Short Stories

You in America by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

2 Comments
You in America - Short Story - Chimamanda Adichie

You believed that everybody in America had a car and a gun. Your uncles and aunts and cousins believed it too. Right after you won the American visa lottery, they told you, “In a month, you will have a big car. Soon, a big house. But don’t buy a gun like those Americans.” They trooped into the shanty townhouse in Lagos, standing beside the nail-studded zinc walls because chairs did not go round, to say good-bye in loud voices and tell you with lowered voices what they wanted you to send them. In comparison to the big car and house […]

Continue Reading

Short Stories

My Mother, the Crazy African by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

5 Comments
My Mother, the Crazy African - Short Story - Chimamanda Adichie

I hate having an accent. I hate it when people ask me to repeat things sometimes and I can hear them laughing inside because I am not American. Now I reply Father’s Igbo with English. I would do it with Mother too, but I don’t think she will go for that just yet. When people ask where I am from, Mother wants me to say Nigeria. The first time I said Philadelphia, she said, “say Nigeria.” The second time she slapped the back of my head and asked, in Igbo, “is something wrong with your head?”

Continue Reading

Short Stories

Bewaji's Ankara Adventures by Sharon Abimbola Salu

No Comments
Bewaji's Ankara Adventures - Short Story - Sharon Abimbola Salu

I found this story during my exploration of the Okada books App/Store (there will be a review on that soon). Sharon Salu is quite an accomplished writer, and I think i have fallen in love with her stories. She has an extensive body of work published on her website, and I suggest you check it out. Bewaji’s story is Sherlock Holmes-like in many ways, the character is certainly eccentric enough, and has a unique sense of humour. I loved this story and I would gladly pay for it and any subsequent installments; However, it is available for free download now. So Enjoy yaselves…

Continue Reading

Book Review, Short Stories

Folk Stories – The Tortise with a Pretty Daughter

No Comments
Folk Stories from Southern Nigeria

There was once a king who was very powerful. He had great influence over the wild beasts and animals. Now the tortoise was looked upon as the wisest of all beasts and men. This king had a son named Ekpenyon, to whom he gave fifty young girls as wives, but the prince did not like any of them. The king was very angry at this, and made a law that if any man had a daughter who was finer than the prince’s wives, and who found favour in his son’s eyes, the girl herself and her father and mother should […]

Continue Reading