It sort of feels as though Chimamanda Adichie has been following me around Europe. Not literally, of course, but I’ve nearly bought one of her books on at least four occasions on my travels. I rather wish I had because she's a wonderful writer and it would have been rather lovely to have been able to sit on a train for 4 hours at a time burrowing through this book. The book's been reviewed previously so I'll try to keep it brief. Oddly enough for a book that is largely about a civil war it isn't a depressing book, there are certainly moments of tragedy and horror, but they are balanced by joy and laughter. The tight focus of the story on the central characters, keeps the story very much a human story, of lives impacted by civil war but not defined by it. I particularly liked the way the twins are written; we never see the story through Kainene's eyes, only ever knowing her feelings from what she tells the other characters, particularly Olanna and Richard, which allows her to remain every bit as much of a mystery to the reader as she does to her sister and her lover. I'll readily admit to knowing very little about Nigeria in the 60s, (There were two history courses at my university for the entire continent of Africa, that they were titled Africa in the 19th Century and Africa in the 20th Century probably tells you everything that was wrong with the courses) so I found the history elements and also the insight into the different strata of Nigerian society, utterly fascinating. Also I would have loved to read either version of The World Was Silent When We Died the little snippets we get were fascinating.

I almost wish I had another star to give this one. Set in Nigerian in the 1960's, the book focusses on the lives of five very different people against the backdrop the the Biafra conflict. You don't need to know much of Nigerian history to enjoy this book - the focus is not on a specific war, or even on war in general, but rather on the lives and emotional conflicts of the characters. Adichie's writing ranks with the best, and in its unpretentious elegance blows away many of our own overly lauded literary luminaries. I wish more contemporary American writers would read this book and learn something from it. Clear and vidid prose, complex characters and an interesting and tangible storyline beat recondite vocabulary, quasi-intellectual supernaturalism and a distracting clutter of pop-cultural references any day. This is how a novel should look.
My only real quibble is with the character of Richard, an Englishman who marries an Igbo woman and takes part in the Biafran cause. I'm glad Adichie included him, but is is clumsy and two-dimensional when compared with the other characters, and one can feel that he is there more for political motives than literary ones. Otherwise an amazing read. I was sorry when it was over. ( )

I am exceeding glad to have had a chance to read this wonderful book. Easy to read and so well written, Adichie has brought the Biafran war with its hate and ethnic cleansing and mass starvation and tragedy right to us so vividly. But in so doing it is not all hopeless. Characters shine through, hope shines through the hopelessness. It is not a book about war, it is about ordinary people in an extraordinary setting; their lives, their loves, their dreams.

I thought four of the five major characters were exceedingly well drawn, but just could not get to like or identify with Odenigbo at any stage, and felt the way he reacted was not very 'in character'. But then again, in times of war when such unbelievable atrocities are committed, I guess lots of us could behave 'out of character'.

The story really brought a tragic period of history home to me. Personal stories always illuminate the political background, and Adichie has woven this fictional human narrative into the facts so masterfully and compassionately that you feel almost that you know these people as friends. At the time, very few people knew precisely what was going on behind the Nigerian blockades. In writing this book, Adichie will ensure that many more people today know what happened, and hopefully will not forget.

Another interesting fact about the Nigerian-Biafran War I learned is that it was as a result of this conflict that the organisation known as Médecins Sans Frontières ("Doctors Without Borders") came into being. ( )

A portrayal of the crippling civil war following the secession of the Igbo people to form the independent nation of Biafra in eastern Nigeria in the 1960s.

I bought this book because I was intrigued by the many raves and the recommendations in LT, but i'm afraid i belong to the tiny minority who are lukewarm to the novel, not finding it an exceptional work. The theme is without doubt noteworthy, and we feel the misery, the loss, the brutality of war, but Adichie's approach and treatment of the subject didn't leave much of an impact overall.

I didn't like that the book didn't seem to know what to get at even after 150 pages. It does get a bit better, and picked up much later but only towards the end. We meet the characters often, we see what's happening in their lives, it gives us a semblance of knowing them, but we never get to know them deeply because they do not engage us, we do not see into their psyche. Also, Adichie perhaps in her attempt to depict the "humanness" of the main characters (she calls it "emotional truth") overemphasizes their weakness instead so that they become very irritating -- for example, the characterization of Richard, the white man, as the spineless, needy and sniveling type, is repeated a lot of times that it becomes well, boring. Same thing with Olanna (one of the twin sisters) -- Adichie doesn't seem to have a very clear idea of how to portray her. I also found it disconcerting that the book doesn't give the reader the context, a background of events (historical and political) before the war unleashed -- the anchor is just not there, the reader gropes for an understanding but doesn't find it (in an almost 500-page book at that). Those many meetings by the academics and intellectuals at Odegnibe's house would have been very good venues for the author to provide this necessary background, but Adichie did not explore this -- we know what drinks these people liked, what hobbies they had, we know they made a lot of noise but we never get to know their opinions, their ideologies, their politics -- and they were supposed to represent the core intellectual and revolutionary elite on the verge of momentous events. Somehow it just doesn't connect.

Overall, i felt there was a lot of "noise" in this novel, a hesitation to challenge the reader to think, to reflect, there is plenty of skirting around without touching on a core theme, a lack of focus and depth. And she didn't seem to know how to end the book either...it seems to want to project uncertainty (with Keinene still missing) but is uncertain how to go about it, quite weak i should say. I'm glad I read it though -- it made me want to learn more about Biafra. ( )

Moving tale of lives affected by Nigerian civil war - an English immigrant, a glamorous woman and her mysterious sister and a houseboy. ( )