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A review by mary_soon_lee
The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney by Okechukwu Nzelu
4.0
This is a very engaging, often funny novel that switches between two time periods (early 1990s and late 2000s) and several point-of-view characters. It's a measure of how engaging it is that I kept reading even though it opens with a group of evangelical Christians, far from my favorite group to encounter. They are evangelical Christians from Cambridge, most of them recent graduates from the university. Having attended Cambridge and having encountered evangelical Christians there, it was interesting to see this from the other side of the belief fence.
Nnenna is worrying that "I feel like people are just waiting to tell me I'm some sort of bad black person, or that I'm not really black" and another character replies "... there's nothing you can do that will make you any more or less black than you already are. You don't have to earn it."
One of the other main characters is a gay man and I found some of the scenes where he is treated poorly quite upsetting.
This is a highly readable story about characters I quickly cared about. Four out of five coming-of-age stars.
About my reviews: I try to review every book I read, including those that I don't end up enjoying. The reviews are not scholarly, but just indicate my reaction as a reader, reading being my addiction. I am miserly with 5-star reviews; 4 stars means I liked a book very much; 3 stars means I liked it; 2 stars means I didn't like it (though often the 2-star books are very popular with other readers and/or are by authors whose other work I've loved).
Spoiler
Much of the story concerns a mother-daughter relationship, seen from both perspectives. The daughter, Nnenna, is a teenager close to my own daughter's age, and, like her, thinking about heading off to university. I was very caught up by this thread, fiercely wanting matters to go well for them. Nnenna is of mixed race, her mother white, her absent father Nigerian. I am of mixed Irish and Chinese ancestry, and I think of myself as half-Chinese. Still, I sometimes feel not-really-Chinese or not-Chinese-enough-to-count, so one section -- page 216 in my edition -- especially struck me.Nnenna is worrying that "I feel like people are just waiting to tell me I'm some sort of bad black person, or that I'm not really black" and another character replies "... there's nothing you can do that will make you any more or less black than you already are. You don't have to earn it."
One of the other main characters is a gay man and I found some of the scenes where he is treated poorly quite upsetting.
This is a highly readable story about characters I quickly cared about. Four out of five coming-of-age stars.
About my reviews: I try to review every book I read, including those that I don't end up enjoying. The reviews are not scholarly, but just indicate my reaction as a reader, reading being my addiction. I am miserly with 5-star reviews; 4 stars means I liked a book very much; 3 stars means I liked it; 2 stars means I didn't like it (though often the 2-star books are very popular with other readers and/or are by authors whose other work I've loved).