Americanah

Everyone in Nairobi is reading now Chimamanda’s Americanah. Let me refine that. Everyone in Nairobi who considers himself the rightful ratio of urbane and academic is reading now Chimamanda’s Americanah – purchased it in the last two months then gobbled it down within days.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s latest novel was released in May 2013 (in UK) and August 2013 (in Kenya).

A quick bio on the author: Chimamanda is Nigerian but she lives in the States with her Dr Husband. Pretty young thing, with almond-shaped eyes. Her undergrad was in medicine then somewhere along the way, she was drawn to the written word and abandoned med all together. She has four book titles to her name. Ten years after her first publication, Chimamanda is now a worldwide commercially and critically acclaimed novelist. One of her earlier works from 2007 – Half on a yellow sun – is being adopted into a film.

All her books readily lend themselves to book reviews and inconsequential book club chitchat. It’s justified though: Chimamanda’s prose is easy, her imagery arresting and her dry wit provokes the constant smile.

The book itself is the size of a tome; friendly font, with a lazy-brown book cover and lazier art title. It runs the length of 400+ pages.

There have been numerous reviews of Americanah. Numerous. Yet only two stood out for me. The first was from the Sunday Times Magazine, written by Francine Prose. The second was by our very own JB Ali.

JB Ali is a writer and a regular reader of this blog. JB Ali currently lives and works in SA. I met JB Ali through writing, the blogosphere to be precise. JB Ali runs an impressive blog where he pens, among other things, book reviews for African authors. Chimamanda’s Americanah was one of them.

I redirect you to JB Ali’s blog for his review. Do tell him I said hi, will you?