Things They Lost

by Okwiri Oduor

Okwiri Oduor's THINGS THEY LOST, following the story of a powerfully lonely girl living on the edge of a Kenyan village and delving deep into the mystery of girlhood, friendship, and loss.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Magical Realism, Africa, Kenya, African Literature, Audiobook

358 pages, Paperback

First published April 12, 2022

About the author

Okwiri Oduor (born 1988/1989) is a Kenyan writer, who won the 2014 Caine Prize with her short story "My Father's Head". In April 2014 she was named on the Hay Festival's Africa39 list of 39 Sub-Saharan African writers aged under 40 with potential and talent to define trends in African literature, with her story "Rag Doll" being included in the subsequent anthology edited by Ellah Allfrey, Africa39: New Writing from Africa South of the Sahara.

Reviews

[Lisa of Troy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Lost On Me

Unfortunately, I felt like this book was boring, and I have struggled to put my finger on exactly the reasons (but here goes).

Things They Lost is written in the third person, and I really believe that it would have been better off written in the first person. There are scenes which should be highly emotional; however, they fall flat. It felt like I was reading a newspaper article which meant that I didn’t connect very well to the characters.

The author does a lot of telling versus showing. For example, one of the characters constructs something over a course of days, and no one seems to notice. That should have been a big scene. It was glossed over in a few paragraphs. It would have been much more poignant to really describe the experience, play-by-play, glimpsing the character’s emotions of putting her heart and soul into a project, only to be ignored by the person she loves most in the world.

There is also too much wriggling with some version of the word mentioned 30 times and mud more than 40 (this is an ARC so the final word count might be more or less). Also, in the format that I read, there were no quotation marks when the characters were speaking. I have a difficult time tracking with my eyes so this was disorientating for me.

In some regards, the author was too obvious. For example, there was a confrontation in a church, and the characters then sat down and started to process the events that just occurred, stating the obvious. This took away from my experience as a reader.

The author has a strong command of nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs with a very diverse vocabulary and has very flowery prose. The author is clearly very capable, but this book just wasn’t my cup of tea.

*Thanks, NetGalley, for a free copy of this book in exchange for my fair and honest opinion.

2024 Reading Schedule
Jan Middlemarch
Feb The Grapes of Wrath
Mar Oliver Twist
Apr Madame Bovary
May A Clockwork Orange
Jun Possession
Jul The Folk of the Faraway Tree Collection
Aug Crime and Punishment
Sep Heart of Darkness
Oct Moby-Dick
Nov Far From the Madding Crowd
Dec A Tale of Two Cities

Connect With Me!
Blog Twitter BookTube Facebook Insta

[emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

i guess sometimes there's such a thing as Too interesting.

julia fox. the harlem globetrotters. this book. all of them have such a sustained high level of interest that it does a full 180 to Impossible To Feel Invested In.

this, for example, has a lot of interesting things to say about mothers and daughters and intergenerational memory, and it's magical and beautifully written, but ultimately it gets so caught up in its own uniqueness it seems to keep the reader at a distance.

much like the harlem globetrotters keep doing, like, that thing where you spin the basketball on your finger.

bottom line: too much of a good thing!

-------------------
currently-reading updates

magical realism <3

-------------------
tbr review

just got an e-arc of this because my life is perfect

[Faith · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Ayosa had many such memories, of the Yonder Days, before she’d turned into a girl. She had been a wriggling thing, unbound, light as a Sunday morning thought. She’d drifted on by, watching people. Well, watching mostly her mama. She had watched her mama for years before that day when her mama felt her close by and said, please-please-please I need you. Most people did not have these sorts of memories.”

The insides of her eyelids were orange, and her tongue tasted cantaloupe on itself. Her chest heaved and her breath oozed out of her nose, hot and stinging, like candle wax.”

This is both a coming of age book and the story of a mother/daughter bond. I hate magical realism, so I should not have even attempted to read this book. Unfortunately, I also did not enjoy the more realistic aspects of the book. I just did not connect with the writing style or characters and this book wasn’t for me.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

[Danielle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Note: I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I had a hard time following the writing. Maybe it’s due to the ARC copy? It feels all over and hard to follow.

[Emily Coffee and Commentary · Rating 3 out of 5]

A whimsical novel on the magic and curse of childhood imagination, as well as the power of the worlds we invent within ourselves. Filled with an otherworldly atmosphere and a growing sense of longing, Things They Lost is a fluid exercise in the weight that language holds; it is a fresh portrayal of the thin veil between worlds, the ways in which we fill the gaps of absence and insecurity in our lives with stories, fables. It is a tale of the lengths we go to in order to connect to one another, to assert, that, in the space between dreams and reality, the waters between life and death, we are here, we remain, no matter how many years go by.

[LONELY TOURIST · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't have words for how gorgeous this book is: I took my time with it because I wanted to make sure I gave it the attention it deserved. I wanted to savor every word. I've read a lot of knockout debuts, but Okwiri Oduor is in a league of her own with this one. If you're into stories about women and girls and the gorgeous, messy roles they fill for each other, which I'm thinking is most of my following here, pre-order it yesterday.

Thank you SO much for the ARC, NetGalley.

[Claire · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely loved this novel and was pulled in by the voice telling it immediately.

Ayosa Ataraxis Brown is a character that is going to stay with me for a long time. She is 12 years old and lives virtually alone in a large house that has passed down the family since the English woman Mabel Brown first arrived and built a house and employed enough people to call the surrounding area Mabel Town. It has now appropriately, evolved into Mapeli Town.

Now her great grand daughter lives there and she is spiritually aware, a necessary trait for her survival, when it is often difficult to tell whether the person standing in front of you is real and kind, or is a wraith that wants to snatch you. The Fatunas who dwell upstairs keep her company and often make the house shake.

The radio also keeps her and the townsfolk company, the Radio man reads the death news and Ms. Temperance reads a daily poem, and violence has been known to occur if she misses a day, so important is the daily poem to this community.

The prose is magical, how to even describe it, reading Okwiri Obuor is to enter into another world, her rich, vibrant, incantatory prose doesn't just shine, it is deeply invested in portraying the day to day presence and effect of abandonment by the mother.

Ayosa is one in a line of those who have been abandoned, who continue the pattern, this is her coming-of-age story, this all-seeing girl, how she lives, what she sees, what nurtures and nourishes her in the absence of mother. And how she might break free of it, despite the characteristics that have become strong in her as a result of all she has experienced until now.

This is a journey of the soul, of the many lives already lived, of those met along the way in this one precious life, of overcoming challenges and learning to stand up to what is no longer acceptable.

...more to come...so happy to see this nominated for the Dylan Thomas Award.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd read this described as magical realism, but I don't think it's that, rather it describes the effect of trauma and the psychological strategies humans use to survive it, using as its patterns the Kenyan folkloric and cultural motifs natural to its protagonist.

I enjoyed the way the story flowed and gradually opened out, integrating the reader into the experience of the main character's disintegration and reintegration. It's dark and painful at times, but ultimately hopeful, full of love and compassion.

[Debbie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Things they lost by Okwiri Oduor
Tells the story of a lonely girl living in a small African town and struggle to free herself from her mother. Ayosa is a wandering spirit joyous, exuberant, filled to the brim with longing. Her only companion in her grandmother's crumbling house are as Ayosa herself: the ghostly Fatumas, whose eyes are the size of bay windows, who teach her to dance and wail at the death news.This story is filled with mystery and magic. ✨

[Nkatha · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book portrays an incredibly lush landscape of longing, betrayal and death. The setting (Matapeli Town) is evocative and surreal. The characters are strange and magical yet have ordinary human yearnings. I loved the fatumas, the jinamizi, the concept of a throwaway girl who rides a bullet ridden car pulled by Magnolia the horse. I loved the cat called Bwana Matambara and the mountain called Mt. Try Me Not. I loved Sindano and her ten dead husbands and "Wajamani that cow is dead". I loved the found sisterhood, and letting go of generational trauma. I was triggered by Nabumbo Promise Brown breaking all her promises, and Lola Freedom depriving her children of freedom. I loved the tender and compassionate way in which Okwiri writes Ayosa and her sadness. Mostly though I loved the centering of Kenyanness and its peculiarities. I highly recommend this.

[Mansi V · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars
Whilst fantasy isn't my go-to genre, the Kenyan folklore woven in throughout the story actually made this a beautifully written and compelling read (at the beginning). Although it was written in the 3rd person. Okwiri Odour managed to perfectly capture the innocence and naïveté of the young Ayosa, whilst also creating complex characters haunted by generational trauma. The use of a small village setting added to the connection with the characters.
However, this book requires a lot of attention and disappointingly I found around halfway through the book, I started to lose interest and didn't reach for the book as much. The ending also somehow felt rushed whilst also feeling dragged out.

[Natasha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't know what to expect with this one. This was just spectacular. Impossibly sad in parts, hopeful and uplifting in others. Beautiful writing. Complex characters. Magical yet terrifying at times. This story will stay with me awhile yet! 💗

[Ellen-Arwen Tristram · Rating 2 out of 5]

REVIEW TO COME! In the meantime, I'll whet your appetite with a few mysterious quotes...

'Her shinbones were made of paper. Different people's shinbones were made of different things. Some people's shinbones were made of bamboo flutes, and some people's shinbones were made of copper wire, and some people's shinbones were made of lemongrass stalks. She knew that her shinbones were made of paper because she knew the story of herself.'

'Their hair was made of cobwebs. Their eyes were bay windows, and when you looked into them, you saw fruit bats and toadstools and tadpoles dangling from gnarled fig branches.'

'My love for you is deep, but even then, it's not always so. Sometimes my love for you is lukewarm at best. And sometimes I feel nothing for you. Nothing at all. I search inside myself for that hot, scalding love and it's not there anymore.'

Intrigued anyone?

[Mentai · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is some astonishing writing by Oduor, and much of it took my breath away: the poetry, the rhythm, the difficult relations between mothers and daughters, intergenerational trauma. But it's also a challenging read, one i wasn't really up for at the moment, and as full as the book is, I couldn't always pay it my full attention.
I sometimes thought, would it have worked better in shorter form, but in the end, Oduor's language and chorus like structure were heft enough.

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okwiri Odour’s Things They Lost slowly, but artfully, tells the story of four generations of the Brown family in fictional Mapeli Town, somewhere in Africa. It opens in 1988 on Epitaph Day, a day of collective memories and grief when people call out the names of all those they have lost. Young, book-loving Ayosa Ataraxis Brown desperately needs to feel wanted by her mother Nabumbo Promise Brown, who comes and goes like tumbleweed. Even during her rare time at home, Nabumbo Promise disappears inside herself, suffering from her own troubled past and making promises she never keeps.

Odour gradually unwinds the complex story not only of mother and daughter, but also of Nabumbo Promise’s sister Rosette and brother Maxwell Truth, grandmother Lola Freedom Brown, and great-grandmother Mabel Brown, the white British Colonial woman who, in the early 1900s built the large, now-decaying home Ayosa too often lives in alone.

“Sitting on the groaning staircase inside the decaying manor, was the loneliest girl in the world,” Odour writes. Ayosa’s only company are the Fatumas, originally Indian Ocean sea creatures, who now hide in the attic and console Ayosa, dancing chakacha for all the world’s missing mothers and ‘for all the daughters left at home waiting.”

Although Nabumbo Promise Brown orders Ayosha to avoid other people and never to go into town, the girl finds ways to connect with the larger world whether listening to the radio as Ms. Temperance recites aching poetry that speaks to the broken-hearted child, visiting Sindano in her Mutheu Must Go Café where no customer ever comes, or befriending Mbiu, the girl whose mother had been shot full of holes and ended up looking like a carrot grater.

In a magical world in which jolly anna birds in the yard mockingly scream “Jolly anna ha-ha-ha,” in which wraiths threaten to steal people away by tempting them with whatever it is that those people most want or need, Ayosa seeks a place in the world—a place where she belongs, where others need and love her.
Those willing to read every vivid, poetic word, suspend disbelief, and enter a strange—yet strangely real—world haunted by its British colonial past will find themselves rooting for Ayosa Ataraxis Brown and her fight for a better life worth living.

Thanks to NetGalley and Scribner for an advance reader copy of this highly recommended novel.

[Julie Ambani · Rating 5 out of 5]

(PSA: Take my review with a pinch of salt because I can definitely see how the writing style in this book would not be for all)

“I have waited for so long. For my mama to say, Buttercup, here is a plate of food that I cooked for you. Eat, my child, so you may grow big and strong. Is that so hard a thing for a mama to say?”

In the early 90s, an Englishwoman named Mabel Brown settled on some Kenyan land. A town developed soon after her arrival and was named Mapeli town, a token to the evolution of her presence there. Mabel was, for lack of a gentler way of putting it, a terrible mother to her daughter, Lola Freedom who in turn, was a terrible mother to her children one of whom is Nabumbo Promise, who is as expected, a terrible mother to her own daughter: Ayosa Brown.

This story follows the journey of 12 year old Ayosa, who is the loneliest girl in the world with only one desire, to be loved wholly by her mother. Used to being abandoned for days on end, Ayosa spends her time tending to animals, dancing chakacha with the ghosts in her house called The Fatumas and using her gift of remembrance to put together her family’s story.

Okwiri Oduor has managed to tell a story about generational dysfunction in the most amazing and lyrical prose I’ve seen so far. Weaved in Kenyan folklore and myths, tangled in magical realism including a jinamizi and several wraiths, I was enchanted by this book from start to finish.

While I wouldn’t normally read this kind of writing, I was drawn into the fictional world created by the author, that balances between the dead and the alive. The journey through which we uncover what really happened with the Brown family to cause such dysfunction is punctuated with some humor and satire and a haunting realism of what mother-daughter relationships could be.

I do recommend this book. It’s the best Kenyan authored book I’ve read so far!

[Cora Jeyadame · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely one of the most beautiful books I’ve read this year. I listened to it in Audible, and the voice actor’s narration added to the experience. The prose is musical and the story jumps back and forth in time and point of view. Magical realism is woven throughout and helps tell the story through multiple perspectives and time periods.

Though it is all told in the 3rd person, the voice of Ayosa is one that will stick with me. Ayosa’s struggles to make sense of what it means to be a daughter, mother and sister and generational trauma are familiar themes but Ayosa’s voice is fresh makes them seem brand new.

There’s an early on reference to Ayosa’s rejection of the librarian’s suggestion of Pippi Longstocking and Pippi’s father, the "King of the Negroes." The best traits of Pippi-her outrageousness, love of animals and ability to function without any adults or societal rules-are mirrored in Ayosa’s friend, Mbui . Mbui and Ayosa’s have different and complementary approaches to navigating a world without reliable adults. Someone could easily write a dissertation exploring these themes as experienced through Ayosa’s and Mbui

Highly recommend!

[Deborah · Rating 3 out of 5]

On the outskirts of a small town in Kenya, 12-year-old Ayosa lives in the crumbling mansion built by her white great-grandmother and waits for her photographer mother to return from her increasingly long absences. Ayosa is left alone for months at a time and is monumentally sad and lonely, though she is looked in on and sometimes fed by a few of the neighbours. Heavily freighted with magical realism and African folklore, this is the story of four generations of a blighted family of women, who each pass, mother to daughter, their burden of sorrow and guilt and anger. As Ayosa waits for her mother to return, she explores her surroundings and probes the past; she’s gifted with an ability to see things that happened even before her birth and starts to put together the past events that birthed the sorry present. I enjoy magical realism judiciously applied, but it was laid on with a trowel here, in my opinion seriously detracting from the vein of narrative.

[Dawn Michelle]

Read Around the World: Kenya

What. THE. HECK?
I had great hopes for this book, but it just wasn't for me. I couldn't connect with the characters, the story, the whole thing. I kept wanting to love this, then even like it and it just didn't happen. I just finished it and I absolutely cannot tell you what it was about and really can only remember one character and one of the stories within the story [it is pretty unforgettable so there is that]. I felt this was disjointed and chaotic and well, it just didn't work for me. I am really disappointed to be honest. This was one book I was really looking forward to.

Thank you to NetGalley, Okwiri Oduor, and Scribner for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Jessica Gregory · Rating 5 out of 5]

wow wow wow I won this in a giveaway and cannot wait to read it! The synopsis sounds great and definitely something I know I will enjoy.

[Shradha · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I was in high school, I read a book called "The House of Spirits" by Isabel Allende. It was my first introduction to the genre of magical realism, yet I never quite found another book that had the same draw, the same wonder as "The House of Spirits." With Okwiri Oduor's "Things They Lost," I think I have finally found the same kind of atmosphere and magic that I experienced all those years ago.

"Things They Lost" tells the story of Ayosa Ataraxis Brown, the twelve-year-old daughter of Nabumbo Promise Brown, and the latest addition to the matriarchal Brown family started by the enigmatic and cruel Mabel Eudoxia Brown in the 1900s. But Ayosa doesn't just inherit the Brown's legacy and name. She also inherits the cycle of mother-daughter neglect and abuse, the crushing loneliness of wanting to be loved by someone who fails to love themselves, and the casual violence it engenders. When Ayosa makes a friend of a "throwaway" girl Mbiu Dash, she finds her first hope of breaking this circle, and freeing herself from the thrall of her mercurial mother.

Reading through other reviews of this book, I have noticed a common criticism is that there is little plot or action to this book, and to a certain extent, that is true. However, if one is familiar with the genre of post-colonial magic realism, one would understand that the focus of this genre is not often the development of the plot, but rather the development of the characters and the heavy-handed and ubiquitous symbolism. Ayosa's twisted and toxic relationship with Nabumbo that both fails and goes beyond that of mother-daughter, her status as the great-granddaughter of an unapologetic colonizer, even the importance of the middle names of all the generations of the Brown family could be fodder for several essays worth of literary analysis. In fact, I would not be surprised if this book one day finds itself in classrooms examining East African literature; this book is just so perfect and lends itself to that purpose.

But just because this book is perfect for academic reasons, does not mean that it does not entertain. Oduor is a master of tone in this novel, deftly creating a dark, dreary, atmosphere filled with little moments of wonder and fantasy. It's a heavy book, and it took me a long time to finish because I found myself reading certain parts over again, trying to make sure that I took in the entirety of what was trying to be said. I loved reading the magic Oduor created in little moments, of a woman using a speculum to prop up her collapsing larynx, of "wriggling things" being present in each dark and lonely moment of some of the main character's lives, and of wraiths ready to kidnap someone in a moment of weakness. I did feel like I still missed out on some items, since this book does rely heavily on East African folklore, of which I have only superficial knowledge, but what I did catch on to, I thoroughly enjoyed.

I received this book through a Goodreads First Reads giveaway. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

[Lu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Totally worth the hype.

I listened to the audiobook instead of reading and it was a good choice.
Christel Mutombo is now on top of my list of favorite readers, and I can't wait to find something else she lends her voice to. She's almost hypnotic without ever seeming dramatic, and even though I tried, she didn't put me to sleep.

The story is often brutal, that's true.
But there's so much more beauty than pain, and beauty even in some of the pain.

When a writer's voice is described as "poetic", I'm sometimes not particularly eager to read the book.

In this case it's true, and it works very well. The whole tale is an enchantment, a song, an epic prose poem.

[Tia · Rating 2 out of 5]

on paper I should have adored this, and honestly I’m not fully sure what didn’t click for me. the writing is absolutely beautiful, but I guess I felt like the characters were a little underdeveloped (although the book was def more about their relationships to each other than the individuals themselves). loved the magical folklore inspired elements, especially the scenes with the wraiths, which never failed to fascinate me. that said, this book somehow still didn’t resonate, and reading it sometimes felt tedious. overall I’m left feeling a little lost myself (pun intended) about my own lukewarm response to this book!

[Eli Brooke · Rating 5 out of 5]

(bookseller - advanced reader copy)
GORGEOUSly written, intricate, funny and uplifting despite dealing head-on with historical & generational trauma

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, it was so beautiful and having gone into it completely blind I didn’t know what to expect.

Things They Lost cover so many important themes, it’s a book about family, friendship, loss and loneliness. There’s a magical element to the book aswell which I did really like as it is woven into the story perfectly. I really felt for the main character Ayosa throughout the book, this book definitely took turns I wasn’t expecting at all and I did find myself emotional in parts.

I know the writing style is one that took me a couple of pages to get used to, it is a book that is beautifully descriptive and overall I think the story is definitely one that had me thinking alot.

I’m definitely looking forward to seeing what Okwiri Oduor releases next😊 The cover of Things They Lost is seriously beautiful and eye catching💜 It’s certainly a book that I would like to reread again at some point.

[Nina · Rating 2 out of 5]

2½

[Olivia Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really excited to read this and then I read some of the reviews and I was really apprehensive.
In the end it wasn't a difficult read and I enjoyed it overall. I definitely agree with the criticisms of the third person pov, it's just not as immersive for me.I also found that it was overly descriptive at times and a little slow.
Unfortunately I found the magical realism was a bit vague and almost purposeless. Maybe my lack of knowledge of the culture and folklore this was drawn from was part of that.
I felt the exploration of intergenerational trauma was very insightful and apt and that the way the magic was weaved into this worked well. The depiction of a mother unable to escape her own trauma to meet her child's needs and the crisis of loyalty of the child who understood the trauma but was still carrying so much hurt felt very real.

[Bethan Evans · Rating 5 out of 5]

I disagree with some of the negative reviews here- I loved this book (especially the second half). The writing created a magical world as I was reading it and I particularly liked how the Kenyan folklore was woven into the themes of grief, familial relationships and trauma. The narrative resonated with me and overall the storytelling and language was chefs kiss. Would highly recommend!

[Katharine Bubbear · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book hooked me immediately - Oduor writes so evocatively. The story was at once relatable - with its exploration of complicated mother/daughter relationships and the bonds between friends - and completely fantastical, almost mythical. I could lose myself for hours in the world she has created. My only criticism (no spoilers here) is that it ended quite abruptly. I like an unresolved storyline (I’m all for bold choices), but I’d become so invested in the characters’ stories that I wish there’d been more of a resolution.

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a 4-star reading experience for me for about the first half or so. Then, it was slow and all over the place at the same time. So, 4...3...2. Towards the end, I wanted only to finish, so I could return it to the library.

Quotes
"One lady, she invites her lonesomeness to lunch every Tuesday. She sets out her best porcelain and sits her lonesomeness at the head of the table and serves it pork ribs. I suppose that's really clever of her. If you wine and dine your lonesomeness, maybe it won't sneak up on you in the middle of the night and slit your throat." (58)