What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky

I read this in one sitting. Arimah's characters seethe with internalized violence they sublimate through storytelling, the same violence that eventually extinguishes the fire of girls as god, their mothers, and society mold them into proper young women. Complete with dashes of magical realism and steeped in lore.

Riverhead has 2017 locked down.

The twelve stories in this collection range from the grim to the whimsical. Set variously in America or Nigeria, in the future, the far future, or an alternate present, they tend to concern the anxiety of familial bonds in a world in which those bonds are severely tested. Betrayals by family members abound. Men are either ineffectual or monstrous or idealized. Women, more complex typically, are also capable of harsher judgements and more devious plans. Reality is permeable. Spirits or ghosts often have walk-on parts. And when the past is not corporealized, it’s atrocities nonetheless take on the immense weight of memory and grief.

The writing is solid without being flashy. Arimah’s characters are believable, if somewhat outside the show more norm, even, or perhaps particularly, her golem-like Ogechi in “Who Will Greet You At Home.” Arimah is especially good on the state of beholdingness, which involves gratitude steeped in resentment. Individuals or part-families fall into the state of dependence on other family members through the vicissitudes of fate: war, accident, economic disaster, ecological catastrophe. There is an ever present feeling of risk. Whatever you might have at one moment could be gone in the next, with no hope of redemption. It makes for compelling yet anxious reading.

The finest of these stories are as good as any you could hope to read anywhere. I particularly admired the aforementioned “Who Will Greet You At Home,” “Buchi’s Girls,” the title story, “What It Means When A Man Falls From The Sky,” and, “Glory.” But I was not disappointed with any. It makes it easy to recommend this collection. show less

‘’Girls with fire in their bellies will be forced to drink from a well of correction till the flames die out.’’

In this outstanding collection by the Nigerian writer Leslie Nneka Arimah, family is examined in all its forms. Family means unconditional love and protection. But there is a very fine, fragile line between protection and asphyxiation, between love and care and the deep wish for absolute dominion over the life of your children. Motherhood acquires centre stage and is seen in a realistic, even raw, light. We meet mothers who nurture and protect, mothers who oppress, mothers who exploit. And most importantly, we meet daughters whose cry of independence and the right to decide their course echoes through the pages of one show more of the most exceptional books I’ve ever had the fortune to read.

This collection is as ferocious as life itself.

The Future Looks Good: We meet a young woman as she is about to unlock the door of an apartment. Through her eyes, we see her family. Her parents, her elder sister. We encounter the hell of the war in Nigeria and the various labours of love. But nothing, nothing can prepare us for the end. An astonishing story in less than six pages.

War Stories: A girl narrates the story of the cruelty of children, the weakness of human nature, the nightmare of war, the secrets of a family. Powerful and moving.

Wild: A teenage girl is sent to stay with her aunt in Nigeria. There she has to face the wild nature of her cousin and a mysterious past. A story of motherhood, womanhood, and the repercussions of a cultural shock.

Light: A moving story about fatherhood and the special bond between a daughter and a father who raises his child alone. And a ‘’mother’’ who is anything but.

Second Chances: The loss of a mother has been haunting her eldest daughter for eight years. But what happens when she returns all of a sudden? Can the girl forgive and forget? Is such a thing even possible?

‘’There is a science to it, falling.’’

Windfalls: A despicable woman has found an abominable way to make money, abusing and exploiting her daughter. The wounds she has caused are unhealable. A shocking, poignant story of disastrous ‘’motherhood’’.

‘’Where are you going?
I am going home.

Who will greet you at home?
My mother will greet me.
What will your mother do?
My mother will bless me and my child.’’

Who Will Greet You At Home: Ιs there an equation to heal pain, war wounds and despair? A mathematician tries to help as many victims as she can. But in a world ravaged by floods that led to its destruction, falling is a reality…

Glory: A young woman has managed to escape her overbearing mother until the day her potential mother-in-law makes an appearance. Glory has to make a choice that involves her independence and the right to remain true to herself and not to the expectations of others.

‘’If you can’t please the gods, trick them.’’

What Is A Volcano?: A beautiful, haunting myth about the tragic feud between the goddess of rivers and the god of ants and the creation of volcanoes.

Redemption: A girl learns about the secrets and cruelty of the adult world and the way it corrupts even the children who try to escape misery and cruel ‘’families’’.

‘’How many people had Kioni worked with over the last decade? Five thousand? Ten? Ten thousand traumas in her psyche, squeezing past each other, vying for the attention of their host. What would happen if you couldn’t forget, if every emotion from every person whose grief you’d eaten came back up? It could happen, if something went wrong with the formula millions and millions of permutations down the line. A thousand falling men landing on you.’’

My reviews can also be found on https://theopinionatedreaderblog.wordpress.com/ show less

This is a terrific debut—inventive and varied in form but still cohesive, no doubt because Arimah's voice is really strong, but without the stories sounding at all alike. These are all dark but they're not ponderous, and she brings out elements of magic, myth, and sf in really inventive ways that won't make non-fans of those genres wince. I didn't, anyway, though I'm not quite a non-fan—but I am an easy wincer, and I thought Arimah pulled off the variety in this collection admirably. I'll definitely pick up whatever she comes out with next.

A collection of 12 short stories with a pretty wide breadth of premises, and a common thread of having an edge to them. My favorite was the title story, ‘What It Means When a Man Falls From the Sky’, a futuristic tale in which amidst global catastrophe, a mathematical discovery has led to overcoming gravity and the ability of people with a certain skill to absorb other people’s grief, to ‘fix their equations’. Another fine one is ‘Buchi’s Girls,’ about a woman and her two girls forced to live with her affluent sister and brother-in-law because of their economic condition after her husband dies. I’d put ‘Glory’ near the top too; it’s about a woman who always seems to do and say the wrong things and instead of show more living up to her potential. She’s working in a customer service call center when she meets a young man interning who seems to be the opposite, leading a charmed life. There are no clunkers, and of the rest, ‘The Future Looks Good’, ‘War Stories’, ‘Who Will Greet You at Home’, and ‘Redemption’ stood out.

Arimah gives a different perspective because many of the stories are either set in Nigeria or involve Nigerian immigrants or folklore, but more importantly, she writes with insight into people struggling with pain. She has an interesting way of blending direct realism that doesn’t pull any punches in describing violence and pathos, with occasional fantasy elements. Would love to see a full novel from her. show less

Wonderful stories, each and every one of them. The twists in the stories, marvellous. The female protagonists in this collection are hurting, uncertain, they don't meet their expectations or those of the ones that are dear to them but carry with them strength and resilience. What a collection of gems this is!

I have been reading a good number of books dealing with grief this year and this one had a relatively fresh approach to it. Grief here is palpable, present with the characters not in temporary spans of time that they willingly snap out of and not as a reminder but as a driving force in the characters' lives influencing their actions and decisions and indecisions.

I think I have found a new favourite writer with Arimah, which doesn't show more normally happen for me after reading just one book from a writer :-) show less

These fierce, vivid stories are well-crafted without ever feeling constructed. Arimah gives readers access to the core emotional struggle of her characters, making us complicit in the impossible decisions they face.