keylaz's review against another edition
challenging
funny
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
gre_books's review
adventurous
funny
informative
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.25
La trasformazione รจ al centro di questo romanzo che mi ha catturata per due giorni interi. Il protagonista subisce un cambiamento e sperimenta la discriminazione dell'essere bianco in un paese a maggioranza nera. Interessante notare le dinamiche sociali e il finale รจ aperto e molto commovente.ย
gathonik's review
3.0
Started off slow but picked up. Had some funny parts but was random at the end.
freyafrejya's review against another edition
emotional
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
jiyoung's review against another edition
3.0
A black Nigerian wakes up to find he has turned into a redheaded, green-eyed white man. He flees into the streets of Lagos and faces a new world of privilege and prejudice. The premise and satirical potential were excellent but execution fell short. The female characters were pretty one-dimensional (i.e., sexist depictions) and Furo had a *criminally* uninteresting internal life given his circumstances. Igoniโs parallel sexual transformation also came out of nowhere (I had to read back I was so confused). But the pidgin and side characters made me miss Lagos.
seeceeread's review against another edition
3.25
๐ญ "We are all constructed narratives."
Plot: Furo Wariboko, an unemployed Nigerian seeking a job among thousands of applicants, wakes up to discover he is now white.
The back cover blurbs call this "a devastating social parable," "hallucinatory brilliance," and "the best kind of serious." I am less smitten. The casual asides strewn every few pages about Nigerian dysfunction and capitol city chaos were not funny, to me, though I think they were meant to be. Furo takes them at face value, hearing biting commentary as permission to ruthlessly take โ money, advantage, opportunity: "Life in Lagos was locked in a constant struggle against empathy. Compassion was a fatal fracturing in hearts bunkered against the city's hardness." I don't believe main characters must be likable, yet this one is especially heinous.
An extended introduction to Furo's sister through Twitter posts needed better integration. I wished for more absurdity, more high drama, in a scene filled with moneyed Nigerian women who all married white Westerners. Furo's failed romance with a co-worker unnecessarily shows his callousness, which is brutally demonstrated in the next plot point:
Barrett started with short stories and I'm curious as to whether their more concise design yielded tighter, punchier versions of his ideas.
Plot: Furo Wariboko, an unemployed Nigerian seeking a job among thousands of applicants, wakes up to discover he is now white.
Spoiler
Abandoning his family, he rushes to the interview and is offered a job for which he didn't apply. Realizing he needs to find a way to pass two weeks before he begins work, he finnagles housing and a kept lifestyle with Syreeta, herself a mistress. Their avid lovemaking reveals he has a blackass, and he begins to fully inhabit a ๐ซ๐ข๐ค๐ฌ๐ข๐ด๐ด persona. Once he begins work as a salesperson with a new company (where the books for business people are real bangers, like Covey's ๐ณ ๐๐ฎ๐ฏ๐ถ๐๐), he is quickly offered several other gigs to be the white-man-in-front. And two weeks in, accepts one because it allows him to more deliberately actualize his new alter ego, Frank Whyte. Along the way, we also meet Igoni, a writer whose gender changes halfway through the story. She's the only person who understands what Furo is experiencing, and the only person who maintains a tenuous tie to his previous life. When she outs him to his family who has been frantically searching for him, via a phone call, he dutifully waits at the door to greet them.The back cover blurbs call this "a devastating social parable," "hallucinatory brilliance," and "the best kind of serious." I am less smitten. The casual asides strewn every few pages about Nigerian dysfunction and capitol city chaos were not funny, to me, though I think they were meant to be. Furo takes them at face value, hearing biting commentary as permission to ruthlessly take โ money, advantage, opportunity: "Life in Lagos was locked in a constant struggle against empathy. Compassion was a fatal fracturing in hearts bunkered against the city's hardness." I don't believe main characters must be likable, yet this one is especially heinous.
An extended introduction to Furo's sister through Twitter posts needed better integration. I wished for more absurdity, more high drama, in a scene filled with moneyed Nigerian women who all married white Westerners. Furo's failed romance with a co-worker unnecessarily shows his callousness, which is brutally demonstrated in the next plot point:
Spoiler
He coerces his lover to end a pregnancy she desires with a manipulative lie.Barrett started with short stories and I'm curious as to whether their more concise design yielded tighter, punchier versions of his ideas.
alecjira's review
challenging
funny
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
I speed-read this book over the couple days I had before an exam I'm writing on the novel today, and while I'm glad I read it and I think it's got meaningful things to say about race and gender, I found the whole Igoni storyline kind of out of left field.
Furo's an asshole. The book commentates on the effects capitalistic mindsets have on a person's morality, and of racial and gender-based power structures have a tendency to reproduce themselves. So Furo being an asshole works for what Barrett was going for.
But for the whole Igoni part not to feel so shoehorned into the novel I feel more time should have been spent on making Igoni a fully rounded out character rather than a mysterious cardboard cutout. That detracted from the novel's efficacy, in my mind.
Furo's an asshole. The book commentates on the effects capitalistic mindsets have on a person's morality, and of racial and gender-based power structures have a tendency to reproduce themselves. So Furo being an asshole works for what Barrett was going for.
But for the whole Igoni part not to feel so shoehorned into the novel I feel more time should have been spent on making Igoni a fully rounded out character rather than a mysterious cardboard cutout. That detracted from the novel's efficacy, in my mind.
thelaurasaurus's review
2.0
I'm glad I read it, but I think it could have gone somewhere a lot more interesting.
vdokk1's review
dark
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5