Reviews

The Middle Daughter by Chika Unigwe

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georgiastyan's review

challenging emotional hopeful sad fast-paced

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

4.25

This book is easy to read, but not an easy read in terms of subject matter. The author uses such vivid and beautiful language and the chapter layout of the book is also unique. Nani's story is heartbreaking but hopeful.

sir_presh's review

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2.0

I like Chika's writing style in this book. I found it relatively easy to read without having to stumble over words or reread sentences.

I didn't enjoy this book. I enjoyed the first thirty pages, but the rest felt off to me.

I didn't like Nani. I think the intention was to show her as an individual who doesn't know how to deal with the grief of losing her sister and father in death, is misunderstood by her mother and remaining sister, and as a result, falls into the hands of a beguiling and controlling man. But there's nothing in the story that makes this believable to me.
In my opinion, Nani is incredibly stupid, not broken by grief or anything. Just plain stupid.
I honestly tried to understand her, but I just couldn't; as a Nigerian neither as someone who has read a lot of broken characters.
None of her decisions made sense to me and it made reading this book all the more tiring.
For me, it would have made more sense if Nani came from a dysfunctional family. But as far as I could tell, before the death of her sister and father, they were a well-rounded family that also had the advantage of being wealthy with sensible parents.

peita_hansen's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful sad 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

booksfadereads's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful sad medium-paced

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

4.75

“There are some burdens one must never carry alone. We are taught from when we are young girls being prepared for marriage never to share our problems. We are told that if the old woman talks too much of how she trampled the chick to death, the mother hen would be given to her too. But you know what Philo says? I say that that is the problem we have as women: we do not talk enough about what we suffer”

Compelling, Heart wrenching, Hopeful

This book centers around 17 year old Nani and how the death of her sister and dad changed the course of her life. Tragedy befell her once loving, close knit and affluent family early in this book and I wasn’t prepared for the many woes to follow, it just kept getting worse.

With heavy subject matter such as loss, grief, domestic violence, abuse, this story shows the reality of many women, what they go through and have to endure even in today’s society.
I could relate with some parts of this book and it just made me sad. Grief truly never ends and the finality of death is something I’d never be able to comprehend or get over.

Chika Unigwe told a powerful story with The Middle Daughter. It’s such memorable read and I will be thinking about Nani for a long time.

Highly recommended