Half of a Yellow Sun

Product Description

A haunting story of love and war from the best-selling author of Americanah and We Should All Be Feminists.

With effortless grace, celebrated author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie illuminates a seminal moment in modern African history: Biafra's impassioned struggle to establish an independent republic in southeastern Nigeria during the late 1960s. We experience this tumultuous decade alongside five unforgettable characters: Ugwu, a thirteen-year-old houseboy who works for Odenigbo, a university professor full of revolutionary zeal; Olanna, the professor’s beautiful young mistress who has abandoned her life in Lagos for a dusty town and her lover’s charm; and Richard, a shy young Englishman infatuated with Olanna’s willful twin sister Kainene. Half of a Yellow Sun is a tremendously evocative novel of the promise, hope, and disappointment of the Biafran war.

Top Reviews

She doesn't just write about a couple of love stories during war
by Amazon Customer (5 out of 5 stars)
December 16, 2016

I came into Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun not knowing much about the Biafran conflict. I came out feeling as if I'd just lived through the experience. "Moving" is the most appropriate term for this novel. Adichie doesn't just write about the failure of a new state trying to gain independence from Nigeria. She doesn't just write about a couple of love stories during war, or family relationships that took place during war. What she does so masterfully and deliciously is capture the dreams and hopes and vision of Biafra, paint it so clearly that the reader can taste it, and then take it all away slowly, deliberately, painfully... mimicking what those who lived through the conflict probably felt. Her ability to capture the dramatic life-altering experiences of Biafra is astonishing. When I put down the book, I felt as if I'd just experienced the conflict through my own eyes.
Essentially, the book is about chronicling the tone and feel of the Biafran conflict. She leaves the reader wanting Biafra, needing Biafra, and feeling remorse for the consequences of its failure (not a spoiler - her plot is carved into history). Nigeria in the 1960s was a society entangled in ethnic troubles and then civil war. The genocide inflicted on the Igbo people is horrible and tragic. Through the war they suffered and starved, eventually bringing Biafra to its knees. This part of her story is one of the most powerful, and where Adichie really flexes her literary muscles. How she is able to have starvation permeate her imagined world, effecting each character and the world around them, is fantastic. How Adichie was able to capture the pain and torment in such a realistic way is beyond me. Her depth of research also becomes apparent here, regularly - but not obnoxiously - dropping in facts and names of organizations and people who were there during the conflict.
Adichie's argument and motive for writing such a work was to chronicle with as much accuracy as possible the tone and feel of that conflict. She leaves the reader wanting Biafra, needing Biafra, and feeling remorse for the consequences of its failure (not a spoiler - her plot is carved into history). I can guarantee you will put down this book and go straight to your computer to research this event.
The length of the work is one of the few complaints I have. In Adichie's obsessive need to create the world of Biafra as realistically for the reader as possible, her details can slow the pacing. This is an emotional novel, and she builds the emotions over time. Also, don't be expecting to laugh - you barely will.
Yet, if you are looking for a work that will move you and your worldview, this is the one. I highly recommend.
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Fabulous well-written Historical Fiction by a Brilliant Writer from Nigeria - Ngozo Adichi
by Liberty Dog Productions (5 out of 5 stars)
January 3, 2017

Half of a Yellow Sun is historical fiction and a fine-written novel. It concerns the history of Nigeria and the war. The characters are very well developed and very interesting. Adichie is a fabulous writer. The story is never boring and there were some interesting character viewpoints. One point of interest was discovering the anti-Semitism that existed within Nigeria or the outright ignorance of some of Nigeria's citizens. A long Muslim vs Christian war or battle has had a terrible effect on Nigeria. The use of oppressive tactics akin to Hitler's 3rd Reich was used within Nigeria to squelch the Christian intellectual party and its citizens by a brutal regime of ignorant religious extremists who oppress girls and women, and hinder educational systems. This is absolutely a fabulously written account with historical facts that is written with fictionally orientated characters to add dynamic realism and dimensions. Adichi herself, is highly intelligent, brilliant, and a prize writer from Nigeria. The book has over 500 pages, so expect to spend some time digesting the contents and comprehending some of Nigeria's immense history. Adichi is one of your better writers on the market.
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An important postcolonial novel
by Sally Howes (4 out of 5 stars)
May 4, 2015

HALF OF A YELLOW SUN is a very important and very readable postcolonial novel. Centering on the Nigeria-Biafra War of 1967-70, it has a lot to teach both about postcolonial Nigeria and about the art and import of storytelling.

Language is a central concern in this book, including the occasional tongue-in-cheek play on words, such as Richard being (emotionally) "stirred" by a ropework pot. I got the sense that the author was almost deliberately deceptive in the simplicity of her language, covering a much greater facility and more playful attitude to language than is at first apparent. The language used is unsophisticated, which makes the occasional moments of searing insight or incisive statements so much more striking. For example: "He [Richard] laughed. The sound spilt out of him, uncontrolled, and he looked down at the clear, blue pool and thought, blithely, that perhaps that shade of blue was also the colour of hope."

The tone and cadence of each chapter matches that of the point-of-view character, despite being written in the third person. There is something characteristically African about Olanna's and Ugwu's chapters, something more straightforward but no less deeply felt, whereas Richard's chapters have a more introverted, tentative, sometimes even wishy-washy feel to them. While the language of the narrative does change in accordance with the age and nature of the current point-of-view character, overall it is endearingly artless - simple but not simplistic, with subtle shades of color to it. Adichie often displays a keenly observational, witty turn of phrase, especially in her descriptions of people. I found this sentence both humorous and evocative: "She began to look more and more like a fruit bat, with her pinched face and cloudy complexion and print dresses that billowed around her body like wings."

In general, this book follows the "show, don't tell" method, so that it is unburdened with large chunks of information but is, rather, an intriguing puzzle to be deciphered bit by bit as you read. Each chapter introduces a new character who is within the orbit of the focal character of the previous chapter. In this way, the characters are enabled to comment on and give contrasting perspectives of each other, so that the reader does not have to dogmatically accept a given view of each character but can draw their own conclusions instead. Is Odenigbo a passionate revolutionary or a deluded idealist? Is Olanna sweet and smart or hopelessly naive? Is Kainene a cold fish or a woman of mysterious depths? You decide.

There is a definite feeling that the characters in this book are there as conduits through which a larger lesson about Nigerian history is delivered. The characters cover almost every possible viewpoint - there is Odenigbo the "revolutionary lecturer"; Olanna, his sweet, beautiful lover from a privileged family; Ugwu, their houseboy from a very poor family; Kainene, Olanna's cynical businesswoman sister; and Richard, Kainene's white English ex-pat lover, the earnest outsider. The older person's perspective is provided by a host of minor characters. Olanna, Ugwu, and Richard are the three point-of-view characters, which offers the most diverse range of viewpoints. Thus, I very much felt that the characters of HALF OF A YELLOW SUN were vehicles for the plot rather than necessarily being themselves the focus of the story. This is one example of how Olanna's life is inextricable from the war she is trying to survive: "It was the very sense of being inconsequential that pushed her from extreme fear to extreme fury. She had to matter. She would no longer exist limply, waiting to die. Until Biafra won, the vandals would no longer dictate the terms of her life." This is another: "... she felt as if she were about to turn a corner and be flattened by tragedy."

If the characters are vehicles for lessons in Nigerian history and politics, they are first-class vehicles. They make these lessons heartfelt and very personal. I will have a hard time forgetting "the second coup," especially thanks to Olanna's experience with it. However, paradoxically, I also often felt a certain detachment from the characters in this book, although this was more pronounced with some than with others. Ugwu was the easiest to feel affection for, and, to an extent, Olanna; but Odenigbo remained quite inscrutable throughout for me, followed closely by Kainene. I found it to be a real shame that these so potentially complex characters were not developed much more fully. It was odd to feel a sense of detachment from the characters yet at the same time recognize how often the narrative provided exceptionally astute insights into human nature. For example, at one point when Olanna is considering Odenigbo: "Then she wished, more rationally, that she could love him without needing him. Need gave him power without his trying; need was the choicelessness she often felt around him."

Perhaps overshadowed by the meta-narrative about Biafra and by the romantic tales woven through it is the fact that this is also very much a story about sisters - how much they share, how much they are willing to forgive, how strong their bond is: "'There are some things that are so unforgivable that they make other things easily forgivable,' Kainene said."

Something I was not expecting was for this book to be funny, but the wry observations of Ugwu's childish perspective provide plenty of levity. For example: "'He's one of these village houseboys,' one of the men said dismissively, and Ugwu looked at the man's face and murmured a curse about acute diarrhoea following him and all of his offspring for life."

For the white, Western reader, HALF OF A YELLOW SUN is a gentle but persistent reminder that theirs is not the only valid point of view, that there is a whole other world out there full of very different but equally important cultures and perspectives. This is gently introduced by Ugwu's careful and often awestruck exploration of his new home, which is extremely vivid, providing a sense of newfound wonder at the "mod cons" we take for granted every day. One of the more humbling realizations for the Western reader of HALF OF A YELLOW SUN is just how much African cultures have to teach about family, community, generosity, and hospitality. This book is also enough to make those of us who only speak one language ashamed of our arrogance! HALF OF A YELLOW SUN is rich with non-English phrases and allusions to the many languages of Africa. Again, Ugwu provides a most evocative example: "Master's Igbo felt feathery in Ugwu's ears. It was Igbo coloured by the sliding sounds of English, the Igbo of one who spoke English often."

There is a lot of information about Nigerian history and politics in this book, but it is quite easily digestible because it is presented in such diverse ways - from informal academic debates to conversations between lovers to the outline of a book. Discussing such issues with friends and colleagues in his home, Odenigbo says: "'... the only authentic identity for the African is the tribe ... I am Nigerian because a white man created Nigeria and gave me that identity. I am black because the white man constructed black to be as different as possible from his white. But I was Igbo before the white man came.'" In the most basic terms, the politics of the book center on tensions between three groups: the Igbo, the Muslims, and the "marauding Europeans."

After all of the horror stories we in the West have heard about Biafra, it is refreshing to be reminded by HALF OF A YELLOW SUN (whose title refers to the central symbol on the Biafran flag) that the country's secession from Nigeria began as an act of great hope. At one point, Olanna explains the significance of their new flag to a class of children: "... she unfurled Odenigbo's cloth flag and told them what the symbols meant. Red was the blood of the siblings massacred in the North, black was for mourning them, green was for the prosperity Biafra would have, and, finally, the half of a yellow sun stood for the glorious future."

The dramas of the characters' personal lives are punctuated throughout by historical and political triumphs and disasters. Seeing the profound effects of these events on the characters in the book just highlights the fact that real Nigerians' or Biafrans' lives would have followed a similar course, with little distinction between the public and the private. The following remark is a chilling affirmation of how many lives were affected by the war: "'The foreigners said that one million died,' Madu said. 'That can't be ... It can't be just one million.'"

In this stridently postcolonial book, Adichie uses the character of Richard to assert quite vigorously that only African people have the right and the ability to tell African stories well. I was slightly affronted by this. I do agree and appreciate that African people will most often be the best at telling the stories of their people - at one point, Kainene says to Richard in this context: "'And it's wrong of you to think that love leaves room for nothing else. It's possible to love something and still condescend to it'" - but I dispute the inference that this is ALWAYS the case, without exception. (I would cite Barbara Kingsolver's THE POISONWOOD BIBLE as one such exception.) At the beginning of the feminist movement, the best women's literature was written by women - but there were exceptions, and they were important. There were some male authors who possessed the necessary respect, understanding, and skills to tell women's stories, and this is much more common today (an excellent recent example being Michel Faber's THE CRIMSON PETAL AND THE WHITE). Perhaps Adichie considers post-colonial literature to be more raw and relevant today than feminist literature? That is just a question that occurs to me, I don't mean to put words into her mouth. However, I do wonder if her attitude to African literature is a little too divisive and exclusionary. Still, there is no denying the outsider's question: "How much did one know of the true feelings of those who did not have a voice?"

HALF OF A YELLOW SUN gives a lilting but powerful voice to those who experienced the creation and collapse of Biafra, as well as to all the color, vigor, passion, gentleness, idealism, and community of Nigerians and Biafrans in the latter twentieth century. I would gladly recommend this book to anyone who wants an engaging story to teach them about a different time and a different culture.
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Great novel
by JenP (4 out of 5 stars)
May 23, 2019

This book takes place in southern Nigeria in the 1960s. There are 5 main characters: Ugwu - a house boy who works for Odenigbo (a professor). His life changes when Olana, Odenigbo's mistress, moves in. Ugwu is very loyal to his employers. Olanna has a twin sister, Kainene who runs their father's company. She falls in love with Richard, who is an Englishman that came to Nigeria to explore Igbo-Ukwu Art.
4 years pass, and trouble starts between the Hausa and Igbo people and hundreds of people die, including Ilanna and Kainene's aunt and uncle. A new republic, called Biafra, is created by the Igbo. Olanna, Odenigbo and their infant daughter (whom they only ever call "baby") are forced to flee and end up in a refugee town called Umuahia where they suffer from lack of food, and air raids. Baby's hair starts to fall out and she develops the tale tell signs of starvation.

In a flash back we find out that the baby was not Olanna's daughter, but the daughter of Odenigbo's mistress. Odenigbo slept with a village girl named Alana and she got pregnant. Olanna is furious, but in the end, forgives Odenigbo. Alana doesn't want to keep the baby, so Olanna agrees to take her in.

As the war goes on, Olanna, Odenigbo, the baby, an Ugwu end up living with Richard and Kainene (who are running the refugee camp). The situation becomes dire and Kainene decides to cross enemy lines to trade, but she doesn't return. The book ends with us not knowif if Kainene is alive or dea.

This was a good book. I liked all of the characters and I thought that their enterwining flowed really well. You learn a lot about the history of the area and what it was like during the war. It covers a wide variety of subjects: genocide, war, relationships, infidelity, identity, loyalty, struggle between classes, etc.

Check this book out. You won't be disappointed.
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What Doesn't Kill Me, Makes Me More Knowledgeable
by Case Quarter (5 out of 5 stars)
September 6, 2019

a story told in the tone and voice of a young man from a small village, working in the house of an intellectual, a mathematician, is made omniscient by adichie's choice of third person narrator. the voices of the white ex-pat from britain, the nigerian twin sisters of a wealthy family, the local intellectuals familiar with the yards of cambridge, uk and harvard, usa, the local colorful characters, the voices of privilege, are not allowed to dominate the story.

the young man is poor, he hasn't much of an education, or the diction of his betters; a suitable servant, his duties are to serve not witness. his education increases as the high are brought low by civil war and starvation. but these are africans several years out from under colonialism, so from a western perspective their wealth is not like our wealth, their intelligence is not like our intelligence, their society isn't as consumer driven as ours, so while their intelligentsia and financiers are every bit as capable as their western counterparts, but as africans their attributes are seen as of a lesser quality of which comparison can't be expected, nor can there be expected african class and economic distinctions, all africans are alike-balancing this western perception of the african is what achibie achieves in this novel, part of her cautioning against the "�danger of a story' she's described in a ted talk.

reading about the biafran blockade and the starvation of two million people, seeing the faces of emaciated biafran children on posters that circulated throughout the western world in appeals for aid and the end of the war the same time the incident of the slaughtering innocents in my lai, viet nam by the troops under the us military commands of captain medina and lieutenant calley and the presence of the us in viet nam vied for time on national news, paled against the reality of the people starving month after month in biafra as described in adiche's fiction. the high and the low are not spared, property is lost, babies die from hunger, eating rats become a welcomed rarity. the struggle to maintain dignity and maintain the sense of importance of routines, like reading to children, against the loss of hope, to struggle with a faith against annihilation, where one's daily existence is fated, is a glimpse from the other side of the wages of war when starvation is used as a military tactic against civilian populations.
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It won't let you go
by suzannemariposa (5 out of 5 stars)
May 29, 2019

"He laughed. The sound spilled out of him, uncontrolled, and he looked down at the clear blue pool and thought, blithely, that perhaps that shade of blue was also the color of hope." Through multiple disasters and desperations, the characters press on, sometimes alone, sometimes together, and always there is a smidgen of hope.
"I feel as if I have been dropped into something I don't entirely understand," says one character. And that is how I felt reading this thoroughly engaging historical novel as the characters drew me deeper and deeper into their lives and countries. Even though I now know more about Biafra and Nigeria, I also know I still know very little.

The five strong, individual characters are so clearly drawn it is as if they were standing before me in their varied beauty and rareness. I want to know them, have deep conversations with them, listen to their ideas, again and again. Through each of them and their suffering, the tragedies of the Nigerian Civil War (1967-70) are personalized in profound ways that have forever changed my perspective of that war and its consequences.

One of the best books I've read in years. So if you're like me and didn't read it when it was first published, it's not too late to be captivated by the fictional characters in a real-life struggle.
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Is war ever a solution?
by Kate (5 out of 5 stars)
February 19, 2019

Chimamanda Adichie remains one of my favorite writers. Having read and loved Americana, I truly was equally impressed by Half of a Yellow Sun. Her writing remains lucid and vivid; her characters are well developed and so very believable; and her attention to the Biafran War and what it was about and how it began provided me a mini education not just about this particular war, but how it impacts large swathes of humans: rich, poor, intellectuals, ex patriots, and surrounding countries. The politics are complex and really no one country or nation that engaged in Biafra's/Nigeria's government and/or economy as it turns out, is blameless. An excellent read......
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Loved other works by this author so decided to check ...
by Adrianne Byrd (3 out of 5 stars)
March 31, 2015

Loved other works by this author so decided to check this one out. The subject matter is unique, but I have to admit around page 300, my patience was wearing thin. There were quite a number of character with motivations that didn't quite jive. Ugwu's stint fighting-seem more like a last minute change or something. What happen was quick and short-and kind of unbelievable. The rape was holy out of character and even at the time, the author didn't give a believable reason of why he did it. Then when he returns, he back to being the docile man servant? Doesn't ring true. Maybe if he'd been conscripted earlier in the war and then we watch his metamorphosis to Target Destroyer then maybe. There were to many floating characters that when they popped back up later in the text, you struggled to remember who they were. Richard never seem believable or make sense either. You never learn whether Kainene and Richard ever found their rhythm in the bedroom. If it wasn't important--why bring it up? The Kainene situation at the end is also frustrating because as a reader I would have liked to have witnessed what happened to her--even if the characters never find out what happened. And Olanna--really not that deep of a person. And what happened between her in Richard made absolutely no sense. The timeline jumping was consistent through out the whole book. Came a cross as something the author thought of at the beginning and then abandoned for some reason. Anyway. I loved Americanah. This one, not too much. But I will check out the movie on Netflix next.
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Heartbreaking portrait of hope in the face of hopelessness
by Raymond Medel (5 out of 5 stars)
September 27, 2016

I went into this novel with zero expectations or even knowledge of the subject matter. I discovered Adichie through her snippet in Beyonce's "****Flawless", and eventually found a couple of her TED talks and thought that her ideas on storytelling and the importance of perspective were unique in a way that I never considered.
"Half of a Yellow Sun" will challenge you. It will make you question what love means, how to survive through both spirit and body. It emphasizes redemption, the unbreakable bonds of family, of sisterhood. But most importantly it will shatter your heart into a million reflective shards that force you to examine your own life. It will teach you the history of Biafra, a nation of people who would not go quietly into that night even as they were being relentlessly starved and bombed. It will make you fall in love with its characters who are all too real, with lives that are too fully fleshed out.

Read this, let it become a part of you...
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4.5/5 stars - great story
by My 2 Cents (5 out of 5 stars)
September 11, 2013

Half of a Yellow Sun is another one of those books that I had been meaning to read for years. I finally had a chance to experience it. What a great book!

The novel takes place in mid-late 1960's Nigeria, during the time the Igbo people attempted to become the independent nation of Biafra. I heard about this civil war, but really did not know much about the horror which resulted.

The story is told through the perspectives of (3) main characters (but there are other terrific characters as well). There is Ugwu, a 13 year old house boy for professor Odenigbo who teaches at the university in Nsukka. He is a very observant young boy who notices how well he is treated compared to other house boys. For example, he sleeps in a bed and is given his own books. He tries his best to do everything right, but sometimes he takes things a bit too far like when he ironed his Mr. O's socks and burned a hole in them. He provides much needed humor at just the right times. Ironically, Odenigbo seems nicer to his house boy than most other people he encounters.

Olanna and Kainene are twin sisters who come from a wealthy family. Olanna is the beautiful sister, but lacks confidence. She becomes involved with Professor O and later moves into his home and the two eventually marry. At first Ugwu feels threatened by Olanna'a arrival, but then he becomes devoted to pleasing her.

Richard is a shy Englishman, a man who is not comfortable in his own skin. He's always felt inferior whether at home or in Nigeria. Richard has come to Nigeria as a expat to write a book about Igbo art. He becomes involved with Kainene, the twin sister of Olanna. Kainene is not considered to be attractive. She's somewhat aloof, very intelligent and financially savvy, and her relationship with Richard is tumultuous at times.

This story covers so many topics: war, genocide, relationships - infidelity, personal identity, loyalty, class struggles and more. It is a book that would make a great choice for book groups. It's beautifully written, the characters are fully explored and they are ones that will stick with you. The author knows how to write, and although this is a work of fiction, the information about the civil war was very informative. I found the graphic details of the war tough to read about at times, but because the writing had moments of humor and the characters were so interesting, it helped to take my mind off the horrors of war. READ IT!

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