Voice of America by E.C. Osondu | Book Review

Voice of America is a collection of eighteen short stories. It begins with Waiting and ends with the titular story, Voice of America. Some of the characters live in Nigeria and fantasize about the American life while swapping and parroting myths about Americans. Other times the characters are immigrants living in America and grappling with the realities of the American way of life. Of the eighteen short stories I only like seven - Waiting (I love, love, love this one. There's a reason it won the 2009 Caine Prize for African Writing), Bar Beach (love this), Our First American (love this one), Jimmy Carter's Eyes (I love this one a lot. It was a finalist for the 2007 Caine Prize for African Writing), A Letter from Home (love this), The Men They Married, and I Will Lend You My Wife. I had a mixed reaction to some of the remaining nine stories and disliked a couple of them.

Voice of America is E.C. Osondu's debut collection of short stories. It was published in 2010 and I've seen it referenced and recommended so many times over the last few years. Because it's so well regarded I expected to like it or at least a good chunk of it but things didn't turn out that way. I loved the first few stories but as I got further in my reading I encountered more and more stories I did not care for. Welcome to America was where my reading completely stalled for the first time. Every other entertainment choice in my house was more appealing than returning to that story but I finally got through it.

The first E.C. Osondu book I read was his second collection of short stories This House Is Not For Sale when it was published last year. I love that book a lot. Voice of America bears some similarities with This House Is Not For Sale except that the country of obsession by its characters is America instead of Britain. Voice of America is very enjoyable at the good points and E.C. Osondu's humor cracked me up just as it always does. I honestly would have liked to walk away loving the majority of stories in this highly regarded collection by Osondu. Honestly. If This House Is Not For Sale is an 8 out of 10 then Voice of America is a 5 out of 10.

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This House Is Not For Sale by E.C. Osondu | Book Review

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This House Is Not for Sale by E.C. Osondu | Book Review

There's a house called "Family House" in E.C. Osondu's 2015 novel This House Is Not For Sale and it's at the center of everything that happens in the city. It's a large, wealthy household run by "Grandpa" and its members are not all related by blood or marriage. Some members of the Family House are runaways, abandoned children, and at least one's a murderer. Each chapter in this novel covers one of the many characters inhabiting the Family House and each character commands attention from start to finish. Grandpa is generous with his wealth and so the Family House is a source of assistance to the community but also a ready source of entertainment and the subject of much gossip. The Family House is a spectacle and with every occurrence the city's inhabitants are always there to dish truly delicious commentary.

This House Is Not For Sale is my first book by E.C. Osondu who won the 2009 Caine Prize for African Writing for his 2009 short story, Waiting, and also authored the short story collection, Voice of America. It's an interesting medley of great characters, myths, social commentary and all things Nigerian. The gossip and murmuring of the city's inhabitants, always preceded by a hyphen right after an occurrence in the novel, are some of the best parts of This House Is Not For Sale. It's a really good read.
[Image via Amazon]