Reviews tagging 'Slavery'

Aftershocks by Nadia Owusu

2 reviews

thebowandthebook's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional informative sad medium-paced

2.5

The writing was lovely. Disagreed with most of the mindsets and struggled with the content examines. 

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jayisreading's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

5.0

Aftershocks is an intimate, beautifully written memoir that explores belonging and identity with incredible nuance and grace. I wouldn’t quite call this an experimental approach to memoirs (e.g., In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado), but it doesn’t follow conventions when it comes to memoirs. Owusu opts out of temporality and, instead, takes the reader through her own temporality that you could argue is defined by a seismometer. I really liked how she divided her memoir up into events related to earthquakes (hence, the title). This presentation of her life, culture, and history through vignette-like pieces takes the reader into a liminal space that Owusu often feels she exists in.

Owusu brings such unique perspective to the table as a biracial woman (Ghanaian Armenian) who had a less grounded childhood as a result of her father’s job with the United Nations. In addition, she brings to attention what it’s like dealing with madness, grief, and trauma; deeply contemplating on their connections with each other and to her life. She traces these through her fraught relationships with her mother and stepmother, the death of her father, the various countries she lived in and, of course, her identity.

Owusu invites you into her world in Aftershocks, but in such a way that doesn’t allow you to stare, because these pieces she shares with the readers are precarious. In addition, and I don’t know if this was her intention, but I thought Owusu demonstrated how intersectionality works phenomenally, especially across time and space. There’s a lot to praise— All I can say is to check this memoir out. 

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