Yejide is struggling to conceive a child. Her husband, Akin has even given into to the pressure of relatives to urge he take on a second wife who can carry his baby. Catapulting between hope and heartbreak, Yejide goes to lengths she wouldn’t imagine and along the way, she discovers secrets about her marriage. Secrets that disguised themselves in plain sight. Stay With Me is Ayobami Adebayo debut novel and its a must-read!
Thoughts
Can someone tell me which poetic deity chose to live among our Nigerian brothers and sisters? I suppose when your predecessors are the likes of Wole Sonyinka and Chinua Achebe, you have no choice but to strive for brilliance. And this is exactly what this book was. Brilliant.
I was surprised by this book. I didn’t expect such a simple narrative to have me gasping for air and literally closing so I could process what I just read…only to return a few seconds later becuase I just couldn’t get enough.
Characters
I absolutely love how Adebayo refuses to fall into the literay mould of African protagonists always having the moral high ground. Her characters are not only far from perfect but unromantically so. Yet, Adebayo cadences their immorality by guiding her readers down a path of understanding and sympathy. Stay With Me reminded me that we are all living behind the shells we built for our own protection against lived experiences. Most times we build them without even being aware of those past traumas.
Writing Style
Adebayo’s writing is prosaic velvet. Using Nigerian folktales and song, she reminds us why we use storytelling to teach, to prophesize and to escape. I love that her imagery is rich and yer soft and unintimidating. While safeguarding that refreshing contemporary voice, she plunges us into Nigeria in the 90s, giving us a taste — literally, a delicious bite of pounded yam — into the blend of suburbia and ruralness in Ife.
Family and Military Governments
Any authentic and believable work of realism set in Nigeria needs to acknowlege the political climate. Since 1983 Nigeria lived under two military governnments, only holding democratic elections in 1999. I love the balance between politics and domesticity in this novel. The latter being Adebayo’s focus and the former merely guiding the plot.
Yejide and Akin are our only eyes to this political state of Nigeria. Only through them do we witness the tension of attempted coups; the crime and corruption in the suburbs as a consequence to all the political unrest; and the role woman play in order to protect their children during this instability. Come to think of it, Adebayo carefully mirrors the politics with Yejide’s quest to be a mother —on the domestic level and on the political level: hope, fear and apprehension are transferable emotions.
Conclusion
Stay with me by Ayobami Adebayo is a georgous achievement that humanizes the experience of parents and marriages in a society of traditionalists and contemporaries. Everyone should read this book and realize that the complexities of love, marriage and motherhood are preciously universal.
Thanks so much for reading 🙂
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