Reviews - Notes on Grief | The StoryGraph

2.73k reviews for:

Notes on Grief

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

4.27 AVERAGE

solorob's review

5.0

I love her ability to cut right to feelings that at first seem inaccessible with language. Her writing keeps me believing that words have the power to reach solitary places within us that we think have no voice.

kamehapahukoa's review

4.0

It’s difficult to say why I picked this book up. So often, I’m intrigued by stories of grief, but then it’s too much to finish. I think what I’m curious about is what other people experience in grief because I’m looking for someone like me. Of course, everyone goes through this difficulty differently so it’s an endless search to morbidly connect. This book was broad and general enough I found several quotes relatable. It was a quick hour and a half, and I’m not upset I listened.
“Grief is a cruel kind of education. You learn how ungentle mourning can be, how full of anger. You learn how glib condolences can feel. You learn how much grief is about language, the failure of language and the grasping for language.”
“A friend sends me a line from my novel: 'Grief was the celebration of love, those who could feel real grief were lucky to have loved.' How odd to find it so exquisitely painful to read my own words.”
“I am writing about my father in the past tense, and I cannot believe I am writing about my father in the past tense.”
“I wish.. I wish.. the guilt gnaws at my soul. I think of all the things that could've happened, and all the ways the world could've been reshaped to prevent what happened on that day...”