Review by New York Times Review
CERTAIN CITIES - New York, London, Paris, Berlin - are commonly associated with the drama of self-exploration. Their stories, at the center of countless novels, plays and films, are familiar, their terrain well-worn. In comparison, postcolonial cities feel fresh, the landscape of their literary and artistic production ripe with potential. And with that their narratives continue to change, not just in how they are told but in who does the telling and to whom. "Welcome to Lagos," the American debut of Chibundu Onuzo, a Nigerian writer whose previous novel, "The Spider King's Daughter," won Britain's Betty Trask Award, offers an earnest - though at times frustratingly frenetic - portrait of Nigeria's sprawling metropolis. The book opens in the Niger Delta, with an army officer, Chike Ameobi, and his friend Pvt. Yemi Oke, who are tired of killing civilians in the name of an obscure national mission. Chike is a serious man with "a rigid morality underlying his mildness"; despite his self-proclaimed agnosticism, he finds solace in the Bible. Yemi, on the other hand, remains a mystery for much of the novel and his quiet demeanor is often mistaken for stupidity. During yet another violent raid on a village, the two men abandon their posts and head for Lagos. On the way, they encounter Fineboy, a clever young man obsessed with honing his radio voice; a recently orphaned young woman named Isoken; and Oma, who is running from her abusive husband and oppressive life. The five form a kind of family, each hoping to fashion a different, if not altogether new, life. Lagos comes most alive early in the novel, when survival is the group's only concern. Their walks through the streets, attempts to find jobs and search for makeshift lodging give Onuzo an opportunity to provide colorful commentary on the city. The crew's first home, under a bridge, offers a view of hawkers who "sauntered by, holding their wares to passing traffic while traders sat beside fresh fruit and vegetables, waiting for customers to beckon," and "thin, agile conductors" who hang from moving minibuses, "calling for passengers." A near accident with a motorcycle snaps Chike out of a daydream and reminds him that "Lagos would kill you if you wasted time on yesterday." Nostalgia is a luxury he can't afford. Unfortunately, in the second half of the book, Onuzo sacrifices meditative sketches of the city to narrative momentum. Characters initially thought to be minor - like Ahmed, the idealistic editor of a Nigerian newspaper, and Chief Sandayo, the former minister of education, on the run after stealing $10 million from the government - play larger roles after colliding with Chike's ragtag crew. As Onuzo attempts to juggle the stories of these individuals (and many others), the novel abandons its portrait of Lagos in favor of fastpaced comedy. When the members of the group place Sandayo under citizen's arrest, they decide to donate his money anonymously to schools across Nigeria. Yet this good deed is interrupted when Sandayo leaks information about government corruption to Ahmed, turning a regional story into an international political scandal. But despite the blunders, missteps and excessive plot twists of "Welcome to Lagos," its dialogue rings true. Conversations between Onuzo's characters move fluidly between Igbo, Yoruba, pidgin and English, demonstrating her skilled ear. In a scene where Sandayo tries to bond with Yemi over their shared Yoruba heritage, the dialogue reinforces their differences and loyalties: "It's like he didn't really like the dancing," Sandayo says, referring to Yemi and Chike's job controlling traffic. "Nah so he talk? He no sabi better thing," Yemi replies. "Of course. The two of you won't be able to see eye to eye. Iru ore wo l'omo Yoruba nse pelu omo Ibo?" To the uninitiated, the complexity of Lagos can seem like chaos. But, as Teju Cole wrote in his novel "Every Day Is for the Thief," this is a city dense with stories: "All I have to do is prod gently, and people open up. And that literary texture, of lives full of unpredictable narrative, is what appeals." Like any city, Lagos is evolving, shedding old stories for new ones told by those who understand its contours and see beyond "a self-effacing sprawl that makes no sense," as the poet John Koethe foolishly wrote in 1945. A steady stream of writers, from Cole to Chris Abani and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, has kept the city's depiction in capable hands, with each attempt to render its image feeling more evocative than the last. Navigating these urban landscapes requires a willingness to experiment with the delicate interplay of individual stories while preserving the city's character. "Welcome to Lagos" starts this way, but by the end Onuzo has split her narrative into too many parts. The band of characters we met at the beginning has been lost in the crowd. LOVIA GYARKYE is on the editorial staff of the Book Review.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [January 31, 2019]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* How do you take the teeming microcosm that is Lagos, set it against a backdrop of Nigeria's slow suicide by oil, and still manage to write one helluva novel? You weave a crisp story that uses well-fleshed characters and a razor-tight plot and stick closely to the show not tell philosophy. This is exactly the theory that Onuzo (The Spider King's Daughter, 2012) subscribes to in this briskly narrated tale of five Nigerians who are mostly bound together by virtue of mucking around in the shadowy periphery of the cutthroat chaos of Lagos. Chike Ameobi, an army officer who deserts his post, is joined by his subordinate, Yemi; Isoken, a woman facing the abyss back home; Oma, fleeing an abusive husband; and Fineboy, who dreams of his own radio show. Their hardscrabble fates intertwine with Nigeria's education minister, Chief Sandayo, and a principled journalist, Ahmed Bakare. What follows is a tangy Ocean's Eleven-esque escapade that exposes class and ethnic divides in the country even as it manages to mock the West for its colonial gaze toward the African continent as a whole. Full of nuance, the story spares no one as it careens toward its satisfying finale.--Apte, Poornima Copyright 2018 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In her winning U.S. debut, Onuzo anatomizes a tumultuous city and its inhabitants, from street hustlers to well-connected government ministers. Seeking refuge in the metropolis for various reasons, several Nigerian travelers group up en route to Lagos, including morally upright army deserter Chike; swaggering teenage militant Fineboy; well-to-do Oma, who is fleeing her abusive husband; and a precocious but traumatized girl, Isoken. These characters form a family of sorts as they are welcomed to Lagos coolly, obliged to live in a homeless encampment before settling in an unoccupied house. There they encounter someone desperately trying to leave Lagos: an education minister who has gone into hiding with $10 million meant for Nigeria's schools. What to do with the minister, and more important, with his money? Onuzo's representation of Lagos as "a carnivore of a city that swallowed even bones" is often unromantic, but she also criticizes how the city is represented, or misrepresented, by Westerners: "Scandal, murder, intrigue. Quintessential African politics," thinks one BBC correspondent covering the minister's story. Onuzo's briskly plotted novel is a rewarding exploration of the limits of idealism and transparency against widespread cynicism and corruption. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Nigeria's corrupt government, as witnessed by a disparate band of misfits hoping to disappear in the teeming capital city of Lagos, is the subject of this provocative novel. Soldiers Chike and Yemi are AWOL from an unjust conflict in the Niger delta, Oma has left an abusive husband, and Isoken seeks safety after a sexual assault. Then there's Fineboy, a street-smart troublemaker who dreams of becoming a radio announcer. They form a de facto family, with Chike as its conscience. But when their path crosses that of disgraced Minister of Education Remi Sandayo, a well-intentioned scheme to redistribute stolen wealth culminates in tragedy. Each chapter is prefaced by ironic excerpts from the "Nigerian Journal," the brainchild of Ahmed Bakare, educated in London but returned to Lagos to print unvarnished truth for the people. VERDICT Winner of the Betty Trask Award for her debut, The Spider King's Daughter, published when she was just 21, Onuzo writes biting social commentary with heart. Though set in Lagos, the work's themes of unscrupulous politicians, irresponsible news outlets, and the unbridgeable divide between privileged and poor are universal and should appeal to a wide audience. [For an essay on libraries by the author, see ow.ly/aF7l30jEXBk.-Ed.]-Sally -Bissell, -formerly with Lee Cty. Lib. Syst., Fort Myers, FL © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A ragtag group of refugees from war, corruption, and domestic violence attempts to resettle in Nigeria's chaotic capital in Onuzo's second novel (The Spider King's Daughter, 2012).When Chike decides to desert the Nigerian army, unable to abide its violence against innocent citizens, he plans to travel light. But Yemi, one of the privates under his command, wants out, too; together, they soon meet Fineboy, another deserter; then Isoken, a young woman who'll be raped if left with her family; then Oma, who's escaping her abusive husband. Together they travel to Lagos, which is hard on newcomers with limited means: The only shelter they can afford is in a camp town under a bridge, and the quintet can only piece together side hustles. (Chike's brief stint directing traffic is at once comic and scarifying.) Fineboy stumbles across what seems to be an abandoned furnished apartment, but they're actually squatting in the home of Sandayo, a former education secretary who's stolen funds in hopes the money will go directly to schools instead of being squandered by bureaucrats. Onuzo's novel is at once a Robin Hood tale and a cross section of Nigerian society, and though she takes on a lot in terms of both themes and characters, she shepherds it along smoothly. She avoids grand defining statements about Lagos, smartly letting the predicaments of each character show how the city's lawlessness runs parallel to its bustle. ("Lagos would kill you if you wasted time on yesterday," she writes.) Simplified statements are for the smug BBC reporter parachuting in to cover Sandayo's story. ("One giant trash can," he thinks.) Not every character gets his or her due (a romantic subplot involving a muckraking journalist feels unfinished), but the novel is marked by lively storytelling throughout.A well-turned tribute to the freedom and frustrations of a diverse city.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
