There’s nothing that beats the feeling of completing a book you had initially thought you’d never finish. And it turns out to be nothing, but: MAGIC! I first read the book some time last year, long before I read Chimamanda’s collection of short stories (The Thing Around Your Neck) and reviewed it, but for strange reasons I couldn’t finish it. I read the first three chapters, and for reasons I don’t understand now (now that I’ve read it!) I then put it aside.

I’m glad I didn’t read it then… I don’t think I would’ve made sense of it if I had read it then. Half of a Yellow Sun is a historical fiction novel that tells the human side of the Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970) through its three main characters – Ugwu, Olanna and Richard – both physically and emotionally.

Now, I knew close to nothing about Nigerian history, about Biafra, and the Nigerian Civil War. Not that I know much of any African country’s history. In my defence, I would say this is to be blamed solely on our government, which has made sure that we learn about the World Wars, the American Civil Wars, and other histories, but know nothing about the history of our continent: Africa. At school, we are not taught African history in detail, and even when they do, it’s only done in passing.

So, for me, the book was an eye-opener! If there’s anything that the book does very well, in my opinion, it is to document the horrors of war and all that comes with it – the fear, the displacement, the hope and the lives lost during the three year span of the war. And this is done without the boring statistics and numbers, but through telling a story of three human beings whose lives are torn apart by the war and have to adjust to those circumstances.

What is even more interesting is the fact that Chimamanda was only born seven years after the Nigerian Civil war had ended, yet she writes as if she was there, lived through the turbulent time of war and had lived to tell the tale: war is ugly. She might have not been alive during the war, but she describes its horrors with impeccable honesty.

“Ikejide was still running and, in the moment that Richard glanced away and back, Ikejide’s head was gone. The body was running, arched slightly forwards, arms flying around, but there was no head” (p.317). What Chimamanda does successfully through her prose is to draw a picture for the reader, with words. Reading a good fiction book, for me, should be more like watching a movie, but the movie happens and ends in your mind. And this book felt like that!

It’s a long, long read, but it’s totally worth every second I spent reading it!

ZZ xx