Imbolo MbueRecensioni

#ReadAroundTheWorld. #Cameroon

“I know nothing about how a girl makes men pay for their crimes, but I have the rest of my life to figure it out.”

Imbolo Mbue brings us a story set in the 1980s in a fictional African village Kosawa, presumably based on her native Cameroon. This is a powerful hard-hitting story about greed, colonialism and environmental exploitation.

An American oil company Pexton has been drilling for oil in Kosawa and consequently contaminating the water causing the deaths of many. Initially the villagers believe the American assurances that they will leave and all will be well, but one day the village madman deviates from his stereotype and steps up to lead a revolution against the oppressors.

The main character in the book is a girl called Thula who eventually goes to study overseas and returns as an activist. The point of view shifts between Thula, her family and her classmates, all of them deeply impacted by the tragedy, and each bringing their own insights such as:

“We wondered if America was populated with cheerful people like that overseer, which made it hard for us to understand them: How could they be happy when we were dying for their sake?”

"I told her that on all sides the dead were too many—on the side of the vanquished, on the side of the victors, on the side of those who'd never chosen sides. What good were sides? Who could ever hail themselves triumphant while they still lived? Perhaps someday, I added, after all the dead have been counted, there will be one number for the living to ponder, though the number will never tell the full story of what has been lost."

This story exposes the evils of corruption and greed and highlights the extent and impact of environmental disasters which are often covered up. I can understand why the author chose not to name the location as she does not spare the government and the dictator for their complicity and corruption either. I think this is a powerful important book with a clear and strong message. 5 stars.

This takes place in an unnamed country in Africa under a dictator’s thumb. He has made a deal with an oil company that the company may take all the oil under one village’s land.

The dictator makes masses of money from this project. The oil company also makes masses of money, especially as it turns out, they had signed an agreement that they have no responsibility for consequences for the villagers’ health, the taking of their land or disruption of their way of life. At first the villagers are excited to learn there will be jobs. But very few of them receive jobs or money. Those who do seem to be creatures owned by the company. The environmental impacts are huge: oil spills destroy farm land, the once pristine river has been dubbed the River of Death due to its chemical load and constant burning at the oil site destroys the air.

When children sicken and die, the men of the village organize a delegation to the capital to talk to the government, but the delegation disappears. Another delegation then goes to check on the first with discouraging results. The dictator solves the complaints by sending in in his military to permanently quiet the villagers by massacring them.

An international justice organization takes up the case to expose the American oil company. At first it seems things will get better as the company agrees on some reparations and bottled water for the children. They provide secondary schooling for the older children and the best scholar in the village, a girl named Thula, is sponsored to go to the United State for college and post graduate work. She learns how ordinary people can stand together to change the course of history.

But nothing really changes – more broken promises, more violence and killings. It’s a pattern that has repeated itself since the first Europeans arrived in the area to take slaves and then later ‘recruited’ workers for their rubber plantations. It’s a story of greed and money and ‘might making right’ whether the might belongs to the colonialists, the corporations, or the leaders within the country itself. All is compounded by suspicions of tribes against each other and the naïve belief of the villagers that if the authorities only knew about the people’s suffering, they would act to fix it.

This book is pretty bleak. Are there answers? I’m also left (as I’m sure the Cameroonian author intended) contemplating how much responsibility belongs to the western nations using the oil.

This is well written with just enough hope dangled that circumstances will change to keep me reading.½

The story of two immigrants from Cameroon trying to make it in NYC around the time of the financial collapse.

It's good for me to read things about how difficult everyday life can be for so many people and how lucky we are to live in America despite its flaws. The immigrants are struggling financially and the rich struggle emotionally but all of them struggle. How they react to their problems often surprises and occasionally disappoints.

I want to give this more stars but it was less of a page turner than j want my books to be. I enjoyed it while reading but didn't feel compelled to get back to it quickly when it wasn't in my hands.

Read this for my book club.

Plot and writing was good. My only minor complaints:

Some of the main characters were a bit too stereotypical. (Terrible relationship between all the Clarks - a privileged family - what else is new.) I would have preferred to hear either a lot more about the Wall Street issues or a lot less. The tiny bits were unsatisfying. Would've liked more about the lawyers - their points of view - cynical? idealistic? realistic? and maybe even the judges, too.

Even though the book was good, I'm giving it a 3 because it just doesn't excite me: I don't feel better for having read it, I'd rather be reading others books, and I don't believe I'll ever find myself talking about it, recommending it to a friend, etc.

“We should have known the end was near,” the story begins. “When the sky began to pour acid and rivers began to turn green, we should have known our land would soon be dead.”

How Beautiful We Were takes place in a fictional African country, but the story bears a close resemblance to some very similar problems in real life. The book explores topics, such as imperialism, political corruption, environmental destruction, acts of rebellion, and courage.

Imbolo Mbue is a highly talented writer. Considering the topic, the book is sobering and difficult to read, yet she writes it so beautifully. I’m officially a fan of Imbolo Mbue!

There's something really genuine about this story. These are just people trying to get through life. And while a larger commentary (or question) is there, it's not forced upon their lives, nor are they forced to embody it. The author's compassion for each character also stands out. All in all, promising, and I look forward to her next work.

I think my fascination with the African voice goes back to Alexander McCall Smith and the Botswana stories, which I guess is ironic because he isn't actually African at all. This story is written by an African author and describes the experience of the Jongas, a Cameroonian couple who is in New York, attempting to immigrate to the United States. They haven't exactly faked their applications, but have fudged things a little in the hopes that they fall through the cracked just enough to carry on and fulfill their dreams. However, fantasy and reality collide as they come to understand that living in America is more difficult than they knew, especially in the grey zone they occupy between legal and illegal. The story is also set with the backdrop of the financial crisis of 2008, and tells the parallel tale of the family the Jongas spend time working for, and how the crisis affects two families on opposite ends of the economic scale. It is both topical and emotional, a great, balanced, contemporary novel.

Really great writing but female protagonist way too wimpy. Otherwise I’d have given it 4 stars!

As a new immigrant in the United States, Jende is hoping to give his family a standard of living and opportunities they would never have had in their native Cameroon. His wife Neni is now attending college, and he has landed an agreeable job as a chauffeur for a Wall Street executive. Things are going well, but Jende never breathes too easily, because his legal status in the country isn't yet secure.

Both heartbreaking and inspiring, Mbue's work provides a glimpse into the lives and thought processes of immigrants to this country, how hard they are willing to work, how much they are willing to sacrifice (materially and psychologically), and the risks they are willing to take for the promise of all this country appears to offer. I have to say that for me the story provoked feelings of dread throughout — I was constantly on edge, waiting for the worst thing to happen. I also half-expected the Edwards family to be stereotypically evil-rich, but to my relief they were painted with a more nuanced brush stroke, though certainly not altruistic. An exquisitely-written and important book.

Jende Jonga and his wife & son immigrate to New York City from their home country of Cameroon, hoping to find a better life for themselves. Jende lands a job as a chauffeur for a Lehman Brothers executive, while his wife Neni also works a job and studies in the hopes of becoming a pharmacist. Things are relatively good. But then Lehman Brothers collapses, and so, seemingly, does the happiness and welfare of the Jonga family.

This was not a bad books by any means. It was enlightening in some ways, but also very sad. But as a story, it felt...underwhelming? It just didn't really ever grab me. The ending was not necessarily predictable or a storybook ending, but it was realistic, which is what I liked about it. Sometimes things don't end up the way you think they will. But that's real life.½

When the American oil company first started work on the village's lands, the villagers were excited about the benefits and improvements that were sure to come. But what followed were lands destroyed and dying children, the water undrinkable and the village stuck between a company that insists that they'd like to help, but their hands are tied, and a government that silences anyone who might get in the way of the current arrangements.

This isn't a fun read, but it is an informative one. Mbue has made some interesting decisions about how she told this story, including the use of the first person plural for some chapters, a choice that works far better here than in other places I've encountered it. This is very much a book written by an African (Mbue was born in Cameroon and now lives in New York) for an American audience but it isn't a book that coddles the reader. It explains without over-simplifying. At heart, though, this is less a novel propelled by a story than one motivated by a cause.

Imbolo Mbue 's second novel, How Beautiful We Were provides an insider's
view of a village whose eden-like existence is ruined by the discovery of oil.
In a village called Kosovo, the oil under the ground winds up being a curse since the American company Pexton started drilling. "Within a year, fishermen broke down their canoes and found new uses for the wood. Children began to forget the taste of fish. The smell of Kosawa became the smell of crude. The noise from the oil field multiplied; day and night we heard it in our bedrooms, in our classroom, in the forest. Our air turned heavy". The use of various narrators and even a Greek Chorus entitled The Children provide the various insights of narrative which reads like a fable. The children have become sick and the once beautiful area is polluted. As the title implies, there's a lot of reminiscing about what this village used to be like.
The story starts with the Pexton, (sound like Exxon), men coming to both hear and ignore the grievances, but the village madman takes their keys and won't let them return. It takes the madman to truly see that no one will listen unless they do something to make them. The second chapter is written in first person from Thula whose father went to reason with the company in the city. The men continue to feel that if they could only talk to the men in charge they would understand and stop the pollution. These men have not been exposed to greed. He and a few men took buses and supposedly met with the company to complain about the death of the children, but they never returned. The mayor, who has profited from the company, just tries to keep the peace. When armed men come looking for the missing company men, they are told that perhaps they are visiting relatives, and the town gets a conspiratorial chuckle at their successful deception. The chuckles will stop soon after.
Mbue goes on to chart the next couple decades and centers her story around Thula as the prodigal child going off to America to get educated, always promising to come back and resolve this problem. I recommend you read to find out if she does.
Lines:
Opening-
We should have known the end was near. When the sky began to pour acid and rivers began to turn green, we should have known our land would soon be dead.”

“Someday, when you’re old, you’ll see that the ones who came to kill us and the ones who’ll run to save us are the same. No matter their pretenses, they all arrive here believing they have the power to take from us or give to us whatever will satisfy their endless wants.”

I had just turned nineteen. I remember I wore a layer of anxiety that day—I’d reached marriage age with no one handsome in sight. A man in my village named Neba was my only option, but I couldn’t look past his nostrils, which flared like a windswept skirt.

In our response, we reminded her of the story about the ants that killed the growling dog, bite by bite. We could do such a thing too. There was no better time to start biting Pexton than now.

She had the fortitude of the sun—no matter how dark and thick the clouds, she was confident she could melt them and emerge in full glory.

Wasn’t it time every tribe started looking out for itself? they wondered. My sister tried to argue against such thinking. She tried to contend that the country might be made up of dozens of tribes but it was still one nation, a garden with flowers of assorted shapes and colors and fragrances, in unison forming an exquisite beauty. Few listened—unity seemed too vulgar a notion.

Washington Post -Ron Charles
Growing up under a dictatorship in Cameroon, Mbue knows the despair that germinates in the contaminated soil of these industrial crimes. Her novel follows out the endless cycles of acquiescence and resistance, exposure and neglect, litigation and corruption that grind down exploited people…. In any practical sense, the village that Thula and her friends are trying to save is already gone. From the first line, we know what awaits Kosawa. But the fatalism of this story is countered by the beauty of Mbue’s prose and the purity of her vision. “We hoped,” the children say, “that we would die where we were born.” As long as there are novels this powerful, the fight’s not over.

3.5 rounded up-- I really liked the beginning but the ending was... not what I expected/wanted. It felt like a massive jump in Jende's entire viewpoint. I know there was *supposed* to be a lot of character development but it still felt very abrupt. What really got me was when he beat his wife and then bought her flowers, and the incident was never brought up again other than as a sign that he didn't like who he was becoming. IDK. It just felt abrupt and weird. I also thought the naivete of Jende and Neni was pushed to the point of absurdity. That said, I still thought it was a good book overall and it kept me emotionally invested. I don't think it was necessarily an educational read about immigration as some other people have described it, but it's a humanization of a more nuanced experience of immigration that isn't about someone fleeing persecution.

How Beautiful We Were, the second novel by Imbolo Mbue, has a strong opening. It depicts the story of a people who live in fear amid environmental destruction brought on by an American oil firm in the imaginary African community of Kosawa. Farmlands have become barren as a result of pipeline spills. Toxic water has killed children while the locals have been given cleanup instructions and financial compensation, but these promises were broken. The dictatorial government of the nation provides no help. With few options left, the Kosawa population decides to rebel. Their battle will cost them dearly and last for years.

How Beautiful We Were is a simplistic examination of what occurs when a community's determination to hold on to its ancestral land and a young woman's willingness to give up everything for her people's freedom clash with the apparent reckless drive for profit and the ghost of colonialism (although there is no explanation how the oil firm makes a profit when their oil pipeline is broken - just one example of how the narrative does not quite hold together). The narrative is spread over a generation of children and the family of a girl named Thula who grows up to become a revolutionary.

I was disappointed with this book as I found the narrative disjointed and repetitive. By the middle of the book I grew tired of the story. I was not impressed with the presentation as it seemed fantastic mixing the evil corporation and colonialism in a way that ultimately defied belief. Certainly bad things can and do happen but this book seemed to portray the situation in a simplistic narrative that did not pass muster with this reader.½

This is a sad and somewhat bleak book about a town ravaged by an American oil company and its affects on a small African village. Beautifully written and heartbreaking, it feels to me kind of like the continuation of Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart.

This book tells the story of two families living in the New York City during the lead-up to the financial crisis of 2008. Jende Jonga, a Cameroonian immigrant, becomes a chauffeur for Clark Edwards, a Lehman Brothers executive. Jende brings his wife, Neni, and son, Liomi, to New York from Cameroon, hoping to take advantage of the “American Dream.” The story follows the lives of these two families, contrasting their triumphs and challenges. One family is pursuing the dream, working hard, saving and sacrificing, to create a life of opportunity for themselves and their children. The other has achieved the dream, but at a substantial cost to their well-being. As the story unfolds, these two families become more interdependent, and face difficult ethical decisions, both personally and professionally. Themes include dreams, family, social class, marriage, and immigration.

This book brought home to me the reality of the many difficulties faced by immigrants – navigating the complicated government bureaucracy over visas and residency, court appearances and costs, language and cultural barriers, working multiple jobs to make ends meet, and sending money to relatives back home. The dream often comes face to face with the reality that there is only so much one can control through hard work and perseverance. The book is well crafted and conveys a sense of time and place. The writing is straightforward, and the characters are vivid. I think the primary strength lies in the interactions among the characters. They come across as flawed individuals but empathetic in unexpected ways. It is not a “happy” book, but it struck me as authentic, and gave me much food for thought. I think it would make an excellent choice for a book club discussion. This book is a strong debut by Mbue, and I look forward to reading more from her in the future.

For generations, the people of Kosawa, a small rural village in an unnamed West African country, have lived peaceful lives, hunting, fishing, and farming to raise their families. That all changes near the end of the last century when Pexton, an American energy company, is allowed by a corrupt government to exploit the villagers by drilling for oil on their ancestral land, an act that gradually despoils the environment with toxic waste and adversely impacts those who still call the place home. How Beautiful We Were tells the story of Kosawa’s fight over the next four decades to restore their former way of life, or at least get compensated for the damages they have suffered. We experience much of this heartbreaking history through the eyes of Thula Nangi, a young girl who grows up to be a strong and resourceful woman with a passion for her homeland and a zeal for seeking justice that never wavers until the day she dies.

This is a beautifully written book that relates a moving and believable tale. Imbolo Mbue creates prose that is both powerfully frank in its depiction of the greed, corruption, and brutality of the agents of power and lyrically tender in rendering the plight and spirit of the Kosawa villagers. It is also interesting to note the structure the author adopts in telling her story. Laid out in a mostly linear fashion over a forty-year period, the narration rotates in alternating chapters from the first-person collective viewpoint of Thula’s peers (called “The Children”) to that of several members of the Nangi family. This provides the reader with a useful contrast as the myriad narrators often see the same set of events from different perspectives and varying levels of intensity. The only real critique I have is that the story seemed to bog down a little bit near the end as the protracted legal process ground toward its inevitably sad conclusion.

So, at the end, I was left with the following question: Can the words in a book—a novel, no less—change the world and make it a better place? As much as I would like to think so and hope so, I am really not sure. Certainly, powerful and moving prose such as that found in How Beautiful We Were can raise awareness and even serve as a rallying cry for some sort of social action. But what becomes of that heightened consciousness and newly found goodwill? How does that get translated into actions and outcomes that will correct an unjust or cruel situation? Of course, the irony is that this novel itself teaches us that while words and good intentions can indeed inspire heartfelt activity, it is very unlikely that anything will ultimately change. Maybe, then, just telling the story will have to be enough for us.

I have mixed feelings about this book. The author does an impressive job of tackling a difficult and painful subject. She weaves the narrative expertly using multiple points of view that evoke complicated emotions focused around the struggle of a small African village suffering from environmental deterioration caused by an American oil company.

I did not enjoy this book - but I did not read it for enjoyment. It is important to recognize the struggles of those whose voices go unheard and the price developed countries claim is their right in the pursuit of progress, convenience, and prosperity. This book allows the reader to step out of their comfort zone and to consider more than just their personal experience in life. I find myself asking 'what changes do I want to see in this world? How can I help make that happen?'.

This book was one of those that is important to read, but relentless in the story. Set in a small village someplace in Africa, it tells the story of the fight to protect the village from a fictional American Oil company that is polluting the land, air, and water of the village.

The story alternates perspective, from brave Thula, whose entire life is defined at making the company pay for the harm it caused, from studying in America and using that education to organize rallies and get legal standing for the villagers, to the collective age-group of Thula's, who stay in their village and have to deal with the immediate results of Oil Spills and dirty air.

This is a book that was chosen by my book club because it has ended up on a number of banned book lists. And I can see why - while the story isn't Anti-American, it is Anti-American Oil Company, pointing out the rich and corrupt are in every company. There are also subplots of women independence, love, loyalty to family/home/ways of life. Its not an easy read, and sometimes bleak in outlook.

As for the book itself, I found it hard to get into. But once I started, I couldn't stop. I really needed to know how it ended. But it is bleak, at times hopeless, and I think it really gets across the feeling of helplessness in the face of evil.

This book is the story of the exploitation and subjugation of indigenous people and land by faceless industrial interests and a brutal authoritarian regime. This story is set in Africa, but contains many parallels to what has happened (and continues to happen) in North America. The story is gritty and dark, and yet beautifully written and narrated. At times the voices became rather sing-songy, and the book felt overlong, but there were many portions where the prose simply soared.

Passionate but the ending in ovety long and tedious..

What a beautifully written, poignant, and moving book. Imbolo Mbue completely immerses you in the lives of Jenta and Nenni, immigrants from Cameroon, who are fighting to stay in NYC on a temporary work permit. The bleakness of their existence, both back in their origin country, and the life they scrabble to eke out in New York, and are so grateful for, is staggering, especially when contrasted with the Edwards, who Jenta drives for.

Mbue does a gorgeous job of descriptions and completely makes you feel like you are there, feeling the heat in the summer, tasting the food Nenni cooks late at night after classes and work and studying, fighting so hard for a future they fear could be taken away at any moment. This is such an important book, particularly in light of today’s political landscape, and a really beautiful read. Highly recommended!

Please excuse typos/name misspellings. Entered on screen reader.

Interesting viewpoint if why people migrate to the U.S. and the anxieties, fears, and roadblocks they face.

Het levensverhaal van de Kameroens-Amerikaanse schrijfster Imbolo Mbue (1982) bevat op zichzelf al voldoende aanknopingspunten voor een boek of een film. Hoe zij als meisje uit een traditionele Kameroense dorpsgemeenschap op haar 17e terecht kwam in de miljoenenstad Chicago om daar te gaan studeren bijvoorbeeld. Of hoe zij, na de economische crisis van 2008 werkloos geworden, begon met schrijven. Hoe zij jarenlang achter uitgevers aanzat om haar manuscript toch alsjeblieft te lezen en uiteindelijk een miljoen-dollar-contract kreeg aangeboden voor haar debuutroman Behold the dreamers. Die ook nog eens Oprah’s boek van de maand werd en waarmee ze in 2017 de PEN/Faulkner award for fiction won.

How beautiful we were (in het Nederlands vertaald als: Hoe mooi wij waren) is Mbue’s tweede roman. Deze speelt zich, in tegenstelling tot haar eerste roman, vrijwel geheel af in een niet nader genoemd Afrikaans land, waarvan ik voor het gemak aanneem dat het Kameroen is. In het (fictieve) dorpje Kosawa om precies te zijn. Kosawa is een traditioneel dorpje zonder elektriciteit of moderne voorzieningen. De mensen wonen in hutten. Eten wordt verbouwd op kleine akkertjes en de mannen jagen in het bos en vissen in de rivier. Belangrijkste gebeurtenissen zijn geboortes, initiatierituelen, huwelijken en sterfgevallen. De oudere generatie heeft het voor het zeggen en geeft kennis en verhalen mondeling door aan de volgende generaties. Zo was het altijd en zo zou het misschien altijd zijn gebleven, ware het niet dat zich vlak naast Kosawa een Amerikaans oliebedrijf heeft gevestigd, Pexton. Pexton’s activiteiten zorgen voor een grote verstoring in het leven van de dorpelingen. Hun land raakt vervuild door de lekkende pijpleidingen, het water raakt zo vervuild dat er niet meer gevist kan worden en de kinderen sterven bij bosjes.

Het boek begint op een avond vroeg in de jaren ‘80, als de dorpelingen zich realiseren dat de zogenaamde gesprekken tussen Pexton en henzelf niks opleveren, dat er niks zal veranderen en dat hun kinderen zullen blijven sterven. Die avond loopt het - onverwacht, ook voor henzelf - heel anders: ze houden de (lokale) vertegenwoordigers van Pexton gevangen. Dit zet een reeks van gebeurtenissen in gang, die zelfs 30 jaar later nog hun effect hebben. We volgen de dorpelingen gedurende die 30 jaar, waarbij een centrale rol is toebedeeld aan het meisje Thula, dat aan het begin van het boek ongeveer 10 jaar oud is.

Thula is een serieus, bevlogen en leergierig meisje. Zij ziet het vergaren van kennis, om zo een gelijkwaardige gesprekspartner voor Pexton te worden, als oplossing voor de problemen van Kosawa. Ze gaat studeren in Amerika en keert uiteindelijk terug als een leider voor haar mensen. Het wrange is dat ze met haar karakter en levensstijl eigenlijk helemaal niet zo goed past in de traditionele dorpsgemeenschap, waar ze zo hard voor vecht. De traditionele leiders accepteren haar (als ongetrouwde vrouw!) nauwelijks en zelfs haar vrienden vinden het moeilijk haar te begrijpen. Op zeker moment is niet meer duidelijk voor wie en voor wat Thula eigenlijk zoveel offers brengt.

De manier waarop het verhaal wordt verteld is bijzonder. Een groot deel van de hoofdstukken wordt namelijk verteld in de wij-vorm door “de kinderen” van het dorp. De kinderen zijn Thula’s leeftijdsgenoten. Wie wel eens in een Afrikaans dorp is geweest zal vast het fenomeen herkennen dat zich binnen een mum van tijd een groep (starende) kinderen om de bezoeker heen vormt, een groep die zich als één organisch geheel lijkt voort te bewegen. Dat ze in dit boek dan ook met één stem spreken vind ik treffend gevonden. Het werkt ook goed, vooral in de eerste helft van het boek, als de kinderen ook daadwerkelijk nog kinderen zijn, die op enigszins naïeve wijze de wereld en de gebeurtenissen aanschouwen.

De andere hoofdstukken worden verteld door Thula en haar familieleden: een oom, haar moeder, haar oma en haar jongere broer. Hoewel Thula eigenlijk alleen als jong meisje zelf aan het woord komt, volgen we haar levensweg in de latere hoofdstukken via de andere vertellers. Vooral het hoofdstuk vanuit de moeder vond ik heel mooi, omdat zij de ambities van haar dochter eigenlijk niet begrijpt maar toch alles uit de kast trekt om haar door te laten leren. Het hoofdstuk vanuit de oma biedt een mooi kijkje in het verleden van het dorp, en laat zien dat het dorp ook in eerdere tijden misschien al minder geïsoleerd was dan je zou denken.

Het is bijzonder om een boek over Kameroen te lezen, en Imbolo Mbue is - door haar verleden in Afrika en haar huidige leven in Amerika- een bijzonder goede gids voor de westerse lezer. Ze neemt je mee naar een gemeenschap waar je waarschijnlijk weinig van weet en geeft tegelijk voldoende uitleg om die wereld te begrijpen. Daarbij idealiseert ze het dorpsleven zeker niet: ze geeft voldoende aandacht aan de donkere kanten van traditie, met name voor de vrouwen, maar ook voor kwetsbare kinderen bijvoorbeeld. Ik vond vooral het eerste deel van het boek heel sterk en meeslepend geschreven. Dit speelt zich af in een afgebakende locatie en tijdspanne, en de verschillende vertelstemmen hebben ook echt hun eigen verhaal te vertellen. Later zwakt het boek wat af: de tijd gaat veel sneller, en de constructie met de vertelstem van de kinderen werkt niet goed meer, omdat Mbue via hen probeert het verhaal van Thula’s ervaringen in Amerika te vertellen. Het is jammer dat ze aan die constructie vast heeft willen houden. Evengoed komt ze tot een mooi (maar ook wel verdrietig) einde aan haar boek. Niet het einde waar je misschien op gehoopt had, maar wel realistisch, vrees ik.

This disturbing novel is also lovely & hopeful. Set in a fictitious African village, an American oil corporation sets up nearby and shortly determined the shape of the residents' lives, not in a good way. They story follows many villagers, with a focus on a particular same age children. The prose is often lyrical despite the horror of certain events. Themes include: the aftermath of trauma, cross cultural confusion, the horror of greed, the birth of revolution, the pain of failure and more. The hopeful aspect comes in the second half as new visions for governance bloom. A bittersweet, thought-provoking, elegantly written novel.