Take a photo of a barcode or cover
katieconley 's review for:
Americanah
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
I enjoyed this book. It started strong with the protagonist and her adolescent love interest. Then it follows her adventures (& misadventures) as she moves to the US to study. It lost a little steam towards the latter part of the middle but then it redeemed itself and ended up on a sweet note. I especially enjoyed the passages about race of which the main character writes an anonymous blog. It’s a unique take on race from the perspective of an African as opposed to an African American.
Here are some highlights:
“I think you’re suffering from depression.” Ifemelu shook her head and turned to the window. Depression is what happened to Americans, with their self-absolving need to turn everything into an illness.
“It seemed to me that American blacks and whites work together but don’t play together, and here [UK] blacks and whites play together but don’t work together.”
“A white boy and a black girl who grow up in the same working-class town in this country can get together and race will be secondary, but in America, even if the white boy and black girl grow up in the same neighborhood, race would be primary.”
They ticked the boxes of a certain kind of enlightened, educated middle-classness, the love of dresses that were more interesting than pretty, the love of the eclectic, the love of what they were supposed to love.
Here are some highlights:
“I think you’re suffering from depression.” Ifemelu shook her head and turned to the window. Depression is what happened to Americans, with their self-absolving need to turn everything into an illness.
“It seemed to me that American blacks and whites work together but don’t play together, and here [UK] blacks and whites play together but don’t work together.”
“A white boy and a black girl who grow up in the same working-class town in this country can get together and race will be secondary, but in America, even if the white boy and black girl grow up in the same neighborhood, race would be primary.”
They ticked the boxes of a certain kind of enlightened, educated middle-classness, the love of dresses that were more interesting than pretty, the love of the eclectic, the love of what they were supposed to love.