A coastline is an immeasurable thing A memoir across three continents

After publishing a book of poetry, Daniel turns her poetic sensibilities onto herself in this mash-up of memoir and narrative nonfiction. Born in Nigeria to two professors, Daniel and her family lived a comfortable existence until the country's destabilization forced them to relocate to England in 1988. A few short years later, her father found a teaching position in Tennessee, uprooting the family once again. Finding community in these places proved difficult, with few other Nigerians or even people of color nearby. Daniel uses her life on three different continents to reflect on the history of Nigeria, contemplate ideas of "otherness" and race, and explore religion. Her family's tribal history, convoluted by official versus cultural designations, her strict Christian upbringing in places people assume she is a heathen or Muslim, and her ostracism in the U.S. by both white and Black children leave Daniel in the grey area of life, navigating competing identities until she comes into her own, which she refers to as American African. While the jumble of memoir and history may throw some readers, they'll find writing so beautiful it's worth the price of admission. Readers who enjoyed memoirs like Albert Samaha's Concepcion (2021) will love this.

In her incandescent debut, Nigerian poet Daniel recounts her life on three continents, surrounded by stories that made up the fabric of her African upbringing. Daniel was born in Maiduguri, Nigeria--the birthplace of the Islamist terrorist group Boko Haram-- and her parents, members of the Longuda and Fulani tribes, taught at the city's university until the destabilized Nigerian dollar dried up their salaries. The family's nomadlike existence began when they uprooted to Reading, England, in 1988, where her parents entered doctoral programs. Painting a lyrical study in contrasts--"England looked blanched, like all color had been boiled out... it lacked the characteristic angry, red Nigerian dust that gets into everything"--Daniel recounts how her mother, Saratu, centered West African traditions in food, clothing, and social interactions. When a new academic position for her father took them to Nashville, Tenn., her parents' Christian evangelicalism created a sense of "apocalyptic paranoia" in their home (secular TV shows, books, and other pastimes were prohibited). Generous doses of Nigerian history are stitched between personal anecdotes as Daniel addresses racism in the U.S. and the long arc of finding her identity as an "American-African": "I don't think I believe in God; I don't know about goddesses. I am grown; on my own." This is a gem. Agent: Jin Auh, Wylie Agency. (Nov.)

A powerful memoir of a life driven by "a spirit of…extreme exophoria--that uncontrollable tendency of eyes to gaze outward." In her debut book, Daniel, a duel citizen of Nigeria and the U.S., tracks her life across Africa, Europe, and North America. In pursuit of a better life, her parents, who were professors at the university in Maiduguri ("birthplace of Boko Haram, the terrorist militia that specializes in kidnapping the girl child"), moved Daniel and her siblings to England, which she found "blanched, like all color had been boiled out of it," compared to the "angry red" of her native land. Throughout the enchanting narrative, Daniel vividly shares her and her family's traditions, customs, and religious views. However, in order to assimilate to English culture, she and her family had to forego many elements of Nigerian culture, including those of her tribe, Hausa-Fulani. The author writes potently about being "acutely wounded by the separation from my culture." After nearly 10 years in England, her parents decided to move again, this time to Nashville. Daniel chronicles the racism she experienced and describes how she changed her first name to Mary-Alice in order to further assimilate. During return trips to Nigeria, the author began to feel embarrassment for being "noticeably Westernized," while in the U.S., she felt "embarrassed by being identifiably African." Overall, she believed she "no longer belonged anywhere." Daniel writes memorably about how her religious views have changed over the years and ponders how different she might feel had she stayed in Nigeria. "My immediate family and I have shared a dozen residences across three continents," she writes. A few pages later, she reflects that "because I come from nomads, I have a tenuous, less tactile relationship with place." Daniel also acknowledges how, as immigrants, she and her family are "integral, even when we are not integrated." Today, the author is "semi-settled" in California, a place that she has chosen for herself. An absolutely fascinating work from a gifted storyteller. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.