A review by novelbloglover
The Sleepless by Nuzo Onoh
4.0
Book Review
Title: The Sleepless
Author: Nuzo Onoh
Genre: Paranormal/Drama/Fantasy
Rating: ****
Review: I personally have never read African Horror so this is a completely new genre to me and was a very interesting experience. I loved the opening page it was so creepy and menacing and hinting at so many dark things to come and for fans of horror like myself it is exactly what we want to see. It complete sucked my into the writing and flying through page after page.
Overall the first chapter was absolutely captivating, there’s a ritualistic sacrifice of a child written the some horrific details and I just loved it. African Horror seems like my kind of reading and I will definitely be reading more by this author and this genre.
I was not keen on the fact that the father in this family is abused towards his youngest daughter and his wife and there is also a slight implication he sexually abused his older daughter – these are themes I don’t personally like – incest and abuse and he’s not afraid the take a birch whip to anyone who angers him or crosses him in a fowl mood.
Obele has a sort of psychic gift, she calls it Mother Voice and it has told her what has happened to her brother, she also sees Kene’s spirit as if he is reaching out to her. When she tells her parents as you can guess all it earns her is a whipping, but the look on her father’s face was priceless.
My favourite thing about this novel is it teaches you so much about the African traditions, superstitions and rituals which teaches you so much about the background of the novel without taking away anything from the novel itself, in fact it adds to it which is very rare in the literary world.
I also enjoyed the fact The Sleepless isn’t just the title of the novel they are actually characters in the book, but naming them would be a major spoiler so I’m not going to.
Another thing about this novel that really impressed me was religion plays a key role but does so without being boring or pretentious. I loved the twists and turns in almost every chapter constantly pushing and pulling you in a million different directions and guessing at what or who is coming for you next.
We see a lot of varied opinions of the aspect of religion and good and evil. I also liked the war within Obele as to whether Mother Voice is a demon or The Virgin Mary.
I absolutely loved how Onoh details the horrors of war and the how realistic the novel is even with its strong paranormal/fantasy elements. The ending was amazing and made for an amazing conclusion to a gripping horror novel, that I will definitely be recommending it to all my blogger friends.
Title: The Sleepless
Author: Nuzo Onoh
Genre: Paranormal/Drama/Fantasy
Rating: ****
Review: I personally have never read African Horror so this is a completely new genre to me and was a very interesting experience. I loved the opening page it was so creepy and menacing and hinting at so many dark things to come and for fans of horror like myself it is exactly what we want to see. It complete sucked my into the writing and flying through page after page.
Overall the first chapter was absolutely captivating, there’s a ritualistic sacrifice of a child written the some horrific details and I just loved it. African Horror seems like my kind of reading and I will definitely be reading more by this author and this genre.
I was not keen on the fact that the father in this family is abused towards his youngest daughter and his wife and there is also a slight implication he sexually abused his older daughter – these are themes I don’t personally like – incest and abuse and he’s not afraid the take a birch whip to anyone who angers him or crosses him in a fowl mood.
Obele has a sort of psychic gift, she calls it Mother Voice and it has told her what has happened to her brother, she also sees Kene’s spirit as if he is reaching out to her. When she tells her parents as you can guess all it earns her is a whipping, but the look on her father’s face was priceless.
My favourite thing about this novel is it teaches you so much about the African traditions, superstitions and rituals which teaches you so much about the background of the novel without taking away anything from the novel itself, in fact it adds to it which is very rare in the literary world.
I also enjoyed the fact The Sleepless isn’t just the title of the novel they are actually characters in the book, but naming them would be a major spoiler so I’m not going to.
Another thing about this novel that really impressed me was religion plays a key role but does so without being boring or pretentious. I loved the twists and turns in almost every chapter constantly pushing and pulling you in a million different directions and guessing at what or who is coming for you next.
We see a lot of varied opinions of the aspect of religion and good and evil. I also liked the war within Obele as to whether Mother Voice is a demon or The Virgin Mary.
I absolutely loved how Onoh details the horrors of war and the how realistic the novel is even with its strong paranormal/fantasy elements. The ending was amazing and made for an amazing conclusion to a gripping horror novel, that I will definitely be recommending it to all my blogger friends.