wolkenbruch

"Hot Milk", published in 2016, is mainly set in Almeria, Spain, where Rose, a British, and her daughter Sofia, half-British and half-Greek, seek treatment for Rose's inability to walk.

The daughter Sofia, a twenty-something Anthropology graduate who works in a London coffeeshop, mourns her unfinished disseratation, suffers under her mother's hostility while replacing her not properly working legs, and tries to negotiate the gap her missing father created. While the reader learns about Rose's leg problem and is left to decide whether Rose is really unable to walk or not, the time in Spain provides Sofia with the chance to take her fate into her own hands.

I liked the Anthropology motive which is drawn through the novel. As Sofia is the main protagonist, she observes her environment and the people surrounding her in an anthropological way. But nevertheless the novel, for me, did not provide as many answers as it raised questions, and therefore, left me rather dissatisfied. The reason or background of Rose's leg problem, for example, would have provided another narrative line which was not concluded in the book. The same is true for all the enigmatic minor characters - Ingrid, Gomez and Julieta, Juan -  they all seem to have numerous secrets which stay opaque to the reader. Also, who is the author of the parenthetic paragraphs?
Therefore, I felt that the novel did not tap its full potential. A pity!

"Half of a Yellow Sun", published in 2013, is Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's second novel. Told through the angle of three different protagonists, the novel is set around the Biafran war which took place in Nigeria during the 1960s.

There is Olanna, a young woman from a wealthy Nigerian family who studied in London and works as a lecturer of sociology. The second focalizer, Ugwu, is the houseboy of Olanna and her partner Odenigbo, who grew up as poor village boy. And there is also Richard, a British journalist and the boyfriend of Olanna's sister Kainene. Through the eyes of these three characters who stem from very different backgrounds, the reader learns about their lives before the civil war - when days were centred around university careers and cocktail parties - as well as what each of them encounters during the years of the war which took the lives of at least 1 million Igbo people, mostly civilians who starved to death.

As Adichie reveals in her dedication of the book, the narrative tells the story of her grandparent's generation. Combining ficticious characters with true historical events, she creates an authentic and moving narrative written in a poetic style. Besides the overall narrative of the civil war, the novel subtly provides numerous other layers of meaning. Represented through the figure of Richard, the novel deals with the tensions between Nigeria and its former colonist Britain. Furthermore there are the dichotomies within Nigeria: between ethnicity, class, generations, and gender.

I admired Adichie's language, her ability to interweave history with such unique characters, her courage to tell the atrocities of the war her ancestors fought and suffered from. For me, "Half of a Yellow Sun" war an enriching and special read.

Wunderbar annotierte Ausgabe des 1847 unter dem Autorennamen Currer Bell, eigentlich Charlotte Bronte, erschienen Romans "Jane Eyre".

Erzählt wird die Lebensgeschichte der elternlos, zunächst bei ihrer Tante, später im Internat für Armenkinder, aufwachsenden Jane Eyre. Trotz widrigster Bedingungen kann sie sich mit Wissensdurst und Lerneifer zur Gouvernante hocharbeiten und landet so auf dem Anwesen Thornfield Hall, wo sie die Ziehtocher des gut situierten Rochesters unterrichten soll.

Die Zeitgenossen des Werkes waren sich über den Wert von "Jane Eyre" zwar noch nicht einig - , heute schätzen wir den für die Entstehungszeit innovativen Roman mit all seinen überraschenden Wendungen, den komplex konstruierten Figurenbeziehungen, der detailreichen Sprache und dem beeindruckenden Ensemble aus eingearbeiteten Genrekonventionen; so bedient "Jane Eyre" zugleich Kategorien wie Bildungsroman, Autobiografie, Roman des Realismus, Schauerroman oder den für die viktorianische Zeit typischen Gouvernantenroman.

Für mich ist "Jane Eyre" - obgleich seiner Omnipräsenz in Seminaren und Handbüchern - nicht nur ein unabdingbarer Klassiker der englischen Literatur, sondern auch eine besondere und genussreiche Lektüre, die man ruhig alle paar Jahre einmal wieder in die Hand nehmen, und bekannte Textstellen wiederentdecken sollte.

Published in 1960 by Nigeria's best known author, Chinua Achebe, the "No Longer at Ease" is set in pre-Independence Nigeria and is regarded as a work of the so-called 'First Generation Nigerian Literature'.

The novel starts with what is actually the outcome of the story: Obi, a young and promising Igbo who just returned from his studies in London and was instantly given a job as civil servant, is convicted for having taken a bribe. Thus, the central question of the novel is: What happened that made the protagonist, who was educated in Western Europe, take a bribe?

Making use of a number of leaps in time, the reader then learns about the protagonist's return from London, which pressures and expectations awaited him upon his return, how he falls in love with Clara, that he neither fits into Great Britain nor, after his time there, back into his home country which seems to have changed during his absence. Or rather, is he the one who has changed too much?

In this way, the novel - on the one hand - was an interesting and quick read which, in its description of what might be called cultural hybridity, seemed an authentic account on what it means to live between two cultures. But on the other hand, I also sensed a confirmation in regard to what post-colonial criticism teaches: the African author writing for a European audience, serving the stereotypical expectations and, thus, removing possible obstacles for his foreign readership. The language in "No Longer at Ease" is kept extremely simple (which is probably the reason why there is a shortened and furtherly simplified children's version of the book). Therefore, the novel - to me - appeared a bit too predictable and, eventually, didn't give as many answers as I had hoped for.

I started "Nutshell" without any expectations, and without having read anything about McEwan's latest publication in advance. The more surprised I was during the first couple of pages!

"Nutshell" is narrated by a foetus. And if this wasn't unusual enough, the novel is not only about a marriage going downhill, about adultery and betrayal of trust, it is even a classic tale of murder and deceit.
Through the perception of Trudy's unborn child, the reader learns about the affair between Trudy and her husband's brother Claude, about how John - the foetus' father and a poet - tries to win his wife back while Trudy and Claude plot how to kill John in order to inherit John's parental home situated in Little John's Wood, London.

In the begging I felt some inner resistance to the novel and its unusual narrative strategy. Why would anyone want to put oneself in the position of a foetus on the verge of birth? Is it authentic to let a foetus adopt the language of an intellectual, upper middle class character? How could anyone be so corrupt as to kill the inculpable father of one's unborn child?
But, in the course of the narrative, I felt my preconceptions dissolve. It IS an important issue that fetuses experience what their mothers feel and do and it is a challenging but highly interesting narrative perspective. Futhermore, I got captivated by the suspense established around the murder plot and McEwan's artful, partly ironic style of writing.
Therefore, from my point of view, a definite recommendation!