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Available
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Description
Fiction. African American Fiction. Literature. Darling is only ten years old, and yet she must navigate a fragile and violent world. In Zimbabwe, Darling and her friends steal guavas, try to get the baby out of young Chipo's belly, and grasp at memories of Before. Before their homes were destroyed by paramilitary policemen, before the school closed, before the fathers left for dangerous jobs abroad. But Darling has a chance to escape: she has an aunt in America. She travels to this new land in search of America's famous abundance only to find that her options as an immigrant are perilously few.
User reviews
LibraryThing member Meredy
Six-word review: Zimbabwe girl adapts to American life.
Extended review:
There's no way I can describe this book that isn't going to result in distortion. I hope I don't do it an injustice by trying.
It's not that my comments simplify too much. It's that I can't simplify enough.
Here we have a novel
In Emily St. John Mandel's novel The Singer's Gun, the focal character ponders "the most obvious, possibly even the most important question you could ever ask anyone--How were you formed? What forged you?" (page 47). The answer to that same question is the core of Bulawayo's novel.
The first half of the book takes place in Zimbabwe, a suffering nation burdened by poverty, disease, despair, and political chaos. As a child and a young girl, Darling understands her environment and knows how to live in it. She has her tight circle of friends, children as savvy as she, whose daring expeditions, appearing lawless, reckless, and wild, are necessary for survival.
At the age of 13 she moves to Michigan to live with her aunt, and she must learn all over again how to live.
The expectation of a better life in America is quickly smothered by the reality of being a stranger in a strange land, ignorant of the language and the culture and lacking the means to rise above the most menial sort of work. Is the gain of a chance to make it in the U.S. worth the loss of friends and family and the sense of knowing who she is, of being where she belongs?
Bulawayo's narrative is enriched by startling, evocative figures of speech, perhaps only possible for someone writing in a second language that is profoundly different from her mothertongue. Here is an example chosen almost at random, by flipping the pages:
Because we were not in our country, we could not use our own languages, and so when we spoke our voices came out bruised. When we talked, our tongues thrashed madly in our mouths, staggered like drunken men. Because we were not using our languages we said things we did not mean; what we really wanted to say remained folded inside, trapped. In America we did not always have the words. It was only when we were by ourselves that we spoke in our real voices. When we were alone we summoned the horses of our language and mounted their backs and galloped past skyscrapers. Always, we were reluctant to come back down. (page 242)
The themes of friendship, family bonds, disappointed expectations, loss, adaptation, and survival are all expressed within a cultural context that is very far from what most of us know and understand. I won't insult the author by imagining that I understand it. But perhaps I have gained something in sensitivity to what it means to cross that divide.
Extended review:
There's no way I can describe this book that isn't going to result in distortion. I hope I don't do it an injustice by trying.
It's not that my comments simplify too much. It's that I can't simplify enough.
Here we have a novel
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characterized by such a feeling of raw authenticity that it's hard to believe any of it is made up; but it would grossly devalue the author's command of her subject matter and her medium to suggest that--even if it were all literally, objectively factual--it was rendered with anything less than artistry. That would be like saying, "What's so special about a Rembrandt or a Vermeer? He just painted what was in front of him."In Emily St. John Mandel's novel The Singer's Gun, the focal character ponders "the most obvious, possibly even the most important question you could ever ask anyone--How were you formed? What forged you?" (page 47). The answer to that same question is the core of Bulawayo's novel.
The first half of the book takes place in Zimbabwe, a suffering nation burdened by poverty, disease, despair, and political chaos. As a child and a young girl, Darling understands her environment and knows how to live in it. She has her tight circle of friends, children as savvy as she, whose daring expeditions, appearing lawless, reckless, and wild, are necessary for survival.
At the age of 13 she moves to Michigan to live with her aunt, and she must learn all over again how to live.
The expectation of a better life in America is quickly smothered by the reality of being a stranger in a strange land, ignorant of the language and the culture and lacking the means to rise above the most menial sort of work. Is the gain of a chance to make it in the U.S. worth the loss of friends and family and the sense of knowing who she is, of being where she belongs?
Bulawayo's narrative is enriched by startling, evocative figures of speech, perhaps only possible for someone writing in a second language that is profoundly different from her mothertongue. Here is an example chosen almost at random, by flipping the pages:
Because we were not in our country, we could not use our own languages, and so when we spoke our voices came out bruised. When we talked, our tongues thrashed madly in our mouths, staggered like drunken men. Because we were not using our languages we said things we did not mean; what we really wanted to say remained folded inside, trapped. In America we did not always have the words. It was only when we were by ourselves that we spoke in our real voices. When we were alone we summoned the horses of our language and mounted their backs and galloped past skyscrapers. Always, we were reluctant to come back down. (page 242)
The themes of friendship, family bonds, disappointed expectations, loss, adaptation, and survival are all expressed within a cultural context that is very far from what most of us know and understand. I won't insult the author by imagining that I understand it. But perhaps I have gained something in sensitivity to what it means to cross that divide.
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LibraryThing member tututhefirst
NoViolet Bulawyo's debut novel landed her on the short list of finalists for the 2013 Man Booker prize. Told in the first person of a young girl named Darling whose wonderful assortment of family and friends in her native Zimbabwe include Bastard, Chipo, Godknows, and her grandma Mother of Bones.
In the second part of the story, Darling manages to go to America where an aunt has agreed to sponsor her for a student visa in Detroit. Her description of her first experience of snow is just one example of her exquisite descriptive abilities. A sample from the chapter DestroyedMichygen:
What you will see if you come here (America) ...is the snow. Snow on the leafless trees, snow on the cars, snow on the roads, snow on the yards, snow on the roofs---snow, just snow covering everything like sand. It is as white as clean teeth, and is also, very, very cold. It is a greedy monster too, the snow, because just look how it has swallowed everything; where is the ground now? Where are the flowers? The grass? The stones? The leaves? The ants?...As for the coldness, I have never seen it like this. I mean coldness that makes like it wants to kill you, like it's telling you, with its snow, that you should go back to where you came from. p.150
Did this deserve to be a Booker finalist. It is certainly IMHO a compelling read, one that grabbed me and held me. Ms. Bulawayo certainly deserved a good hard look. I was grabbed, repulsed, horrified, entranced, amused and immersed from the beginning to the end. Did I like the subject matter? NO. Did I like the characters - not particularly, but neither did I dislike them. Some are actually eccentric enough to be loveable. This is a coming of age story that tells us not just the discouragements of her birthplace, but her disappointments when expectations of America don't quite fit her mind's picture. As such, the brutality fits the realism of Darling's life.
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The preacher, Prophet Revelations Bitchington Mborro, proclaims from the top of a steep climb his flock must endure every sabbath before they can enjoy (or endure?) his proselytizing posturing. She paints a very realistic picture of life in Rhodesia (later Zimbabwe) and the pain the birth pangs of revolution imparted to everyday citizens: the hunger, the lack of privacy, lack of sanitation and education opportunities, and the disappearance of male family members who leave to go to work in the gold mines, often to return bringing no money but "the sickness" instead.In the second part of the story, Darling manages to go to America where an aunt has agreed to sponsor her for a student visa in Detroit. Her description of her first experience of snow is just one example of her exquisite descriptive abilities. A sample from the chapter DestroyedMichygen:
What you will see if you come here (America) ...is the snow. Snow on the leafless trees, snow on the cars, snow on the roads, snow on the yards, snow on the roofs---snow, just snow covering everything like sand. It is as white as clean teeth, and is also, very, very cold. It is a greedy monster too, the snow, because just look how it has swallowed everything; where is the ground now? Where are the flowers? The grass? The stones? The leaves? The ants?...As for the coldness, I have never seen it like this. I mean coldness that makes like it wants to kill you, like it's telling you, with its snow, that you should go back to where you came from. p.150
Did this deserve to be a Booker finalist. It is certainly IMHO a compelling read, one that grabbed me and held me. Ms. Bulawayo certainly deserved a good hard look. I was grabbed, repulsed, horrified, entranced, amused and immersed from the beginning to the end. Did I like the subject matter? NO. Did I like the characters - not particularly, but neither did I dislike them. Some are actually eccentric enough to be loveable. This is a coming of age story that tells us not just the discouragements of her birthplace, but her disappointments when expectations of America don't quite fit her mind's picture. As such, the brutality fits the realism of Darling's life.
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LibraryThing member chrisblocker
Occasionally I come across a book that is difficult for me to say much about. I finish the book, put it aside, scratch my head as I try to piece together what it is exactly I feel about what I just read. Obviously, I didn't love it, but I also didn't hate it. It just didn't resonate with me and I
Bulawayo writes some fantastic prose. She is certainly a talented writer and I expect her to continue garnering attention for her work in the future. I think she has some wonderful stories to tell as well. I think the problem for me with We Need New Names was that I never completely connected with the story or the characters. This may in part be the structure—the “novel” is akin to a collection of connected short stories. It may also be that the novel is essentially two parts—Darling in Africa, Darling in America—and though the two do connect logically, stylistically they are world's apart. Add to this that I never really connected with Darling, though I most felt close to her during her moment's of alienation in America.
So maybe I do know how I felt about the novel, at least in part. Maybe I needed to sit down, contemplate the novel, and write down my thoughts. To make clear my feelings—for my reader as much as myself—We Need New Names shows considerable talent, but the urgency of the work felt buried underneath too many threads. That's why it didn't work for me. Other readers may be able to sort through those threads, make something beautiful out of them. Me, the non-crafty one, I ended up with a beautiful mess of string. My bad.
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can't say why. We Need New Names was one of those novels for me. The pieces fit for what could've potentially been a great book, but it didn't gel with me.Bulawayo writes some fantastic prose. She is certainly a talented writer and I expect her to continue garnering attention for her work in the future. I think she has some wonderful stories to tell as well. I think the problem for me with We Need New Names was that I never completely connected with the story or the characters. This may in part be the structure—the “novel” is akin to a collection of connected short stories. It may also be that the novel is essentially two parts—Darling in Africa, Darling in America—and though the two do connect logically, stylistically they are world's apart. Add to this that I never really connected with Darling, though I most felt close to her during her moment's of alienation in America.
So maybe I do know how I felt about the novel, at least in part. Maybe I needed to sit down, contemplate the novel, and write down my thoughts. To make clear my feelings—for my reader as much as myself—We Need New Names shows considerable talent, but the urgency of the work felt buried underneath too many threads. That's why it didn't work for me. Other readers may be able to sort through those threads, make something beautiful out of them. Me, the non-crafty one, I ended up with a beautiful mess of string. My bad.
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LibraryThing member lamotamant
Most of the criticism I've seen for this book is that the author crammed too much into it. I get that; a lot is covered in this book that could certainly have been covered in more depth than it offers. However, as I got into the book I was kind of glad that there was so much crammed in because it
I didn't sit back and go, wow, I'm very well informed about everything in Africa and it's countries. I sat back from the book and thought about a life I haven't lived, what I've experienced that identified with the character or what I couldn't identify with, and, because I'm very much in love with books that inspire further reading and learning, I added things to my list to further explore that I might not have without the help of Bulawayo's work. So, for me, this was a really good and interesting read.
A kid doesn't pop out of Zimbabwe knowing everything about the political climate and current state of affairs. She knows about stealing guavas with her friends because they are hungry, she knows about red dust coating her feet, and how to smile for a camera as if that's her payment for the gifts the NPO bring even if it's the last thing she wants to do. She knows how she's been taught, she knows the stories she's grown up on, knows that "America" is supposed to be better. She knows people are getting killed, getting arrested, not because she reads the paper every day or tunes into the BBC but because she witnesses events up close and hangs around in a tree during a funeral where a mother falls apart. Her world is crammed with every sense and every crisis she is surrounded by. So, to tell her story, we read a book that is crammed in the same way. For me, that made sense and made it seem genuine. I feel like Bulawayo captured the essence of being young and experiencing life, not for an anonymous girl from Zimbabwe but for Darling in particular.
With all that being said, I really can't wait to read more from Bulawayo. I think she's a young writer with enormous potential because she seems to have a rather good grip on the psychology of her characters.
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made me feel like I was reading a book that was written from a child's/preteen's/teen's perspective. Just like the language used, the imagery, the almost visceral reaction to snow, etc. drew me into the book, into the character in different ways. I didn't sit back and go, wow, I'm very well informed about everything in Africa and it's countries. I sat back from the book and thought about a life I haven't lived, what I've experienced that identified with the character or what I couldn't identify with, and, because I'm very much in love with books that inspire further reading and learning, I added things to my list to further explore that I might not have without the help of Bulawayo's work. So, for me, this was a really good and interesting read.
A kid doesn't pop out of Zimbabwe knowing everything about the political climate and current state of affairs. She knows about stealing guavas with her friends because they are hungry, she knows about red dust coating her feet, and how to smile for a camera as if that's her payment for the gifts the NPO bring even if it's the last thing she wants to do. She knows how she's been taught, she knows the stories she's grown up on, knows that "America" is supposed to be better. She knows people are getting killed, getting arrested, not because she reads the paper every day or tunes into the BBC but because she witnesses events up close and hangs around in a tree during a funeral where a mother falls apart. Her world is crammed with every sense and every crisis she is surrounded by. So, to tell her story, we read a book that is crammed in the same way. For me, that made sense and made it seem genuine. I feel like Bulawayo captured the essence of being young and experiencing life, not for an anonymous girl from Zimbabwe but for Darling in particular.
With all that being said, I really can't wait to read more from Bulawayo. I think she's a young writer with enormous potential because she seems to have a rather good grip on the psychology of her characters.
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LibraryThing member kaitanya64
When the story opens, 10 year old Darling lives with her mother and grandmother in Zimbabwe. Darling, like all children, has a vivid imagination and loves to play with her friends. But the violence and poverty that surrounds them exposes them to fears and pressures that most children never
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experience. When Darling goes to America to live with her aunt in Michigan, she leaves behind physical hunger and many dangers. But, as her experiences illustrate, there are many other kinds of poverty. Readable and compelling, Darling's story is beautifully individual but also represents the life of many in Zimbabwe and in the African immigrant community in the United States. Show Less
LibraryThing member TheBookJunky
The author of We Need New Names chose her own new name for her writing. ‘NoViolet’ is a tribute to Elizabeth Tshele’s mother Violet, who died when Elizabeth was only 18 months old.
She also chose interesting names for some of the characters in this book set in Zimbabwe. The story is a first
Darling is written as a strong dynamic voice. She’s not a creation; she is there, existing, right there on the page, talking to you. She’s tough, she’s funny, she’s opinionated. Especially powerful are scenes where Darling and her friends meet up with Westerners, usually expats or from NGOs, and later in America. The familiar tv scene of the NGO truck arriving in some African village to dispense aid and goodies to throngs of shouting black kids is turned inside out, or flipped around, and it is funny as well as unsettling and thought provoking.
The novel is a collection of discrete events, almost linked short stories. Many of the chapters stand on their own. As the character gets a bit older, several short chapters become more introspective, and serve more as the role of chorus.
There’s a lot here — coming of age, colonialism, AIDS, immigration, assimilation — but somehow it knits wells together, and Darling’s voice always stays strong.
I hope to see this one on the Booker shortlist.
She also chose interesting names for some of the characters in this book set in Zimbabwe. The story is a first
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person narrative by Darling, beginning at about age 10. Her close friends include Bastard, Chipo, Godknows. Her grandma is Mother of Bones. They live in Paradise; in the first chapter Hitting Budapest (which won the Caine African Short Story contest a couple of years ago), Darling and her friends are going to the rich area (village? neighbourhood?) of Budapest. They are looking for guavas to steal and eat (it reminded me as a kid sneaking into the nearby church yard with a couple of friends to steal crabapples from the trees. Somehow the tart fruits tasted better when the adrenaline was surging and the heart was palpitating with fear.) Their antics are brought up short by a white woman who calls to them from her house, and then comes outside to talk with them and take photos. The kids are uncomfortable — who is this person? The peculiar encounter is described with just the right level of unease, of a bit of a culture tangle. The shocking ending to that chapter sends a warning about what may come later.Darling is written as a strong dynamic voice. She’s not a creation; she is there, existing, right there on the page, talking to you. She’s tough, she’s funny, she’s opinionated. Especially powerful are scenes where Darling and her friends meet up with Westerners, usually expats or from NGOs, and later in America. The familiar tv scene of the NGO truck arriving in some African village to dispense aid and goodies to throngs of shouting black kids is turned inside out, or flipped around, and it is funny as well as unsettling and thought provoking.
The novel is a collection of discrete events, almost linked short stories. Many of the chapters stand on their own. As the character gets a bit older, several short chapters become more introspective, and serve more as the role of chorus.
There’s a lot here — coming of age, colonialism, AIDS, immigration, assimilation — but somehow it knits wells together, and Darling’s voice always stays strong.
I hope to see this one on the Booker shortlist.
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LibraryThing member shemsu
NoViolet Bulawayo’s We Need New Names is heart wrenching yet beautiful. Bulawayo describes hunger, poverty, cultural shock, and assimilation with extreme clarity that makes it both captivating and hard to read.
We Need New Names is the story of a young girl, Darling, that lives in an impoverished
With incredible innocence, Darling attempts to understand the insanity surrounding her and her people. She tries to reconcile the raggedy life they have now to the normal life they had before.
Darling eventually emigrates to “Destroyedmichiygen” and is greeted with the reality of America, instead of the fantasy. The very first thing she encounters is the cold and it makes her rethink the decision to leave her war torn country and move to Detroit. This portion of her life offers a little more comic relief than the first portion, but it is just as amazing.new-names-quote1As an outsider looking it, it is hard to understand all of the different levels of a situation, while Darling does not always understand them. It is depressing to listen to Darling talk about her 10 year-old, pregnant best friend, Chipo, with the same naive tone used to talk about playing a game. However, as she matures, it is also interesting the way this young woman learns about the world around her. She manages to shed some of her naivety and mold herself into a new person.
We Need New Names is a great read. The subject matter is a little heavy, so it’s not exactly a relaxing read. However, it is an interesting story that is not usually heard. The stories that mainly come out of Africa are controlled by non-Africans. NoViolet Bulawayo is continuing the legacy of authors like Chinua Achebe, and telling the African story from the African perspective. It is both an important and entertaining read.
We Need New Names is the story of a young girl, Darling, that lives in an impoverished
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African community. Darling and her crew are bored and hungry in a country struggling to find its footing. Most days the children go to the neighboring white community, Paradise, for adventure and guavas. The children walk pass the lavish homes of the white people, now mainly isolated and locked down, and struggle to imagine the world they live in.With incredible innocence, Darling attempts to understand the insanity surrounding her and her people. She tries to reconcile the raggedy life they have now to the normal life they had before.
Darling eventually emigrates to “Destroyedmichiygen” and is greeted with the reality of America, instead of the fantasy. The very first thing she encounters is the cold and it makes her rethink the decision to leave her war torn country and move to Detroit. This portion of her life offers a little more comic relief than the first portion, but it is just as amazing.new-names-quote1As an outsider looking it, it is hard to understand all of the different levels of a situation, while Darling does not always understand them. It is depressing to listen to Darling talk about her 10 year-old, pregnant best friend, Chipo, with the same naive tone used to talk about playing a game. However, as she matures, it is also interesting the way this young woman learns about the world around her. She manages to shed some of her naivety and mold herself into a new person.
We Need New Names is a great read. The subject matter is a little heavy, so it’s not exactly a relaxing read. However, it is an interesting story that is not usually heard. The stories that mainly come out of Africa are controlled by non-Africans. NoViolet Bulawayo is continuing the legacy of authors like Chinua Achebe, and telling the African story from the African perspective. It is both an important and entertaining read.
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LibraryThing member Jayeless
This is an incredibly frustrating book; it has so much it wants to say, and even some moving sections, and yet so much of it is so boring and so laborious and it never devotes enough time to the myriad topics it brings up so you end up thinking to yourself, "What the fuck, all of this at the same
And it's so infuriating because as I said this novel has some really good parts, parts that make you know it could have been so much better. The good news is that the best parts have nothing to do with the plot of the novel, not referencing the characters at all, so they can be (and should be) read in isolation: chapters 10 and 16 are beautiful and poetic, on the theme of the exodus from Zimbabwe and the hardships of life abroad. There's also some good stuff in the other chapters, but they're all mixed up with less good stuff, so you can't look at them in isolation the same way.
The other aspect to this book I liked was the way Darling's voice changed over time. At the beginning of the novel she's a ten-year-old kid living in a Zimbabwean slum after the demolition of her "real home"; by the end she's a teenage indocumentada in Michigan, and has lost all the vibrancy and enthusiasm with which she began her story. It's a subtle progression, and very well done.
It's too bad these things were let down by other aspects of the book. Each chapter is more or less a self-contained story, so you have bizarre things like Darling's father returning from South Africa, dying of AIDS, then never getting mentioned again once his chapter is over. The first half of the book (before chapter 10, the brilliant bridge) follows her life in Zimbabwe, the second half her life in America. Each is characterised by spending long periods of time describing very mundane, boring things in agonising detail, bringing up a very weighty issue and not giving anywhere near enough time to developing it, then returning to mundanity, over and over again. In the "America" half, there is also a kind of revolting chapter where Darling and her friends watch porn including a snuff film and that has to be described, but then in the middle of this revolting chapter is an important and powerful section where Darling ruminates on how hard she finds it to keep in touch with her friends back home… I really liked that section, but why did it have to be bookended with the gross porn descriptions?
Hopefully I've conveyed my frustration enough. This has potential, but it's squandered and I came away disappointed. Some of the reviews of this book, where people have taken the ideas presented here and run with them, I liked much better than the book itself. It has at least increased the urgency in my mind of reading Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, as it's yet another book that makes extensive reference to that. (Jan 2014)
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school?! What is this, Degrassi High???" which is not really a good comparison because that's a Canadian show and this is all about ~*~America~*~. Still, it's like Bulawayo made a list of every single social issue in Zimbabwe and the United States and decided to cram them all into one book, narrated by one young character, Darling. It comes across as implausible, so much so that it really ends up just as eye-rolling as Degrassi.And it's so infuriating because as I said this novel has some really good parts, parts that make you know it could have been so much better. The good news is that the best parts have nothing to do with the plot of the novel, not referencing the characters at all, so they can be (and should be) read in isolation: chapters 10 and 16 are beautiful and poetic, on the theme of the exodus from Zimbabwe and the hardships of life abroad. There's also some good stuff in the other chapters, but they're all mixed up with less good stuff, so you can't look at them in isolation the same way.
The other aspect to this book I liked was the way Darling's voice changed over time. At the beginning of the novel she's a ten-year-old kid living in a Zimbabwean slum after the demolition of her "real home"; by the end she's a teenage indocumentada in Michigan, and has lost all the vibrancy and enthusiasm with which she began her story. It's a subtle progression, and very well done.
It's too bad these things were let down by other aspects of the book. Each chapter is more or less a self-contained story, so you have bizarre things like Darling's father returning from South Africa, dying of AIDS, then never getting mentioned again once his chapter is over. The first half of the book (before chapter 10, the brilliant bridge) follows her life in Zimbabwe, the second half her life in America. Each is characterised by spending long periods of time describing very mundane, boring things in agonising detail, bringing up a very weighty issue and not giving anywhere near enough time to developing it, then returning to mundanity, over and over again. In the "America" half, there is also a kind of revolting chapter where Darling and her friends watch porn including a snuff film and that has to be described, but then in the middle of this revolting chapter is an important and powerful section where Darling ruminates on how hard she finds it to keep in touch with her friends back home… I really liked that section, but why did it have to be bookended with the gross porn descriptions?
Hopefully I've conveyed my frustration enough. This has potential, but it's squandered and I came away disappointed. Some of the reviews of this book, where people have taken the ideas presented here and run with them, I liked much better than the book itself. It has at least increased the urgency in my mind of reading Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, as it's yet another book that makes extensive reference to that. (Jan 2014)
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LibraryThing member Lin-Z
I can’t quite recall where I first heard about this book, but I have been hearing about it a lot lately. I discovered that We Need New Names is definitely not being over-hyped; it is awesome. This is probably the first work of Africa-related, contemporary fiction I’ve read since Achebe’s
This book is beautifully written. It is just full of amazing imagery. I’m not inclined to gush about such things, but as I was reading this book, I just wanted to drink up all the language and become drunk from it because it was so heady. Even though the story is told from the point of view of a child, the language isn’t necessarily puerile. Darling, the narrator, doesn’t use lots of sophisticated language, but her thoughts are really succinct and what she says makes the reader picture everything. For example, when speaking about the heat she says, “The sun keeps ironing us and ironing us and ironing us,” which is something I can relate to with the heat wave happening at the moment. In another chapter, Darling is watching a funeral and comments of the cemetery:
“[It] is mounds and mounds of red earth everywhere, like people are being harvested, like death is maybe waiting behind a rock with a big bag of free food and people are rushing, tripping over each other to get to the front before the handouts run out. That is how it is, the way the dead keep coming and coming.”
Not all the imagery is morbid, of course, but this example stood out to me because it’s such a mature observation even though it is rooted in kid-logic.
As to the plot (which is, I suppose, what people want to hear about in a review), the book is told from the perspective of Darling, a girl who lives in Paradise—a shanty town in Zimbabwe. Her observations about life are folded in among vignettes of playing with her friends: Bastard, Godknows, Shbo, Stina, and the pregnant Chipo. Darling dreams of moving to America, a place where everyone has enough food and is rich, and she knows that one day she will because her Aunt Fostalina lives there. The second part of the book focuses on Darling’s life in America (specifically, in “Destroyedmichygen”) and how she copes with the reality of living in the US, works through her identity, and relates to others. The result is both a poignant view of life in modern Zimbabwe and of the immigrant experience in America.
The first half of We Need New Names made me realize how little I know about Zimbabwe specifically and Africa in general. From the way the story is told, the reader can gather that Zimbabwe used to be ruled by a king, but then it was taken over by white colonialists. The colonialists were eventually ousted by the native black people, who were then deposed by another group of black people. That is an extremely rudimentary understanding, but clearly this isn’t a book about politics or history; it’s about one person’s experience in Zimbabwe. I feel like I should be able to at least put names on some of these movements or governments, but I don’t have any in my head. I think that reading up on modern African history is definitely going to be on my to-do list.
The second half of the book was, in a way, more relatable, just because I am American and Darling’s experiences were easier for me to digest, even though they were through the eyes of someone new to the country. I briefly taught English as a second language when I was a teacher, so I was able to appreciate some of the observations about learning (or improving, more accurately) English. In one scene, Aunt Fostalina is on the phone trying to order something from Victoria’s Secret, but she is not being well-understood. Darling comments about how you can practice what you want to say beforehand, but the words still come out wrong, concluding “English is like a huge iron door and you are always losing the keys.” This is such an amazing way to conceptualize all language learning, but especially English learning.
Something incidental to the story, but that I really liked, is the concept of a “talking eye.” Essentially, this is when you look at someone in a way that says something, like when a little dog wearing a pink jacket tries to get attention from Darling and she gives it a talking eye that says “No, dog, you don’t even know me like that.” Or you could give a talking eye that says “Don’t even think about it,” or “Get over here.” Bulawayo has managed to name something I didn’t know I needed a word for.
We Need New Names is stuffed with observations about life both in Zimbabwe and in America. I really enjoyed Bulawayo’s take on the world and I feel like my worldview has definitely been expanded (which is the point of reading in the first place). There is a lot more in this book that I haven’t discussed because I know I can’t just talk about a whole book, but if anyone who has read it would like to discuss it with me, I would love to talk about it! I will definitely be keeping my eye out for future works by NoViolet Bulawayo.
What should you read after you’ve finished We Need New Names? Here are some things I am thinking of picking up that have similar themes:
Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie seems to be focused on immigration in a similar way to Bulawayo’s work, but centers on a teenage couple from Nigeria. The woman in the couple manages to immigrate to America, but the man is unable to do so. Adichie won the 2002 Caine Prize for African Writing for one of her previous novels.
A Contellation of Vital Phenomena is the debut novel of Anthony Marra. This story is set in Chechnya, another place I don’t know enough about.
The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe by Peter Godwin looks to be a pretty solid work on the modern political situation in Zimbabwe. If, like me, you know want to know more about Zimbabwe, this would be a good pick.
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Things Fall Apart in high school and it made me feel like I’ve been missing out on something profound and interesting.This book is beautifully written. It is just full of amazing imagery. I’m not inclined to gush about such things, but as I was reading this book, I just wanted to drink up all the language and become drunk from it because it was so heady. Even though the story is told from the point of view of a child, the language isn’t necessarily puerile. Darling, the narrator, doesn’t use lots of sophisticated language, but her thoughts are really succinct and what she says makes the reader picture everything. For example, when speaking about the heat she says, “The sun keeps ironing us and ironing us and ironing us,” which is something I can relate to with the heat wave happening at the moment. In another chapter, Darling is watching a funeral and comments of the cemetery:
“[It] is mounds and mounds of red earth everywhere, like people are being harvested, like death is maybe waiting behind a rock with a big bag of free food and people are rushing, tripping over each other to get to the front before the handouts run out. That is how it is, the way the dead keep coming and coming.”
Not all the imagery is morbid, of course, but this example stood out to me because it’s such a mature observation even though it is rooted in kid-logic.
As to the plot (which is, I suppose, what people want to hear about in a review), the book is told from the perspective of Darling, a girl who lives in Paradise—a shanty town in Zimbabwe. Her observations about life are folded in among vignettes of playing with her friends: Bastard, Godknows, Shbo, Stina, and the pregnant Chipo. Darling dreams of moving to America, a place where everyone has enough food and is rich, and she knows that one day she will because her Aunt Fostalina lives there. The second part of the book focuses on Darling’s life in America (specifically, in “Destroyedmichygen”) and how she copes with the reality of living in the US, works through her identity, and relates to others. The result is both a poignant view of life in modern Zimbabwe and of the immigrant experience in America.
The first half of We Need New Names made me realize how little I know about Zimbabwe specifically and Africa in general. From the way the story is told, the reader can gather that Zimbabwe used to be ruled by a king, but then it was taken over by white colonialists. The colonialists were eventually ousted by the native black people, who were then deposed by another group of black people. That is an extremely rudimentary understanding, but clearly this isn’t a book about politics or history; it’s about one person’s experience in Zimbabwe. I feel like I should be able to at least put names on some of these movements or governments, but I don’t have any in my head. I think that reading up on modern African history is definitely going to be on my to-do list.
The second half of the book was, in a way, more relatable, just because I am American and Darling’s experiences were easier for me to digest, even though they were through the eyes of someone new to the country. I briefly taught English as a second language when I was a teacher, so I was able to appreciate some of the observations about learning (or improving, more accurately) English. In one scene, Aunt Fostalina is on the phone trying to order something from Victoria’s Secret, but she is not being well-understood. Darling comments about how you can practice what you want to say beforehand, but the words still come out wrong, concluding “English is like a huge iron door and you are always losing the keys.” This is such an amazing way to conceptualize all language learning, but especially English learning.
Something incidental to the story, but that I really liked, is the concept of a “talking eye.” Essentially, this is when you look at someone in a way that says something, like when a little dog wearing a pink jacket tries to get attention from Darling and she gives it a talking eye that says “No, dog, you don’t even know me like that.” Or you could give a talking eye that says “Don’t even think about it,” or “Get over here.” Bulawayo has managed to name something I didn’t know I needed a word for.
We Need New Names is stuffed with observations about life both in Zimbabwe and in America. I really enjoyed Bulawayo’s take on the world and I feel like my worldview has definitely been expanded (which is the point of reading in the first place). There is a lot more in this book that I haven’t discussed because I know I can’t just talk about a whole book, but if anyone who has read it would like to discuss it with me, I would love to talk about it! I will definitely be keeping my eye out for future works by NoViolet Bulawayo.
What should you read after you’ve finished We Need New Names? Here are some things I am thinking of picking up that have similar themes:
Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie seems to be focused on immigration in a similar way to Bulawayo’s work, but centers on a teenage couple from Nigeria. The woman in the couple manages to immigrate to America, but the man is unable to do so. Adichie won the 2002 Caine Prize for African Writing for one of her previous novels.
A Contellation of Vital Phenomena is the debut novel of Anthony Marra. This story is set in Chechnya, another place I don’t know enough about.
The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe by Peter Godwin looks to be a pretty solid work on the modern political situation in Zimbabwe. If, like me, you know want to know more about Zimbabwe, this would be a good pick.
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LibraryThing member Beamis12
I loved the names of the children in this novel, Godknows, Bastard and Darling to name a few. Darling is our narrator, she is ten years old in a very changed Zimbabwe, once they went to school , now the schools are boarded up and the children roam and steal. They live in Paradise, which is a sort
This book is more a series of linked stories than a continuous narrative. I loved the sensitive portray, by the author, of Darling, can tell she realty liked this young girl. We also get a clear look at modern day Zimbabwe and what some of her people are dealing with. Also deals with the displacement and sense of not belonging when an immigrant enters a new country. There were a few plot lines that could have been developed but instead were dropped. I liked this book, I think the author is very talented. It is just sometimes I have problems with these linked story. I feel that I am not always getting a clear picture. I will , for sure look for this authors next novel, curious to see how she develops.
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of shanty town, but they go to Budapest, which is where the wealthy black and the white people live. Chipo, her 11 yr. old friend is pregnant and the children try to understand how she got that way. She is a sure of her place in this life, at least as sure as any ten yr. old can be. Soon she will be sent to Detroit to live with her aunt, and her life will be very different.This book is more a series of linked stories than a continuous narrative. I loved the sensitive portray, by the author, of Darling, can tell she realty liked this young girl. We also get a clear look at modern day Zimbabwe and what some of her people are dealing with. Also deals with the displacement and sense of not belonging when an immigrant enters a new country. There were a few plot lines that could have been developed but instead were dropped. I liked this book, I think the author is very talented. It is just sometimes I have problems with these linked story. I feel that I am not always getting a clear picture. I will , for sure look for this authors next novel, curious to see how she develops.
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LibraryThing member AndrewBlackman
This is a book of two halves. The first half is set in an unnamed African country that bears more than a passing resemblance to Zimbabwe, and the second half is set in the USA.
Narrating both halves is Darling, a ten-year-old child in the first half and a teenager in the second. Her voice is
Here is Darling, for example, describing her Aunt Fostalina’s struggles with the English language as she tries to order a push-up bra over the phone:
"The problem with English is this: You usually can’t open your mouth and it comes out just like that – first you have to think what you want to say. Then you have to find the words. Then you have to carefully arrange those words in your head. Then you have to say the words quietly to yourself, to make sure you got them okay. And finally, the last step, which is to say the words out loud and have them sound just right. But then because you have to do all this, when you get to the final step, something strange has happened to you and you speak the way a drunk walks. And because you are speaking like falling, it’s as if you are an idiot, when the truth is that it’s the language and the whole process that’s messed up. And then the problem with those who speak only English is this: they don’t know how to listen; they are busy looking at your falling instead of paying attention to what you are saying."
There are other wonderful pieces of prose, like describing parked cars “surrounding the little ballpark like teeth”, and “If these walls could talk, the buildings would stutter, wouldn’t remember their names.” The language always feels fresh, the voice strong.
The novel also gives a great insight into life in a country that is unravelling, and the experience of moving to America and having people refer to Africa as a single country with a single, unchanging reality.
My favourite chapter was one narrated by an insane old man in a nursing home. I’d love to quote it in full, but instead I’ll just recommend that you read it. It’s a searing account of life in Zimbabwe and the compromises and sacrifices and sometimes heartbreak involved in migrating to America.
What stops me from recommending this book whole-heartedly is the meandering plot. The trajectory is “Darling runs around stealing guavas with her friends as her country falls apart; Darling moves to the US and becomes partly but not wholly American, not fitting in with Americans but struggling to connect with her friends back home too.” Beyond that, there’s not much of a shape to it, and the ending felt completely flat.
As I look back over the novel, I think I see why it was that way. The point, I assume, is that emigration is not the happy ending that Darling had naively imagined while sitting at home in Zimbabwe. She is stuck, just as her aunt and uncle are stuck, just as her country is stuck. The American dream is inaccessible to them, but their homeland offers nothing. So the lack of an ending is true to life – there is no grand denouement. Life just goes on.
Still, as a reader I found it frustrating. I expected the characters to change in some way, beyond the familiar story of immigration and the struggle for identity. I kept reading for the voice, for the sometimes funny sometimes angry sometimes heartbreaking descriptions, but the lack of plot or character development was disappointing. I can see why the book got so much praise, and I can see that Bulawayo is a talented writer, and I think the book is certainly worth reading, but I wouldn’t urge you to rush out and buy it right now. I’d add it to the “TBR some day” pile.
Narrating both halves is Darling, a ten-year-old child in the first half and a teenager in the second. Her voice is
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compelling and beautifully written throughout, and I think it’s Darling’s voice that was the main reason for the novel’s Booker shortlisting.Here is Darling, for example, describing her Aunt Fostalina’s struggles with the English language as she tries to order a push-up bra over the phone:
"The problem with English is this: You usually can’t open your mouth and it comes out just like that – first you have to think what you want to say. Then you have to find the words. Then you have to carefully arrange those words in your head. Then you have to say the words quietly to yourself, to make sure you got them okay. And finally, the last step, which is to say the words out loud and have them sound just right. But then because you have to do all this, when you get to the final step, something strange has happened to you and you speak the way a drunk walks. And because you are speaking like falling, it’s as if you are an idiot, when the truth is that it’s the language and the whole process that’s messed up. And then the problem with those who speak only English is this: they don’t know how to listen; they are busy looking at your falling instead of paying attention to what you are saying."
There are other wonderful pieces of prose, like describing parked cars “surrounding the little ballpark like teeth”, and “If these walls could talk, the buildings would stutter, wouldn’t remember their names.” The language always feels fresh, the voice strong.
The novel also gives a great insight into life in a country that is unravelling, and the experience of moving to America and having people refer to Africa as a single country with a single, unchanging reality.
My favourite chapter was one narrated by an insane old man in a nursing home. I’d love to quote it in full, but instead I’ll just recommend that you read it. It’s a searing account of life in Zimbabwe and the compromises and sacrifices and sometimes heartbreak involved in migrating to America.
What stops me from recommending this book whole-heartedly is the meandering plot. The trajectory is “Darling runs around stealing guavas with her friends as her country falls apart; Darling moves to the US and becomes partly but not wholly American, not fitting in with Americans but struggling to connect with her friends back home too.” Beyond that, there’s not much of a shape to it, and the ending felt completely flat.
As I look back over the novel, I think I see why it was that way. The point, I assume, is that emigration is not the happy ending that Darling had naively imagined while sitting at home in Zimbabwe. She is stuck, just as her aunt and uncle are stuck, just as her country is stuck. The American dream is inaccessible to them, but their homeland offers nothing. So the lack of an ending is true to life – there is no grand denouement. Life just goes on.
Still, as a reader I found it frustrating. I expected the characters to change in some way, beyond the familiar story of immigration and the struggle for identity. I kept reading for the voice, for the sometimes funny sometimes angry sometimes heartbreaking descriptions, but the lack of plot or character development was disappointing. I can see why the book got so much praise, and I can see that Bulawayo is a talented writer, and I think the book is certainly worth reading, but I wouldn’t urge you to rush out and buy it right now. I’d add it to the “TBR some day” pile.
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LibraryThing member EBT1002
This novel told from the POV of a child growing up in Zimbabwe and immigrating to the US as a teenager is worth reading despite its inconsistency. At times engaging, at times frustrating, Bulawayo's novel explores the process of assimilating to another culture. She effectively captures the
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love-hate relationship of a young person with her new country and her new culture, but she fails to make the reader care as much as I wanted to do. She provides insight into the ambivalence, the excitement, the disappointment, and the determination of a young person moving to the idealized wealthy America. Our narrator, whose voice shifts as her language acquisition shifts, is shocked and amused by things we (assuming an American reader) take for granted; she is also a "typical" teenager in so many ways and this feels true. There are brief lapses in the narrative arc and inconsistent use of metaphor, but I give Bulawayo credit for approaching a subject fraught with danger for a novelist. How do you honestly explore this subject without rancor? How do you engage a privileged audience -- the very readers whose liberal guilt (mixed with genuine caring, but without any real understanding of this child's experience) you want to expose? Carefully, methinks. NoViolet Bulawayo almost succeeds. Show Less
LibraryThing member jerhogan
A look at Africa and Zimbabwe which seems very accurate. An unflinching realistic look at childhood in Africa and as an immigrant in the States. Says things about Africa that I've never seen, Worthy of the Booker short list.
LibraryThing member hemlokgang
NoViolet Bulawayo's debut novel is remarkable. How? It is timely and timeless. Her writing is eloquent, yet straightforward. Her prose is both lyrical and stark. And to top it off, there are some very witty passages. Told through the eyes of Darling, the reader experiences a child's view of life in
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Zimbabwe and then in the United States. The illusion of America and its reality makes the reader cringe. The losses which accompany emigration are myriad and profoundly moving. This is a marvelous novel! Show Less
LibraryThing member daniellnic
NoViolet Bulawayo’s ten-year-old Darling tells her story with all the sassy and vibrant honesty of a young girl who is fully accepting of and in love with the precarious life she is offered growing up largely unsupervised and in a greatly changing Zimbabwe. When Darling moves to the United
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States, readers are treated to an illumining, funny, heartbreaking, and eye-opening look at two cultural perspectives on friendship, family, and consumerism. Show Less
LibraryThing member bibliobibuli
I really loved the first half of this book, set in Zimbabwe. The country's troubles are played out through a gang of shanty-town kids who have all experienced much more than children ever should - teen pregnancy, homes being bulldozed, malnutrition, absent fathers, AIDS, closed schools because the
But the second half of the book, where the protagonist, Darling, moves to the US badly loses its way. The sense of dislocation of the immigrant is well-portrayed, and the America Darling finds herself in is almost as much a place of nightmare, albeit in different ways. But the story no longer seems to hold together. And what is that squashed dog ending all about?
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teachers have emigrated ... a country falling apart. There is colour and humour which tempers the terrible events in the background. The writing is so good that I began to wonder if this might be the book to win this year's Booker.But the second half of the book, where the protagonist, Darling, moves to the US badly loses its way. The sense of dislocation of the immigrant is well-portrayed, and the America Darling finds herself in is almost as much a place of nightmare, albeit in different ways. But the story no longer seems to hold together. And what is that squashed dog ending all about?
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LibraryThing member BCbookjunky
The author of We Need New Names chose her own new name for her writing. ‘NoViolet’ is a tribute to Elizabeth Tshele’s mother Violet, who died when Elizabeth was only 18 months old.
She also chose interesting names for some of the characters in this book set in Zimbabwe. The story is a first
Darling is written as a strong dynamic voice. She’s not a creation; she is there, existing, right there on the page, talking to you. She’s tough, she’s funny, she’s opinionated. Especially powerful are scenes where Darling and her friends meet up with Westerners, usually expats or from NGOs, and later in America. The familiar tv scene of the NGO truck arriving in some African village to dispense aid and goodies to throngs of shouting black kids is turned inside out, or flipped around, and it is funny as well as unsettling and thought provoking.
The novel is a collection of discrete events, almost linked short stories. Many of the chapters stand on their own. As the character gets a bit older, several short chapters become more introspective, and serve more as the role of chorus.
There’s a lot here — coming of age, colonialism, AIDS, immigration, assimilation — but somehow it knits wells together, and Darling’s voice always stays strong.
I hope to see this one on the Booker shortlist.
She also chose interesting names for some of the characters in this book set in Zimbabwe. The story is a first
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person narrative by Darling, beginning at about age 10. Her close friends include Bastard, Chipo, Godknows. Her grandma is Mother of Bones. They live in Paradise; in the first chapter Hitting Budapest (which won the Caine African Short Story contest a couple of years ago), Darling and her friends are going to the rich area (village? neighbourhood?) of Budapest. They are looking for guavas to steal and eat (it reminded me as a kid sneaking into the nearby church yard with a couple of friends to steal crabapples from the trees. Somehow the tart fruits tasted better when the adrenaline was surging and the heart was palpitating with fear.) Their antics are brought up short by a white woman who calls to them from her house, and then comes outside to talk with them and take photos. The kids are uncomfortable — who is this person? The peculiar encounter is described with just the right level of unease, of a bit of a culture tangle. The shocking ending to that chapter sends a warning about what may come later.Darling is written as a strong dynamic voice. She’s not a creation; she is there, existing, right there on the page, talking to you. She’s tough, she’s funny, she’s opinionated. Especially powerful are scenes where Darling and her friends meet up with Westerners, usually expats or from NGOs, and later in America. The familiar tv scene of the NGO truck arriving in some African village to dispense aid and goodies to throngs of shouting black kids is turned inside out, or flipped around, and it is funny as well as unsettling and thought provoking.
The novel is a collection of discrete events, almost linked short stories. Many of the chapters stand on their own. As the character gets a bit older, several short chapters become more introspective, and serve more as the role of chorus.
There’s a lot here — coming of age, colonialism, AIDS, immigration, assimilation — but somehow it knits wells together, and Darling’s voice always stays strong.
I hope to see this one on the Booker shortlist.
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LibraryThing member nomadreader
The backstory: We Need New Names, the first novel by Zimbabwean author NoViolet Bulawayo, was shortlisted for the 2013 Booker Prize.
The basics: We Need New Names is the coming of age story of Darling. The novel begins in Zimbabwe when Darling is ten years old. She knows she will soon be able to
My thoughts: Child narrators are hit or miss for me, and I don't have a consistent opinion about them. Instead, I feel as I do about almost any staple in literature: when it's done well, I love it. When it's not done well, I don't. In this case, I am of two minds about Darling's narration. Admittedly, I know little about the history of Zimbabwe, so it was helpful to have a child guide me through some of it. When done well, a child's narration enhances a story rather than detracts from it; it's a lens into the world, but the reader can realize things deeper than the child does. While Bulawayo attempted these moments, I don't think they were completely successful.
I loved the idea of this book more than its execution. It's clear, from both the description of the novel and Darling's narration from the beginning, that she is going to the United States. There's even a plane on the U.S. cover. The anticipation of this shift made me restless at the amount of time spent in Zimbabwe. I don't mean to diminish the complicated history and hardship, but Darling's reflection of it soon seemed redundant, and I was eager for Darling to escape. Once she does leave, I found myself much more fascinated by her observations. Her aunt lives in Detroit, and Darling experiences culture shock in numerous ways. Her transformation and commentary are intriguing, and time seemed to pass more quickly after she arrives in the U.S. She was more fascinating as a teenager than a ten-year-old.
Audio thoughts: Robin Miles narrates with a deeply accented voice, and it took me awhile to get used to it. I had to concentrate quite hard early on. At one point, I caught myself realizing she had shifted into a non-accented voice for a certain character, and I didn't immediately realize it, so I did get used to it. Over the course of the book, her accent choice grew on me, as Darling's accent abates slowly when she makes it to the U.S. This subtle transformation enhanced my enjoyment of Darling's transformation.
The verdict: We Need New Names is an intriguing coming of age story, but its strength is in Darling's acclimation to the United States. I wish that geographic transition would have happened earlier in the novel, or that more would have happened in Zimbabwe. These two parts of the novel felt out of balance, but beneath these issues of balance and pacing is a promising young writer.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 (audio: 4 out of 5)
The basics: We Need New Names is the coming of age story of Darling. The novel begins in Zimbabwe when Darling is ten years old. She knows she will soon be able to
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escape her troubled country and go to the U.S., where her aunt lives, but little else in this novel is so simple.My thoughts: Child narrators are hit or miss for me, and I don't have a consistent opinion about them. Instead, I feel as I do about almost any staple in literature: when it's done well, I love it. When it's not done well, I don't. In this case, I am of two minds about Darling's narration. Admittedly, I know little about the history of Zimbabwe, so it was helpful to have a child guide me through some of it. When done well, a child's narration enhances a story rather than detracts from it; it's a lens into the world, but the reader can realize things deeper than the child does. While Bulawayo attempted these moments, I don't think they were completely successful.
I loved the idea of this book more than its execution. It's clear, from both the description of the novel and Darling's narration from the beginning, that she is going to the United States. There's even a plane on the U.S. cover. The anticipation of this shift made me restless at the amount of time spent in Zimbabwe. I don't mean to diminish the complicated history and hardship, but Darling's reflection of it soon seemed redundant, and I was eager for Darling to escape. Once she does leave, I found myself much more fascinated by her observations. Her aunt lives in Detroit, and Darling experiences culture shock in numerous ways. Her transformation and commentary are intriguing, and time seemed to pass more quickly after she arrives in the U.S. She was more fascinating as a teenager than a ten-year-old.
Audio thoughts: Robin Miles narrates with a deeply accented voice, and it took me awhile to get used to it. I had to concentrate quite hard early on. At one point, I caught myself realizing she had shifted into a non-accented voice for a certain character, and I didn't immediately realize it, so I did get used to it. Over the course of the book, her accent choice grew on me, as Darling's accent abates slowly when she makes it to the U.S. This subtle transformation enhanced my enjoyment of Darling's transformation.
The verdict: We Need New Names is an intriguing coming of age story, but its strength is in Darling's acclimation to the United States. I wish that geographic transition would have happened earlier in the novel, or that more would have happened in Zimbabwe. These two parts of the novel felt out of balance, but beneath these issues of balance and pacing is a promising young writer.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 (audio: 4 out of 5)
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LibraryThing member TheWasp
Following political upheaval, 10 year old, "Darling's" secure life in Zimbabwe falls apart and home becomes a shanty town and hunger and uncertainty become a way of life. Her small group of friends escape their harsh realities through play.
Darling eventually is sent to America to live with her Aunt
A book full of emotion
Darling eventually is sent to America to live with her Aunt
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and although she now has food and a "good" life she will always long for the smells, tastes and customs of her own country.A book full of emotion
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LibraryThing member Kirstie_Innes-Will
First book of 2013 the very fresh voice of NoViolet Bulawayo who captures the exuberant if harsh life of children in an African refugee camp and their subsequent experience adjusting to the 'shattered Coke bottle' of America. Vivid, graphic, funny and tragic all at once. Loved it.
LibraryThing member apurdie
I loved this book. Somehow I've read a lot of books about the white experience in Zimbabwe, and it was really interesting to read about the flip side. I especially enjoyed Darling's take on American culture as a teenage immigrant. The tone and prose is reminiscent of a Junot Diaz novel.
LibraryThing member pinkcrayon99
Darling along with her family and friends live in an area of Zimbabwe called Paradise. The name is more of a cruel metaphor than their reality. Darling and her friends biggest battle is hunger. Their excursions in search of food always end up being grand adventures. Darling is ten. Her friends
Bulawayo throws a wide net in We Need New Names . There is a country hoping for change. Families affected by AIDS and poverty. Paradise has an influx of "goodwill" that only generates more hopelessness. The Chinese are present like in most of Africa. Of course, the juxtaposition of escaping life in Africa to live in the United States looms large. Darling leaves Paradise only to find out the streets aren't paved with gold in the United States.
The characters are named like those from a Toni Morrison novel: Bastard, GodKnows, Messenger, Prophet Revelations...etc. These characters possessed a certain innocence that kept me reading but it also felt like the author was trying too hard and never made a point of anything. I'm still lost. The ending was so vague until it was pointless. There was no heartbeat, just names.
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aren't much older. There is no school for them to attend in Paradise. Bulawayo throws a wide net in We Need New Names . There is a country hoping for change. Families affected by AIDS and poverty. Paradise has an influx of "goodwill" that only generates more hopelessness. The Chinese are present like in most of Africa. Of course, the juxtaposition of escaping life in Africa to live in the United States looms large. Darling leaves Paradise only to find out the streets aren't paved with gold in the United States.
The characters are named like those from a Toni Morrison novel: Bastard, GodKnows, Messenger, Prophet Revelations...etc. These characters possessed a certain innocence that kept me reading but it also felt like the author was trying too hard and never made a point of anything. I'm still lost. The ending was so vague until it was pointless. There was no heartbeat, just names.
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LibraryThing member SandDune
Darling and her friends Bastard, Chipo, Godknows, Sbho and Stina roam the streets of Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe, getting handouts from the NGO lorry and searching for ripe guava in the gardens of more prosperous suburbs. The shanty town that they come from, Paradise, does not have gardens of fresh
But first we have to fight over names because everyone wants to be certain countries, like everybody wants to be the U.S.A. and Britain and Canada and Australia and Switzerland and France and Italy and Sweden and Russia and Greece and them. These are the country-countries. If you lose the fight, then you just have to settle for countries like Dubai and South Africa and Botswana and Tanzania and them. These are not country-countries but at least life is better than here. Nobody wants to be rags of countries like Congo, like Somalia, like Iraq, like Sudan, like Haiti, like Sri Lanka, and not even this one we live in -- who wants to be in a terrible place of hunger and things falling apart.'
Gradually it becomes apparent that the children have not always lived like this: they once had proper brick houses with bathrooms and TVs and proper furniture; some them had parents who had been to university; they had bicycles to play with outside. And then the government bulldozers had come and bulldozed their houses and everything in them, and the children were left with Paradise...
The first half of this book is definitely the strongest, when the imperfect understanding of the children brings to life the horror of the day to day existence. But as Darling's dream comes true and her Aunt Fostalina takes her to the United States to live the book seems to lose something of its focus. Throughout the book has a slightly loose structure, but this seems to loosen further once Darling is in U.S. so that it becomes a series of rather disjointed episodes. And while overall it has some interesting things to say about the differences between the reality of life in a new country and the expectations of those who remind behind in the old, it seemed to do so on a quite superficial level. Overall, while an interesting read, I'm a bit surprised it made the Booker shortlist.
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fruit: it has tin-roofed one-roomed shacks with no running water or sanitation. There are no schools any more as the teachers have not been paid and have fled to more prosperous countries: any one who can leaves to find a country where it is easier to stay alive. Even the children play the country game as they dream of where they will live:But first we have to fight over names because everyone wants to be certain countries, like everybody wants to be the U.S.A. and Britain and Canada and Australia and Switzerland and France and Italy and Sweden and Russia and Greece and them. These are the country-countries. If you lose the fight, then you just have to settle for countries like Dubai and South Africa and Botswana and Tanzania and them. These are not country-countries but at least life is better than here. Nobody wants to be rags of countries like Congo, like Somalia, like Iraq, like Sudan, like Haiti, like Sri Lanka, and not even this one we live in -- who wants to be in a terrible place of hunger and things falling apart.'
Gradually it becomes apparent that the children have not always lived like this: they once had proper brick houses with bathrooms and TVs and proper furniture; some them had parents who had been to university; they had bicycles to play with outside. And then the government bulldozers had come and bulldozed their houses and everything in them, and the children were left with Paradise...
The first half of this book is definitely the strongest, when the imperfect understanding of the children brings to life the horror of the day to day existence. But as Darling's dream comes true and her Aunt Fostalina takes her to the United States to live the book seems to lose something of its focus. Throughout the book has a slightly loose structure, but this seems to loosen further once Darling is in U.S. so that it becomes a series of rather disjointed episodes. And while overall it has some interesting things to say about the differences between the reality of life in a new country and the expectations of those who remind behind in the old, it seemed to do so on a quite superficial level. Overall, while an interesting read, I'm a bit surprised it made the Booker shortlist.
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LibraryThing member BillPilgrim
I ordered this book from the library after is was on the Man Booker Prize shortlist.
It starts in a village in Zimbabwe. Paradise is a young girl who spends her days playing with her friends in the shanytown called Paradise, but is anything but. They go into the rich neighborhood nearby to steal
It starts in a village in Zimbabwe. Paradise is a young girl who spends her days playing with her friends in the shanytown called Paradise, but is anything but. They go into the rich neighborhood nearby to steal
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guavas from the residents' trees there, to quench their hunger. She goes to church with her grandmother, who does not like her friends. And, she fantasizes about moving to the USA to live with her Aunt. Eventually she does immigrate to Michigan, and we see her adjustment there. Show Less
LibraryThing member seeword
The first half of this novel is set in Paradise, a shantytown in Zimbabwe in 2008. It relates the adventures of a small group of children through the eyes of Darling, a ten-year-old girl. It consists of a series of vignettes dealing with different aspects of their lives. Each is rich in descriptive
In the second part of the story, Darling has left Paradise and immigrated to Michigan where she lives with her aunt. These are her teenage years. Again, there are short chapters that seem almost like a collection of related short stories. Then, there is a shift. The first person singular voice changes to “we” and the narrator is no longer telling her own story. Just a few pages earlier she was deploring the fact that her employer lumps all people from Africa as one people. Now, she, herself, is using the collective “we” to include not only all immigrant Africans but also all the other immigrant groups.
This larger picture of inferring the general immigrant experience from the story of one individual is overdone, I felt as if she were drilling it into me. The sermon was too long and repetitive. She did not trust me to read her story and draw my on conclusions as to its broader meaning.
However, the rest of the book was so good that I feel comfortable in recommending it and look forward to seeing more from this author.
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language and is like a miniature painting. Taken all together, they form a stark, often disturbing, but somewhat colorful mural.In the second part of the story, Darling has left Paradise and immigrated to Michigan where she lives with her aunt. These are her teenage years. Again, there are short chapters that seem almost like a collection of related short stories. Then, there is a shift. The first person singular voice changes to “we” and the narrator is no longer telling her own story. Just a few pages earlier she was deploring the fact that her employer lumps all people from Africa as one people. Now, she, herself, is using the collective “we” to include not only all immigrant Africans but also all the other immigrant groups.
This larger picture of inferring the general immigrant experience from the story of one individual is overdone, I felt as if she were drilling it into me. The sermon was too long and repetitive. She did not trust me to read her story and draw my on conclusions as to its broader meaning.
However, the rest of the book was so good that I feel comfortable in recommending it and look forward to seeing more from this author.
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Awards
Booker Prize (Longlist — 2013)
Dublin Literary Award (Longlist — 2015)
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — 2013)
Betty Trask Prize and Awards (Award Winner — Shortlist — 2014)
PEN/Hemingway Award (Winner — 2014)
Maine Readers' Choice Award (Longlist — 2014)
Guardian First Book Award (Shortlist — 2013)
Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Award (Finalist — Fiction — 2013)
Nautilus Book Award (Fiction — 2014)
9mobile Prize for Literature (Shortlist — 2013)
Internationaler Literaturpreis – Haus der Kulturen der Welt (Shortlist — Shortlist — 2015)
Hurston/Wright Legacy Award (Nominee — Fiction — 2014)
5 Under 35 Award (2013)
NPR: Books We Love (2013)
Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year (Debut Fiction — 2013)
Christian Science Monitor Best Book (Fiction — 2013)