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A review by rballenger
How Beautiful We Were by Imbolo Mbue
4.0
Type of read: Commuter Read.
What made me pick it up: I think I saw it on one of the suggested lists I receive and the cover art and description got to me.
Overall rating: Beautiful and eloquent, 'How Beautiful We Were' is a true work of art. This is a mature read, and I don't mean that necessarily just content-wise - although there is violence, sex, and general death - but more in the sense that it is a complex work of writing that approaches its storyline from multiple perspectives. It is written from a cultural standpoint of one that I am not at all familiar with and I really enjoyed listening and learning from. There were definitely parts of this book that felt very nonfiction and I had to keep reminding myself that it was fiction (I wanted to know more about the circumstances and see how I could help).
I think one of the hardest parts of reading 'How Beautiful We Were' for me was that there are a lot of names/chapter main characters and a lot of different perspectives told on the same event. I was very thankful the audiobook had multiple narrators to help differentiate the individual stories and the author did a great job of saying things like uncle so and so or friend what's his name, but it was still a little confusing at first.
"How Beautiful We Were" is honestly not comparable to anything else I've read over the last couple of years. I think of trying to compare it to something like The Tattooist of Auschwitz (work of fiction based on nonfiction and historical events) but the style and writing are so completely different and unique that I'm not sure they can even be put in the same category - although they are both very high up on my list of books I've enjoyed.
I would recommend "How Beautiful We Were" to those I know would be interested in a meaty, complex read that requires a bit of work on the reader's part.
Some favorite quotes that stuck out to me:
"How could we be so reckless as to dream?"
"We can't do only what we're at ease with, we must do what we ought to do."
What made me pick it up: I think I saw it on one of the suggested lists I receive and the cover art and description got to me.
Overall rating: Beautiful and eloquent, 'How Beautiful We Were' is a true work of art. This is a mature read, and I don't mean that necessarily just content-wise - although there is violence, sex, and general death - but more in the sense that it is a complex work of writing that approaches its storyline from multiple perspectives. It is written from a cultural standpoint of one that I am not at all familiar with and I really enjoyed listening and learning from. There were definitely parts of this book that felt very nonfiction and I had to keep reminding myself that it was fiction (I wanted to know more about the circumstances and see how I could help).
I think one of the hardest parts of reading 'How Beautiful We Were' for me was that there are a lot of names/chapter main characters and a lot of different perspectives told on the same event. I was very thankful the audiobook had multiple narrators to help differentiate the individual stories and the author did a great job of saying things like uncle so and so or friend what's his name, but it was still a little confusing at first.
"How Beautiful We Were" is honestly not comparable to anything else I've read over the last couple of years. I think of trying to compare it to something like The Tattooist of Auschwitz (work of fiction based on nonfiction and historical events) but the style and writing are so completely different and unique that I'm not sure they can even be put in the same category - although they are both very high up on my list of books I've enjoyed.
I would recommend "How Beautiful We Were" to those I know would be interested in a meaty, complex read that requires a bit of work on the reader's part.
Some favorite quotes that stuck out to me:
"How could we be so reckless as to dream?"
"We can't do only what we're at ease with, we must do what we ought to do."