As with me, most people’s first reaction to this book will be to its title. To be clear, it does not use the infamous n-word but rather refers to Nigeria (pronounced with a soft-g, not a hard-g). Further, it is used in real life to describe a group of women in Lagos, Nigeria, who are foreign-born wives of Nigerian men living in Nigeria. As described in this book, they meet in an organized group and have witnessed the rise and fall of hopes for rekindled Nigerian strength. While telling a suspenseful tale, Vanessa Walters shows the seeming pettiness of a two-class economic system in the cities coupled with less structured rural environments.
Nicole Oruwari, the wife and mother of a prominent family in Lagos, suddenly goes missing. Outwardly, she seems to have a perfect life of comfort, yet surprisingly, no one seems especially worried about her disappearance except her aunt Claudine, who raised her and lives in the UK. Claudine voyages to Lagos to explore. She finds that Nicole, Nicole’s family, and just about everyone else have dark family secrets that imprison their lives. The story unfolds in a series of paired chapters set before the disappearance and then after the disappearance. As the plot develops, Claudine discovers that she and Nicole, too, have disturbing family secrets that they have been harboring. Then the story reaches a powerful, punctuated climax followed by a surprising, short denouement.
This work’s main strength is a complicated but unique and surprising ending, which ties together a complex plot. The climax and conclusion are both plausible and unpredictable – a tough pairing to pull off. I suspect that Walters wrote the entire book with this ending in mind. Therein lies its main weakness, too. The book takes a long time to unfurl and can get a bit boring. I’d suggest that it might be improved by a few subplots and character development. All the “Easter eggs” are laid very carefully, but Walters might lose some readers before her stellar ending. It needs something more to draw in reader interest to move it from merely good to great.
The Author’s Note exposes part of the larger social problem. Under a hopeful governmental leader, many talented, educated Nigerians (and there are many across the world) moved back to Nigeria with the hope of strengthening the country. Thus came the group of Nigerwives. However, cultural inertia then led to widespread corruption under a new government. Directionless lifestyles of cultural elites are on full display in this work, and culminate in the life story of Nicole. The often-meaninglessness of a life of wealthy leisure degenerates into secret vices that constrain everyone. Having once lived as a Nigerwife herself in Lagos, Walters calls for the rejuvenation of the original, spiritually rich aim of national renewal.
The Nigerwife: A Novel
By Vanessa Walters
Copyright (c) 2023
Atria Books
ISBN13 9781668011089
Page Count: 318
Genre: Suspense, Fiction
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