A review by bookish_by_elle
Innards: Stories by Magogodi oaMphela Makhene

emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

5.0

At the end of this, I might be crying because it's over and the writing was so eloquent and felt so raw and authentic and unbound by rules. Or I am probably crying because some of these stories are sad. Apartheid stories are probably supposed to be sad, at least for those who have been pushed to the periphery and sometimes over the edge. Yet, the author manages to capture her characters in the fullness of their lives — they love, they laugh, they fight, they are human. But I am mostly crying because the product that is this book is such a beautiful offering to the author's family and it caught me completely off guard:

How to thank my family? By writing a book that tries to mimic the explosive belly laughing, eye-rolling and heart-feasting I know because of you. People mistakenly think apartheid is our whole story. That overcoming it is our triumph. They don't realize how far our jokes, joy, resilience, side-eyes, phat asses, raw beauty, and humanity stretch — from time immemorial and way yonder, into the unbound eternal.