Scan barcode
teatiger's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
julia_dale's review against another edition
4.0
A beautiful tapestry ad others have said. I felt like the last 100-ish pages were thinner than the rest, more disjointed. But overall, I enjoyed this more than most in the last year.
clairewords's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this book, it was a pleasure to read and consider its characters and what they represented, I loved it for the questions it posed in the mind of the reader, leaving us to come to our own conclusions, for every question could have had an equally valid, if opposite answer, such is life and the characters who inhabit our own reality, there are those who will stand up even it means they will be sacrificed and those who will remain quiet and flourish.
For my full review and readers comments, click here to connect to 'Word by Word'.
For my full review and readers comments, click here to connect to 'Word by Word'.
serendipitysbooks's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
The Memory of Love is a powerful sweeping tale set in Sierra Leone. It’s the intersecting stories of three men - Adrian who is a British psychologist who has left his family to work in Sierra Leone, Elias, a former academic who is dying in hospital, and Kai, an orthopaedic surgeon - and one woman who connects them all. The novel highlights the lasting effects - physical and mental - of trauma, even trauma not consciously remembered at both an individual and national level. Friendship, love and betrayal are some of the key themes. As the story unfolds the lasting legacy of colonialism and the horrors of war are brutally revealed, and the connections between past and present emphasised. There is lush writing and intricate storytelling that requires some effort from the reader due to the shifting perspectives and temporal jumps. However, this effort is well rewarded. The Memory of Love is a story well worth reading, and one that held my interest the entire time.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape and Violence
sinikiwe07's review
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
ladymirtazapine's review
4.0
Content warnings: various psychiatric presentations, a psychiatric hospital, PTSD nightmares and flashbacks, insomnia, a hospital during war time, war crimes, death, descriptions of operations, death in custody, character in custody on unknown charge, a character is beaten up, a character has malaria, racism, death in a car accident, death in child birth, infidelity, child estranged from parent, death of children in refugee camp, kidnapping, sexual assault of a male and female captive, murders, beheading, death of baby at birth, death of small baby, death of a parent in the past. I think that's everything.
The story has three strands; one during the late 60s and early 70s, one in the run up to and during the civil war, and one in the novel's present day which is the late 00s. The strands are represented by Elias Cole, an old man who is dying, Kai, a young doctor, and Adrian, a British psychologist who has only just arrived in the country.
Their strands were all interesting, but the jumping around between strands and time periods happened a bit too quickly for the book to be a real page turner. I can see that this was a deliberate choice; and works particularly well for Elias Cole's story - it captures the disjointed nature of the way a lot of very old people tell their stories. It is also somewhat effective in conveying the fractured nature of memory in the PTSD which Kai appears to suffer from. And in Adrian's case I think it's suppose to represent the fact that he doesn't know the place he is in, his reason for being there, or even himself.
Elias Cole is an unlikeable man and unreliable narrator of his own life. But that he's dying of a condition that would be perhaps be curable in a different country he's the only character who can reasonably be said to have thrived. He's a triumph of mediocrity. Which is why his daughter believes that the only way to have survived in their country is through cowardice. His braver contemporaries either died or had their lives ruined.
Kai is a successful surgeon, a caring uncle/father figure to Abass, but until he meets Adrian has no life outside of his home or work. His work helped him to survive the war but he's been doing it so long all he knows how to do is survive. He needs to find a way to live. His friend encourages him to do this by leaving for America, as most of his peers have done. Still his interactions with his patients show that he has at least come through his experiences with his humanity intact, unlike Elias Cole.
Adrian is running away from his own life in England. He has plenty of theory on how to help the people left with psychological problems by the civil war and the tumultuous period before it; but is the embodiment of the idea that going to school for something is insufficient preparation for actually practicing it. He's a developed and fleshed out character but I think his purpose in the story is more as plot device than player. I think his conclusion is that Sierra Leone is not his place or his struggle and he returns home. Or else he represents that foreign aid workers come and do a little good, but then go home leaving little meaningful difference behind.
I'm genuinely unsure whether Mamakay being Nenebah was meant as a plot twist, as I figured it out shortly after she appeared. She was an interesting character and I would have liked to see more of her. Unfortunately she seemed to die to bring conclusion to the stories of the men in her life.
I liked how Agnes's story ultimately came from others. It was brutal but the nature in which it was revealed fit with the theme of brutalised histories being commonplace in Sierra Leone, and people struggling to find a way to move forward.
I was not happy with the ending. That either Adrian went home and forgot about his child with Mamakay or that nobody in the hospital bothered to tell him the child survived so Kai could raise her. It didn't feel fitting to either of their characters.
I then went back and forth over what I thought should have happened to the child. Should Adrian have taken her home so she could have her father and her sister in her life. Should Adrian have stayed, so that she could have both her father, and her culture and heritage, but basically deprived Adrian's other daughter of a father. It felt as though some kind of compromise should have been possible, but I'm not sure what that would have looked like.
Maybe it wasn't out of character for Adrian to abandon this child, as he'd been happy to move to Sierra Leone leaving his wife and first daughter just months before. But it seemed that this daughter was his link to Mamakay, and he'd love her fiercely because of it.
In the end the daughter is a sign of hope for Kai, and his friend's return I think of hope for the country.
While the ending was a bit disappointing I will definitely looking forward to reading more books by this author.
The story has three strands; one during the late 60s and early 70s, one in the run up to and during the civil war, and one in the novel's present day which is the late 00s. The strands are represented by Elias Cole, an old man who is dying, Kai, a young doctor, and Adrian, a British psychologist who has only just arrived in the country.
Their strands were all interesting, but the jumping around between strands and time periods happened a bit too quickly for the book to be a real page turner. I can see that this was a deliberate choice; and works particularly well for Elias Cole's story - it captures the disjointed nature of the way a lot of very old people tell their stories. It is also somewhat effective in conveying the fractured nature of memory in the PTSD which Kai appears to suffer from. And in Adrian's case I think it's suppose to represent the fact that he doesn't know the place he is in, his reason for being there, or even himself.
Elias Cole is an unlikeable man and unreliable narrator of his own life. But that he's dying of a condition that would be perhaps be curable in a different country he's the only character who can reasonably be said to have thrived. He's a triumph of mediocrity. Which is why his daughter believes that the only way to have survived in their country is through cowardice. His braver contemporaries either died or had their lives ruined.
Kai is a successful surgeon, a caring uncle/father figure to Abass, but until he meets Adrian has no life outside of his home or work. His work helped him to survive the war but he's been doing it so long all he knows how to do is survive. He needs to find a way to live. His friend encourages him to do this by leaving for America, as most of his peers have done. Still his interactions with his patients show that he has at least come through his experiences with his humanity intact, unlike Elias Cole.
Adrian is running away from his own life in England. He has plenty of theory on how to help the people left with psychological problems by the civil war and the tumultuous period before it; but is the embodiment of the idea that going to school for something is insufficient preparation for actually practicing it. He's a developed and fleshed out character but I think his purpose in the story is more as plot device than player. I think his conclusion is that Sierra Leone is not his place or his struggle and he returns home. Or else he represents that foreign aid workers come and do a little good, but then go home leaving little meaningful difference behind.
I'm genuinely unsure whether Mamakay being Nenebah was meant as a plot twist, as I figured it out shortly after she appeared. She was an interesting character and I would have liked to see more of her. Unfortunately she seemed to die to bring conclusion to the stories of the men in her life.
I liked how Agnes's story ultimately came from others. It was brutal but the nature in which it was revealed fit with the theme of brutalised histories being commonplace in Sierra Leone, and people struggling to find a way to move forward.
I was not happy with the ending. That either Adrian went home and forgot about his child with Mamakay or that nobody in the hospital bothered to tell him the child survived so Kai could raise her. It didn't feel fitting to either of their characters.
I then went back and forth over what I thought should have happened to the child. Should Adrian have taken her home so she could have her father and her sister in her life. Should Adrian have stayed, so that she could have both her father, and her culture and heritage, but basically deprived Adrian's other daughter of a father. It felt as though some kind of compromise should have been possible, but I'm not sure what that would have looked like.
Maybe it wasn't out of character for Adrian to abandon this child, as he'd been happy to move to Sierra Leone leaving his wife and first daughter just months before. But it seemed that this daughter was his link to Mamakay, and he'd love her fiercely because of it.
In the end the daughter is a sign of hope for Kai, and his friend's return I think of hope for the country.
While the ending was a bit disappointing I will definitely looking forward to reading more books by this author.
claudibonini's review
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, and Torture