Summary:
A dazzlingly accomplished debut collection explores the ties that bind parents and children, husbands and wives, lovers and friends to one another and to the places they call home.
In “Who Will Greet You at Home,” a National Magazine Award finalist for The New Yorker, A woman desperate for a child weaves one out of hair, with unsettling results. In “Wild,” a disastrous night out shifts a teenager and her Nigerian cousin onto uneasy common ground. In “The Future Looks Good,” three generations of women are haunted by the ghosts of war, while in “Light,” a father struggles to protect and empower the daughter he loves. And in the title story, in a world ravaged by flood and riven by class, experts have discovered how to “fix the equation of a person” – with rippling, unforeseen repercussions.
Evocative, playful, subversive, and incredibly human, What It Means When a Man Falls from the Sky heralds the arrival of a prodigious talent with a remarkable career ahead of her.
My take: 3 looks
Originally reviewed August 21, 2018
Some of the stories made no sense to me, feeling as if I were dropped into the middle of a conversation which was over before it truly ended. Like the middle of a sandwich with no bread. However, most of the stories had me on the edge of my seat, flipping pages with anticipation.
At first I was a bit reminded of “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor because of the jarring nature of the ending of the opening story. I just didn’t expect it. However, Arimah is her own storyteller, with a distinct taste of African culture, yet universally relatable tales. It is with interest that I note a repetitive theme in mothers and daughters. As an only child, a daughter, to a very present mother, I appreciated this, and read these stories several times.
Written to shock, console, engage the little gray cells, and entertain, don’t let this one pass you by.
Recommended.
