Suffers from the subordination of plot to its feminist message, but presents authentic perspectives on modern challenges in...
Albert’s debut novel explores women’s roles in modern Nigeria.
This portrait of contemporary Africa sees feminism through characters including the director of an orphanage, a corporal/philanthropist from the United States who provides quiet but dedicated support to women’s causes, and a doctor who runs a women’s leadership organization. Secondary to its message is the novel’s episodic plot: a man brings his daughter to Mrs Lawal’s orphanage; Mrs. Lawal and Dr. Hafsat meet American visitor Edna Shay, who travels to meet the orphanage’s largest donor; and Dr. Hafsat struggles with the political and practical challenges of developing female leaders and fighting corruption. At times the plot is set aside entirely, with multiple chapters devoted to speeches given at Dr. Hafsat’s meetings, which allows Albert to take a didactic approach: “The post-independence Nigerian women became hypnotized, and the perils of bad government transcended from state to community and to the family levels.” Although characters face many challenges, the book ends on an optimistic note, with a clear path forward for Nigeria if it embraces the possibilities offered by women’s full participation in civic life. Albert delivers dialogue with an apparently Nigerian flavor that is occasionally jarring: “Madam, the quietness of this place has charmed me so much that I developed a very strong dislike for Motor Park, my abode, overnight.” However, the perceived authenticity of the narrative voice is limited by characters’ tendency to provide acronyms for organizations they mention: “I am Bridget Shawn, the president of Females Perfoming [sic] Musicians Association of Nigeria (FPMAN).” The book is ultimately more successful as a polemic than as a novel, since the plot presents neither an overall conflict nor a resolution of all its elements. In his focus on the book’s message, however, Albert presents a coherent list of the problems currently facing Nigeria as well as a path forward that incorporates both men’s and women’s contributions to community success.
Suffers from the subordination of plot to its feminist message, but presents authentic perspectives on modern challenges in Nigeria.Pub Date: June 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5049-4385-7
Page Count: 116
Publisher: AuthorHouseUK
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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