"Richly marbled with criss-crossing storylines", the action follows four women living between Nigeria and Washington DC whose "lives haven't panned out as imagined", said Anthony Cummins in The Guardian. In a "bumper compilation of middle-aged life experience", Adichie follows the women as they navigate love, trauma, regret and societal pressures to marry and have children.
The story unfolds with "stately virtuosity" and "doesn't flag or sag", partly because Adichie continuously "deepens and reframes our understanding" of each character, but also because she manages to pack so much into every page.
The book begins to "crackle with outrage and urgency" when we're introduced to Kadiatou, a Guinean-born single mother who has finally found "steady work" in America as a maid at a luxury hotel when she is "suddenly, horrifically assaulted" by one of the "prominent guests" staying there. Drawing on Dominique Strauss-Kahn's alleged assault of a Guinean maid, Nafissatou Diallo, almost 15 years ago, Adichie uses the narrative to delve into "darker questions of justice and exploitation".
In the "aftermath" of these scenes, the "novel's undercurrent of politics hums louder". Travel writer Chiamaka sees her career as a journalist "hampered by American editors who would rather publish outdated stereotypes of Africans" than listen to her ideas, while "saucy, sharp" former banker Omelogor is "willing to play in the corrupt games of powerful men" to amass her wealth in Nigeria but feels "ridiculed and dismissed in America for that same spirit".
At times, the pacing "speeds up too quickly" and the character Zikora "fades away" in the final section of the book. But these issues never dampen the novel's "vibrant energy", and on every page the writer's voice is as "forthright and clarifying as ever".
It's almost as if Adichie has treated us to "four novels for the price of one", added Cummins in The Guardian, each charged with the "thrill" of "lavishly imagined" characters. "It was worth the wait." By Irenie Forshaw, The Week
