A book about the history of Biafra, a state that seceded from Nigeria from 1967 and was reunited with the country in 1970 following a devastating civil war.

Achebe starts by recounting his early life and education in Nigeria under British colonial rule, then describes the sequence of historical events following independence leading up to Biafran succession and the Nigerian–Biafran War. The events of the war are related through a mixture of personal recollections and historical details. The text also contains a number of poems by the author written during the period.

While I found the subject matter interesting, the fusion of history and memoir in this book was not entirely successful. As a memoir, the book is hampered by the author's efforts to maintain a neutral or even impersonal tone, while as a work of history the viewpoint seems too narrowly restricted to the author's own experiences. Still, despite its limitations, this book did provide an interesting perspective on this period of Nigeria's history. ( )

I wish this 'personal history of Biafra' was more personal. Achebe was intimately involved in Biafran independence and the war that followed, but this book wasn't vey intimate. I got the feeling he was being very careful with what he said, perhaps not to offend people still living.
But of course Achebe is a great writer and thinker. The real strong point of this book I think is the poetry he includes at the end of each section. His beautiful poems humanize the war at it's progressive stages in fragile, heartbreaking images.
I think the book would have benefitted from more of his poems being included, and more of his poetry infused in the prose. ( )

This book is a mixture of memoir and history of the Biafran War of 1967-1970, hence Achebe's description of it as a "personal history", an account of events from the perspective of himself and his family.

Nigeria had gained its independence from Britain in 1960 - the new country had a number of different peoples, speaking many different languages, who had different histories of relating to British rule and thus to the new state and its government. The foundation of the breakaway Biafran Republic in the south east was announced in May 1967, after some quite brutal conflicts in the north of the country, and a very bitter civil war followed, ending in defeat for Biafra.

Achebe attempts to explain the origins of the conflict in post colonial Nigeria, in an attempted coup in Northern Nigeria and the response to it, etc. He also describes some of the experiences of himself, his wife and their young children in war torn Biafra (the third was born just after the declaration of the Biafran Republic). He also includes a number of his poems about the conflict.

I was eager to read this book as I loved Achebe's previous book The Education of a British-Protected Child (Penguin Modern Classics) , a collection of essays including several autobiographical ones. I didn't find this quite as accessible or engaging. The juxtaposition of sections of history and memoir seemed a bit disjointed, and the rather dry historical narrative with lots of names of military leaders felt as if it was pulling me away from the story of the book.

I did appreciate the inclusion of some of his poetry in the book, and was interested in the way he tried to tell the story, I just didn't find it completely successful.

On a more positive note, the book is a nicely presented hardback with an elegant and sombre dust jacket and a very comprehensive index. Some of the endnote citations from the book seem a bit eccentric and of doubtful reliability - lots of conversations with named and unnamed individuals which cannot be followed up as they may not be published, and even "author's recollections" - I think it would be sufficient to make it clear in the main text that something is from conversation or memory and use endnotes just for published external sources.

I intend to refer back to this if I read other books about Nigeria and Biafra, and think it would be useful alongside other books as an introduction to Nigerian and/or recent African history.

Reviewed for Amazon Vine December 2012 ( )

The pain and horror of the loss of his country pervade Chinua Achebe's personal and historical account of the Biafra War in Nigeria.

FRIENDS: Ivory Coast, Gabon, Tanzania, Netherlands (?), MLK and NAACP, France, Pope Paul VI and Italy (oil interests excepted),
Carl Gustaf von Rosen, Haiti, and a few others

NEUTRAL: The United State of America until Nixon (!!!) stood up for the people

FOES: LBJ, Great Britain, Soviet Union, Portugal, The United Nations

(It would be good to update maps to show missing locations.) ( )

An interesting book, but it is not Achebe's best work. For such an important event, Achebe could have brought more than the propagandist's view to the events about which he writes. ( )