Stephanie Jane reviewed Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Interesting discussions
4 stars
I was interested to see, when reading other reviews after having finished Americanah, that a lot of people didn't like the discussions and arguments about race or the imagined blog posts, preferring the Ifemelu-Obinze romance instead. Personally, once Ifemelu had left for America, I wasn't convinced by the apparent longings to resume their relationship and enjoyed reading the race discussions instead!
Americanah has a large cast of characters, some of which appear and reappear briefly so keeping track of everyone wasn't always easy. I did read the book over just a few days and think that if I had taken much longer, I could have gotten very lost. As a white Brit I did occasionally cringe at spotting things I have done or said being pulled up by Adichie. She has a wonderfully sharp eye and I love her ability to create such realism on the page. There are …
I was interested to see, when reading other reviews after having finished Americanah, that a lot of people didn't like the discussions and arguments about race or the imagined blog posts, preferring the Ifemelu-Obinze romance instead. Personally, once Ifemelu had left for America, I wasn't convinced by the apparent longings to resume their relationship and enjoyed reading the race discussions instead!
Americanah has a large cast of characters, some of which appear and reappear briefly so keeping track of everyone wasn't always easy. I did read the book over just a few days and think that if I had taken much longer, I could have gotten very lost. As a white Brit I did occasionally cringe at spotting things I have done or said being pulled up by Adichie. She has a wonderfully sharp eye and I love her ability to create such realism on the page. There are so many different people speaking here, yet none felt false or overdrawn. Ifemelu herself is a fantastic creation - a proud confident and emotional woman who even without her blog's anonymity seemed able to speak as she saw. I was irritated by the ease in which her blogs took off though. How many of us bloggers have really got 1000 views for a third post without spending a single minute on promotion?!