Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

I received what I was expecting: A SNOW DAY!

I checked the TV quite a few times during the night, and I finally got the message; school would be closed today.

So, this morning, I finished reading Half of a Yellow Sun. What a treat!!!

This book tells the story of the Nigeria-Biafra War that took place from 1967-70. The Nigeria-Biafra War was the Nigerian Civil War. Chimamanda tells this story though the characters Ugwu, Odenigbo, Olanna, Richard, and Kainene.

Olanna and Kainene are twin sisters who come from a wealthy family, and both Olanna and Kainene are women who are educated, free-thinking, and are in love with men who love them back. Not sure about you, but this is the first book that I have read that talks about Black Africans who were rich and the women are free thinking and have great love stories.....

Ogenigbo is a well-educated Black African man who works at the University, and he loves Olanna, and Richard is an Englishman who has moved to Nigeria and respects the Nigerian culture and loves Kainene. Chimamanda writes about these men, their careers, and their love for their women with great respect and care. (I really appreciate any book that talks about men, and especially men of color, with respect.)

We see what happens to the characters once the war starts, and we also see how complicated life can be at times. Chimimanda does a great showing that Black Africans are people just like all other people.

This is a must-read!

By the way, at the beginning of this school year, my school showed the faculty a video of a young woman of African descent, and she was talking about the dangers of telling a single story. You know that I believe that when it comes to African American women, there is this single story of us being super strong, and we can and will take a whole lot and still remain standing. I reject this single story for myself, because I find it quite damaging. However, when I saw this video on "The Danger of the Single Story," I decided, right then, that I would teach novels about people of color as not a single story but just a story, because there is no one single story for any race, gender etc.

Well, the person who was in that video was non-other than Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, author of Half of a Yellow Sun.

Here is the video:

My people, make it your business to get to know Chimamanda and another story about people of African descent....

Happy Snow Day!

Time to read Chinese Cinderalla by Adeline Yen Mah..... Join me......