Binyavanga Wainaina tells the story of his middle-class Kenyan childhood, his failed attempt to study in South Africa as a computer programmer, a moving family reunion in Uganda, and his travels around Kenya. There is a lot of turmoil and trouble. He does a very good job of creating word pictures. ( )

157/2020. Interesting content but too overwritten for an enjoyable read. I didn't even need to look at the spine to guess this was published by Granta.

The author aims a pre-emptive strike at readers like me and misses by a country mile, lol: "After a couple of hours, I am starting to get uncomfortable at the levels of pleasure around me. I want to go back to my cheap motel room and read a book full of realism and stingy prose. Coetzee maybe? That will makes me a Protestant again. Naipaul. Something mean-spirited and bracing."

Content: 4
Style: 3
Average: 3.5 ( )

In a style of writing that I cannot but call absorbing, Wainaina talks about growing up in Kenya in the 70s and 80s, his addiction to fiction, about his booze- and cigarette-fueled attempts at studying in South Africa, about his early days as a writer, about his travels around the continent and the world. Over the course of his personal story, he adds in just enough politics and historical background to keep things firmly in memoir territory (as opposed to general history or international relations).

Some of the chapters were published as magazine articles before, and much of the book reads like that: a skilled writer using personal stories to talk about his world of intertribal distrust, colonial legacies, hesitant African democracies, Lagos cityscapes, Togo markets, and how to chart Kenya’s development through a succession of music styles. The best vignettes in the book, though, are the personal ones: this is where Wainaina’s less-is-more writing style does its most evocative work; his sparse sentences and carefully picked details are more artificial and less effective when it comes to more general topics.

That said, One day I will write about this place was an immersive read that I was eager to pick up and looking forward to read. I would very much like to read more by Wainaina. ( )

The first half is so slow, but getting through it is totally worth the effort. The second half almost merits the NY Times "run, don't walk, to buy this book," but overall, I think walking would be just fine. ( )

This is a memoir written in spectacularly descriptive and creative language that works best in describing scenes and the African world, less well in engaging the reader personally with the writer. ( )