Reviews with content warning for Incest - The Death of Vivek Oji

I could barely put this book down, but not because I needed to know what happened to Vivek. The portrait of a young, queer Nigerian man and his family was so vivid, generous, and devastating. Walking through their lived experiences and their grief was so raw and beautiful. The timeline jumps and narrator shifts were absolutely seamless. This book flowed in such a poignant way and it will stay with me for a long time.

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avidreadr's review against another edition

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5.0

Wow. This book was so bizarre and broached some uncomfortable subjects. But it's impossible absolutely impossible to not fall in love with Vivek.

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nightfell's review

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emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

I know the ending was probably intended to be shocking but it ended up being anticlimactic for me. I wish we had gotten to see more of what was going on for Vivek, even though I know the book was intentionally written through outside perspectives, I wanted to hear more about his journey finding himself, even through the perspectives of the girls, I would have had more of a connection to his struggles and thus his families' struggles.

But I feel like the author didn't and framed his gender identity as a reveal at the end, which I personally didn't like, but I understand why it was written in that way.

Also, why was there incest. What was the reason? "My cousin. My brother. The love of my sinful life" or something like that, like whyyy did they not only write incest but kept on reminding us that they are related, and like brothers?? It kind of ruined the book for me, I couldn't look past it.

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room334's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix

4.5

Akweake Emezi continues to be one of the most breathtaking and talented writers I’ve read. There certainly was a big aspect of this that made me uncomfortable, but I think only Emezi could write a book about such a taboo subject matter and make it hauntingly beautiful. I do think there was a lot of buildup to a reveal that felt very obvious, but even knowing that, it still had such a heart wrenching ending.

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