allegiances, about class and race—and the ways in which love can complicate them all. Adichie brilliantly evokes the promise and the devastating disappointments that marked this time and place, bringing us one ofthe most powerful, dramatic, and intensely emotional pictures of modern Africa that we have ever had.”

The Short of It:

Tightly woven, character driven novel about the fight for Biafra’s freedom. Although this novel is fiction, it is based on historic events and achingly real at times. I could not put it down.

My Thoughts:

There are so many things to say about this novel. I was completely swept away to another time and place while reading it. It basically follows the lives of three main characters during the Nigerian-Biafran War (1967-1970). This was a brutal war where the Igbo or Ibo (eebo) were slaughtered just for being Ibo. As the world falls apart around them, Olanna and Odenigbo who have become accustomed to the finer things in life, are stripped of all their worldly possessions and forced to focus on survival.

Ugwu, the boy servant who works for Olanna and Odenigbo, ended up being my favorite character. His innocence and boyishness is so well drawn. There were times where I just wanted to shake him and say, “Silly Ugwu! What were you thinking?” We really get to know Ugwu and his thoughts as he cares for Baby, Olanna and Odenigbo’s young daughter. Ugwu is a constant reminder of the class differences within Nigeria. Although he is often considered part of the family, he quietly takes his place as the houseboy and never questions his place within the household.

There are other characters within the novel that I enjoyed as well. Richard, the Englishman that falls in love with Olanna’s twin sister, Kainene. Richard is a misfit of sorts. A struggling writer who believes in the freedom fight and will do anything to win Kainene over. Although educated, he struggles with his place in the world.

Adichie’s portrayal of a war-torn state is vividly real at times. There are some violent scenes within the book and depictions of rape. I do not have a strong stomach when it comes to rape but these scenes accurately depict the horrors that the Ibo people were forced to live with during their quest for freedom.

My book group met last night to discuss the book and it was a good discussion. Most fell in love with the characters and found the writing quite easy to follow. Although the novel is 500+ pages, you do not notice its length as you are reading it. Although it deals with a heavy subject matter, there are moments of hopefulness and even humor at times. I highly recommend this novel.

To read more about Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, click here to visit her website. Also, Jill over at Fizzy Thoughts recently reviewed this book as well. She and I are on the same reading kick right now. Click here to check out Jill’s review.

When I visited the Festival of Books a couple of weeks ago, I picked up The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton for my almost-eleven-year-old-son. As some of you may recall, he is not a reader and constantly fights with me over books and reading. To him, reading is boring. He often considers it punishment which is a bit of a stretch but I guess if you really don’t enjoy doing something and your mom makes you do it anyway… I digress.

Do you remember reading The Outsiders? We took turns reading it in my junior high English class and then we saw the movie when it came out. I fell in love with Ponyboy who was played by C. Thomas Howell. Actually, I fell in love with a lot of the characters and the movie had a star-studded cast (Patrick Swayze, Matt Dillon, Rob Lowe, Ralph Macchio, Tom Cruise, Emilio Estevez, Leif Garrett, and Diane Lane). As far as adaptations go, I felt this was a pretty good one. Francis Ford Coppola directed and I remember sleeping with the movie posters plastered all over my room.

So as I stood in the FOB tent pondering the purchase, I decided to give it a shot. I bought it with the hopes that it would strike a chord with my son. This book was written over 40 years ago. Can you believe that? Anyway, I handed it over to him, he smirked, said “thank you” and tossed it into his backpack.

The other night he came up to me, sat on the couch and in his “cool kid” way said that he likes the book…a lot and that he wants to read more books like it. He has been talking about the book to his friends too. I told him about the movie and we both got online to look up all the other books that S.E. Hinton has written and he was thrilled to know that there are several more out there. All this time I have been handing him adventures, fantasies and humorous books that are quick reads but sort of fun and it turns out he likes the deeper stuff.

So after all these years, The Outsiders are IN! For more information on S.E. Hinton, check out her website and this post by Jill over at Fizzy Thoughts. Jill attended the S.E. Hinton discussion at the Festival of Books and now in hindsight, I wish I had attended that one myself.

If you’ve never read the book, try it out and definitely see the movie afterward. My son and I plan to have a movie night and I will post his thoughts after the viewing. If you happen to know of additional books that are similar in style or theme, I would love to hear about them.