Say You're One of Them
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Review
'Say You're One of Them gives voice to its children in beautifully crafted prose and stunning detail. Uwem Akpan is a major new literary talent.' - Peter Godwin, author of Mukiwa 'Uwem Akpan writes with a politcal fierceness and a humanity so full of compassion it might just change the world. His is a burning talent.' Chris Abani, author of The Virgin of the Flames
Review
'SAY YOU'RE ONE OF THEM is an absorbing and, at times, disturbing read. Akpan gives voice to African child protagonists from different religious and cultural backgrounds. There is an energy that makes his book compelling . . . an unflinching collection'
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
25 of 27 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is not the Africa I know....Akpan depicts an Africa of victims and oppressors...there is no in-between...children are left to fend for themselves and of course the Western world has lapped this up as it no doubt reinforces their one-dimensional view of Africa.
I have lived and travelled all over Africa - and been to all but one of the countries depicted in this book and what I take away time and again are stories of hope and ambition. Many years ago, I worked in Kenya with someone who lived in the Kibera slums, but to look at this well turned out young man with dreams bigger than mine, you would have no idea of his living conditions or that he was surviving on one basic meal a day and supporting a family of 8. Likewise I have heard many stories of national solidarity in Rwanda during and following the 1994 genocide. People who live in poverty in Africa in my experience have dreams and aspirations as big as anyone else's.
The story that carries the book's title and deals with the Rwandan genocide is over simplistic at best....the round dark faced Hutu versus the light Tutsi with fine features....the evil Hutu genocidaires, the apathetic UN soldiers and ofcourse the vengeful Tutsi RPF soldiers - again we find ourselves in a setting where African children have nowhere to turn, no one to save them.
Say you're one of them' depicts an Africa of victims, one where Africans cannot rescue one another because they are all either evil or poor and helpless. I suppose this supposes that we are a continent waiting to be rescued by the benevolent Western world.
While I do not question Akpan's ability to write, I do find it sad that so many reviews have suggested that his stories are in some ways the 'true' Africa and I find it even sadder that Akpan himself sees no hope in his continent or his own people. Had this been a story of one country and one perspective it would be forgiving but to put it forward as in some ways depictive of Africa as a continent and African children's life is a shocking indictment of the continent and in my humble opinion one that is wholly inaccurate.
I have lived and travelled all over Africa - and been to all but one of the countries depicted in this book and what I take away time and again are stories of hope and ambition. Many years ago, I worked in Kenya with someone who lived in the Kibera slums, but to look at this well turned out young man with dreams bigger than mine, you would have no idea of his living conditions or that he was surviving on one basic meal a day and supporting a family of 8. Likewise I have heard many stories of national solidarity in Rwanda during and following the 1994 genocide. People who live in poverty in Africa in my experience have dreams and aspirations as big as anyone else's.
The story that carries the book's title and deals with the Rwandan genocide is over simplistic at best....the round dark faced Hutu versus the light Tutsi with fine features....the evil Hutu genocidaires, the apathetic UN soldiers and ofcourse the vengeful Tutsi RPF soldiers - again we find ourselves in a setting where African children have nowhere to turn, no one to save them.
Say you're one of them' depicts an Africa of victims, one where Africans cannot rescue one another because they are all either evil or poor and helpless. I suppose this supposes that we are a continent waiting to be rescued by the benevolent Western world.
While I do not question Akpan's ability to write, I do find it sad that so many reviews have suggested that his stories are in some ways the 'true' Africa and I find it even sadder that Akpan himself sees no hope in his continent or his own people. Had this been a story of one country and one perspective it would be forgiving but to put it forward as in some ways depictive of Africa as a continent and African children's life is a shocking indictment of the continent and in my humble opinion one that is wholly inaccurate.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Before I bought Say You're One of Them, I had heard the hype about the book. It was supposed to the work of an original voice from Nigeria, a Catholic priest, who weaved stories of the continent's ills and grace, with the dexterity of a traditional basket maker. After reading the book, I am left wondering what all the hype was about.
To be sure, there are some good stories. I liked the eponymous short story, Say You're One of Them. It is told from the perspective of a ten-year old middle-class Rwandan girl, whose father is Hutu and mother Tutsi. The little girl notices her mother dressing up for an evening out--without her father. After mother disappears into the night, her paternal Hutu relatives storm the house looking for her mother. One of the assailants almost rapes the girl. In time, they discover that mother had dressed up only to hide in the ceiling. In the presence of the little girl, Hutu father is forced to kill his Tutsi wife--with one blow of a machete. The scene is thoroughly macabre. Finally, the little girl's life is spared. She is let out onto the streets with the admonition from her father, "if they [presumably the Hutu] ask who you are, say you are one of them".
However, I was disappointed with the longest story in the book, Luxurious Hearses (a play on the word, Luxurious Bus, which, in Nigeria, connotes buses used to ferry passengers on long intercity trips). The story is about Jubril, a Muslim boy with an identity crisis. His mother is from the Muslim north of Nigeria and his father from the Christian South. Jubril, along with other passengers on the bus, is fleeing religious riots in northern Nigeria. On the bus, Jubril's parochial conception of the world is challenged by his experience of the kindness of southern Christian Nigerian strangers (mostly women, to Jubril's alarm). His trip is cut short when he reveals his religion: the passengers kill him by slitting his throat.
The author introduces various passengers into the bus to give multiple perspectives on Nigeria's toxic religious milieu: an animist chief, an atheist army captain, and a Roman Catholic market woman. This device is so transparent that I almost choked with disbelief. The characters are hopelessly one-dimensional; thoroughly unbelievable.
Jubril's village companions (almajiris) are the most unbelievable of them all. They are supposed to be barely literate, fundamentalist Muslims, yet they have a commanding grasp of regional politics and even articulate their grievances with Jubril in English and the local patois. As a Nigerian, who lived in northern Nigeria for six years, I think that Uwen Akpan stretches the English vocabulary of the almajiris. While they seethe with riotous religious zeal against the infidel, I find it difficult to see how they can be as articulate as Uwen Akpan portrays.
Say You're One of Them makes for interesting reading, but don't go away thinking that he has captured the 'compelling reality of Africa's children', as one reviewer put it. Such hyperbole is unjustified. I would recommend that you read and enjoy it for what it is: entertainment.
To be sure, there are some good stories. I liked the eponymous short story, Say You're One of Them. It is told from the perspective of a ten-year old middle-class Rwandan girl, whose father is Hutu and mother Tutsi. The little girl notices her mother dressing up for an evening out--without her father. After mother disappears into the night, her paternal Hutu relatives storm the house looking for her mother. One of the assailants almost rapes the girl. In time, they discover that mother had dressed up only to hide in the ceiling. In the presence of the little girl, Hutu father is forced to kill his Tutsi wife--with one blow of a machete. The scene is thoroughly macabre. Finally, the little girl's life is spared. She is let out onto the streets with the admonition from her father, "if they [presumably the Hutu] ask who you are, say you are one of them".
However, I was disappointed with the longest story in the book, Luxurious Hearses (a play on the word, Luxurious Bus, which, in Nigeria, connotes buses used to ferry passengers on long intercity trips). The story is about Jubril, a Muslim boy with an identity crisis. His mother is from the Muslim north of Nigeria and his father from the Christian South. Jubril, along with other passengers on the bus, is fleeing religious riots in northern Nigeria. On the bus, Jubril's parochial conception of the world is challenged by his experience of the kindness of southern Christian Nigerian strangers (mostly women, to Jubril's alarm). His trip is cut short when he reveals his religion: the passengers kill him by slitting his throat.
The author introduces various passengers into the bus to give multiple perspectives on Nigeria's toxic religious milieu: an animist chief, an atheist army captain, and a Roman Catholic market woman. This device is so transparent that I almost choked with disbelief. The characters are hopelessly one-dimensional; thoroughly unbelievable.
Jubril's village companions (almajiris) are the most unbelievable of them all. They are supposed to be barely literate, fundamentalist Muslims, yet they have a commanding grasp of regional politics and even articulate their grievances with Jubril in English and the local patois. As a Nigerian, who lived in northern Nigeria for six years, I think that Uwen Akpan stretches the English vocabulary of the almajiris. While they seethe with riotous religious zeal against the infidel, I find it difficult to see how they can be as articulate as Uwen Akpan portrays.
Say You're One of Them makes for interesting reading, but don't go away thinking that he has captured the 'compelling reality of Africa's children', as one reviewer put it. Such hyperbole is unjustified. I would recommend that you read and enjoy it for what it is: entertainment.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Very well written - extremely distressing tales of the lives of children in Africa. The devastation of poverty and violence come across even more than mere third person reporting, as the stories are told from the child's perspective, with the voice of the child.
This is very uncomfortable reading, but such horrible events need to be more widely known, in the hope that global pressure will bring much needed changes.
Highly recommended
This is very uncomfortable reading, but such horrible events need to be more widely known, in the hope that global pressure will bring much needed changes.
Highly recommended
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Incredibly powerful
This is a collection of the most haunting stort stories I have ever read. Beautiful compassionate writing. Read more
Published 1 month ago by avidreaderlondon
When you have nothing, something becomes everything
The narration's power comes from the eyes, ears and lips of the children: very humbling, inspiring and puts an aspect of Africa into perspective. Read more
Published 12 months ago by The Dragonfly
Deeply moving
Anyone who, like me, has ever reacted in a careless way to horrifying world events, in Africa or elsewhere, on the grounds that they didn't impact on me, should give this book a... Read more
Published 17 months ago by S. Ambrose
Five harrowing stories about Africa's children
We read this book for a book group and although I would normally avoid short stories for such discussions, these were sufficiently similarly themed to make for an enlightening... Read more
Published 19 months ago by DubaiReader
Brilliant and so true.
Uwem writes with a true knowledge of Africa and it's problems. This book captures some of the many challenges plaguing African children in graphic detail. Read more
Published 22 months ago by JM Lagos
hauntingly brilliant
I loved this book - ripped through the pages as fast as I could ready to pounce on every well written word. It took my breath away again and again.
Published on 13 May 2010 by Natasha Price
Brilliant
This book is a collection of stories all written from the point of view of a child-whatever happens in these stories is seen ,witnessed experienced from total innocence and it is... Read more
Published on 15 Nov 2009 by Ms. Hilary Truscott
An extremely haunting read.
This is a well written book but it is extremely heavy going. Several stories haunted me for days. The problem I have with it is it perpetuates negative African stereotypes. Read more
Published on 6 Aug 2009 by Loccy
Striking and terrifying
These short stories are not easy to read. The fictional form does not modify the impact of their descriptions of contemporary life in Africa. Read more
Published on 12 Jun 2009 by Francesca Murphy
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