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A review by cgj13
Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi
5.0
This one is going to stick with me for a while and ruminate in my brain.
It is not a straightforward book for a white american woman. There is Nigerian culture here that I know/knew nothing about that oversees the whole story. So I spent a fair amount of time determining whether this was a book about lore or mental health. Maybe it is both.
TRIGGER WARNINGS:
The majority of the book is narrated by other selves that reside with Ada. If you were an outsider looking at Ada, you would assume that she was suffering from multiple personalities, self-mutilation,self destructive behavior, as well as being bisexual and transgender. That's a lot going on in one person. But the basis of this book is in an ideology that each person is born with other selves that return to the other side while born, but occasionally that does not happen, and what ensues is generally madness in the person of "the flesh".
This is a very different look at the cause of multiple personality disorder and the section of selves, in relation to "the other side"
I know I am not getting all of this correct, and I do apologize to the author for any inaccuracies due to my lack of knowledge of the culture.
It is not a straightforward book for a white american woman. There is Nigerian culture here that I know/knew nothing about that oversees the whole story. So I spent a fair amount of time determining whether this was a book about lore or mental health. Maybe it is both.
TRIGGER WARNINGS:
The majority of the book is narrated by other selves that reside with Ada. If you were an outsider looking at Ada, you would assume that she was suffering from multiple personalities, self-mutilation,self destructive behavior, as well as being bisexual and transgender. That's a lot going on in one person. But the basis of this book is in an ideology that each person is born with other selves that return to the other side while born, but occasionally that does not happen, and what ensues is generally madness in the person of "the flesh".
This is a very different look at the cause of multiple personality disorder and the section of selves, in relation to "the other side"
I know I am not getting all of this correct, and I do apologize to the author for any inaccuracies due to my lack of knowledge of the culture.