The Bossy Bookworm
May 25, 20212 min
Adunni is a tough young woman determined to have a voice and emerge from her oppressive situation, and she's wonderfully dogged, creative, and spirited.
Adunni is a young teen growing up in a rural Nigerian village where girls are often married off by age fourteen and are frequently made to stop attending school even earlier in life.
She's curious, talkative, joyful, and full of song. Being thrust into a polygamous marriage with a husband twice her age--and the sense that she has been sold off by her widowed father for her dowry--isn't enough to break her. The deaths of the few people who show her love and affection slow her down but don't stop her. Being tricked into working as an unpaid, abused slave without freedoms or even time to sleep doesn't make her give up. Adunni just needs that one glimmer; a spark; a single kindness; one person who really sees her to inspire her to keep going, and against all odds she continues to find enough strength to get her through.
Adunni experiences tremendous emotional, physical, familial, and societal hardships, yet she keeps her sights set on getting back into school and escaping the grim, constricting situations she's been forced into. She's a tough young woman determined to have a voice and emerge from her oppressive situation, and she's wonderfully dogged, creative, and spirited.
My friend Kirstan recommended this book, and I listened to it as an audiobook, which I adored.
Do you have any Bossy thoughts about this book?
Abi Daré grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, and has lived in the United Kingdom for eighteen years. This is her first book, but hopefully not her last.
I'd love to hear what you think about this book!