Dream Count by Chimamanda Adichie
Dream Count is a book written by one of the finest African authors, Chimamanda Adichie. The book narrates in easy to understand language the intersecting stories of four African women, recounting their hopes, dreams and struggles, interweaving flashbacks from their childhood and earlier adulthood. These stories have episodes set in the narrative present, during the COVID-19 pandemic, making the reader have what seems like real-time experience enmeshed in the life of the characters.
Among these four women, the first woman is Chiamaka, a US-based travel writer from a wealthy Nigerian family. The story tells how she spends much of her adult life looking for the ideal romantic partner. Chiamaka’s narrative is followed by the story of her friend Zikora, a Nigerian lawyer who also lives in the US. She gives birth to a baby boy after her boyfriend has left her. What follows next will keep you glued to the book.
Next is Kadiatou, Chiamaka’s Guinean housekeeper who is sexually assaulted by a powerful guest in the hotel where she works as a cleaner. Her story was inspired by the real-life case of Nafissatou Diallo and Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
Finally, the book closes with the story of the last of the four women, Chiamaka’s cousin Omelogor, a banker in Nigeria’s capital city, Abuja. Apart being a banker, Omelogor also operates a website giving life advice to men, and she spends a short time in a US university conducting research on pornography. Hers is another intriguing sub-plot that makes the book very interesting.
Chimamanda’s Dream Count is an engaging, occasionally humorous, and deeply moving portrait of these women, providing dramatic details of how navigate social expectations, especially when it comes to marriage and motherhood. This is another intriguing piece from Chimamanda that you should read.
