Onyi Nwabineli
Author of Someday, Maybe
Works by Onyi Nwabineli
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- Nigeria
- Associated Place (for map)
- Nigeria
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This was definitely a tough read/listen. Probably not for people going through a really rough patch of their own. This book is about the paralyzing grief of losing your loved one to suicide. At times, it's so difficult to listen to. However, the author does an amazing job showing how our main character's Nigerian family support her as well as her friends.
The words that made me pick up this book in the first place.
" here are three things you should know about my husband:
He was the great love show more of my life despite his penchant for going incommunicado,
He was, as far as I and everyone else could tell, perfectly happy. Which is significant because…
On New Year’s Eve, he killed himself.
And here is one thing you should know about me:
I found him."
Not for everyone but an excellent book. show less
The words that made me pick up this book in the first place.
" here are three things you should know about my husband:
He was the great love show more of my life despite his penchant for going incommunicado,
He was, as far as I and everyone else could tell, perfectly happy. Which is significant because…
On New Year’s Eve, he killed himself.
And here is one thing you should know about me:
I found him."
Not for everyone but an excellent book. show less
I knew I would like this book based on its description, but I had no idea that it would be one of my rare 5-star reads. Onyi Nwabeineli's voice is beautiful, funny, and heartbreaking. She takes what is already a loaded issue, mommy bloggers who make bank by putting their children's lives online, and raises the stakes with racism and cultural differences. Things I loved:
*Our MC Anuri Chinas, with all of her understandable flaws and amazing gifts. Her crippling self-doubt resulted from a show more childhood in which her stepmother loved her as long as she performed for the webcam as requested, and her father remained emotionally distant because he never recovered from the tragic loss of Anuri's mother.
*Anuri's relationship with her two ride-or-die BFFs, especially their physical closeness and emotional honesty.
*The promising romance arc that is never portrayed as more important than Anuri's friendships.
*The resolution to the dilemma of how Anuri can save her little half-sister from being exploited without destroying both of them in the process.
*The occasional peek into the heads of Anuri's stepmom and father, just enough that I didn't completely despise them (maybe 95%).
My only caveat is that Nwabineli's style includes a LOT of POV hopping, but considering the incisive characterization, it feels like being at a noisy party where everyone has a lot to say. I can't believe that this is only the author's second novel. Normally I would immediately search out her debut( [b:Someday, Maybe|59952176|Someday, Maybe|Onyi Nwabineli|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1667569085l/59952176._SY75_.jpg|94336308]), but the subject matter, a loved one's death by suicide, is too painful for me to handle right now. But I will definitely keep her on my radar.
A few sample quotes to whet your appetite (hopefully):
*Our MC Anuri Chinas, with all of her understandable flaws and amazing gifts. Her crippling self-doubt resulted from a show more childhood in which her stepmother loved her as long as she performed for the webcam as requested, and her father remained emotionally distant because he never recovered from the tragic loss of Anuri's mother.
*Anuri's relationship with her two ride-or-die BFFs, especially their physical closeness and emotional honesty.
*The promising romance arc that is never portrayed as more important than Anuri's friendships.
*The resolution to the dilemma of how Anuri can save her little half-sister from being exploited without destroying both of them in the process.
*The occasional peek into the heads of Anuri's stepmom and father, just enough that I didn't completely despise them (maybe 95%).
My only caveat is that Nwabineli's style includes a LOT of POV hopping, but considering the incisive characterization, it feels like being at a noisy party where everyone has a lot to say. I can't believe that this is only the author's second novel. Normally I would immediately search out her debut( [b:Someday, Maybe|59952176|Someday, Maybe|Onyi Nwabineli|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1667569085l/59952176._SY75_.jpg|94336308]), but the subject matter, a loved one's death by suicide, is too painful for me to handle right now. But I will definitely keep her on my radar.
A few sample quotes to whet your appetite (hopefully):
Anuri was aware, as most people who practice the art of avoidance are, that running from yourself requires the kind of stamina that can only be fueled by self-destruction. The truly gifted can manage it forever. She would know. The unique thirst for alcohol lived like an unruly tenant in her mind, refusing to be evicted. She was thankful [her therapist] had taught her how to sit with her emotions, the most insistent and unwelcome of companions.show less
At night, Simi (BFF) would plead with Anuri to abandon the laptop, discard the phone and lie beside her on the bed. "You don't even have to sleep," she said, but Anuri was afflicted by the thing inside us which wrongly asserts that if we can only keep our eyes on something, then we can put our arms around it and contain it.
Allow Me to Introduce Myself is one of those books that has book group questions at the back, but to my mind there are only three questions they'd want to discuss: the first is, do parents have the right to monetise their child's life on social media; the second is, how does anybody make them stop; and the third is, what role do we as consumers have in facilitating that kind of exploitation?
Although it's laced with dark humour, Onyi Nwabineli's novel makes a clear case that it's a form of show more child abuse. Written from the perspective of Anuri* Chinasa, it charts the harm done by this kind of 24/7 exposure throughout the child's life. Now 25, Anuri is estranged from her family, has a serious drinking problem and a compulsive shopping habit. She relies on her therapist and a pair of wonderful friends to get her through the day.
Her stepmother Ophelia is a celebrity mummyblogger, i.e. she is internationally famous for documenting her child's life online. (Mommybloggers have their own Wikipedia page, who knew?) Although internet definitions of an 'influencer' vary, the consensus seems to be that an influencer is someone who is paid by a company to show and describe its products and services on social media, encouraging other people to buy them.
The book begins with a prologue that lists the tools her stepmother used to build her lucrative empire. It starts with Blogger, expands with WordPress, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat; and charts her followers from Year one at 26,000 to 4 million by Year five. It lists the first few products that were sold using her child's likeness, and then the larger range of products sold using the money she'd made from that. She and her husband are now enormously wealthy, and when Anuri decides at fourteen that she's had enough of it, Ophelia switches to using her own child, Noelle. And without being #SpoileristicallySpecific* that leads Anuri to try to rescue her sister from dangers she could never have envisaged.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2024/06/25/allow-me-to-introduce-myself-2024-by-onyi-nw... show less
Although it's laced with dark humour, Onyi Nwabineli's novel makes a clear case that it's a form of show more child abuse. Written from the perspective of Anuri* Chinasa, it charts the harm done by this kind of 24/7 exposure throughout the child's life. Now 25, Anuri is estranged from her family, has a serious drinking problem and a compulsive shopping habit. She relies on her therapist and a pair of wonderful friends to get her through the day.
Her stepmother Ophelia is a celebrity mummyblogger, i.e. she is internationally famous for documenting her child's life online. (Mommybloggers have their own Wikipedia page, who knew?) Although internet definitions of an 'influencer' vary, the consensus seems to be that an influencer is someone who is paid by a company to show and describe its products and services on social media, encouraging other people to buy them.
The book begins with a prologue that lists the tools her stepmother used to build her lucrative empire. It starts with Blogger, expands with WordPress, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat; and charts her followers from Year one at 26,000 to 4 million by Year five. It lists the first few products that were sold using her child's likeness, and then the larger range of products sold using the money she'd made from that. She and her husband are now enormously wealthy, and when Anuri decides at fourteen that she's had enough of it, Ophelia switches to using her own child, Noelle. And without being #SpoileristicallySpecific* that leads Anuri to try to rescue her sister from dangers she could never have envisaged.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2024/06/25/allow-me-to-introduce-myself-2024-by-onyi-nw... show less
fiction - compulsively readable story about 25 y.o. Igbo Nigerian-born Brit Anuri struggling with mental health issues from her childhood being publicized and monetized by her momfluencer step-mom Ophelia, as well as her concerns for her half-sister Noelle who is starting to rebel against Ophelia's omnipresent cameras and social media-ready expectations (but who, since she is only 5 y.o., lacks the language and knowledge to be able to effectively stand up for herself). Takes place in London, show more with trips to Awka, Nigeria. (CW/TW: alcoholism, self-harm and suicidal thoughts)
This is a book I tore through, not wanting to stop reading -- it was so good. I love these characters and their rich, dynamic relationships: Anuri's close friendships with her BFFs Simi and Loki, trying to connect with her emotionally distant dad Nkem, finding additional support in therapist Ammah and kickass lawyer Gloria, and being able to rely on paternal aunt in London and grandparents in Awka, plus the developing interest in one of Anuri's hair clients. show less
This is a book I tore through, not wanting to stop reading -- it was so good. I love these characters and their rich, dynamic relationships: Anuri's close friendships with her BFFs Simi and Loki, trying to connect with her emotionally distant dad Nkem, finding additional support in therapist Ammah and kickass lawyer Gloria, and being able to rely on paternal aunt in London and grandparents in Awka, plus the developing interest in one of Anuri's hair clients. show less
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- 2
- Members
- 428
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- Rating
- 4.0
- Reviews
- 7
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- 23