THE EMOTIONAL STORMS WEATHERED BY A MOTHER AND DAUGHTER YIELD A PROFOUND NEW UNDERSTANDING IN A MOVING SHORT STORY BY THE BESTSELLING, AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF 'AMERICANAH' AND 'WE SHOULD ALL BE FEMINISTS'.
When Zikora, a DC lawyer from Nigeria, tells her equally high-powered lover that she's pregnant, he abandons her. But it's Zikora's demanding, self-possessed mother, in town for the birth, who makes Zikora feel like a lonely little girl all over again. Shunned by the speed with which her ideal life fell apart, Zikora turns to reflecting on her mother's painful past and struggle for dignity. Preparing for motherhood, Zikora begins to see more clearly what her own mother wants for her, for her new baby, and for herself.
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All through the night my mother sat near me but never touched me.
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(Amazon Original Stories, 27 October 2020, 35 pages, ebook, borrowed from @AmazonKindle, #PrimeReading)
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I've read the author's previous work but not for some years. Half of a Yellow Sun still stands out as one of my all-time favourites and is the first book I read set in Nigeria. I couldn't resist this story when I saw it promoted on the Kindle store. The story uses a first person narrator, one of my favourite POV's and it works really well in this format. Zikora has a powerful voice and I was immediately pulled into her story. I'm not a mother but I really liked the way the relationship between Zikora and her mother is explored, fraught at times as they have such very different goals in mind. This felt like a very real relationship. I also liked the flashbacks into Zikora's relationship and show everything fell apart when she became pregnant like a domino effect. This is a profound story. I thought it was great.