Ikè > Recent Status Updates

"I'm just going through the motions. I haven't written a single story worth spit since... well, since. And words were always what moored me. Now, I'm flotsam."

I'm starting to wonder if Ifemelu would ever move back to Nigeria. But suppose she does, what sort of reunion should we expect between her and Obinze?

The man is married. They are strangers.

"Growing up, it had been male alcohol, gruff and inelegant."

This sentence nearly made me laugh out loud from its truthiness. As a child, I had seen beer as the habit of older men who drank it in a weird, semi-formal raucousness that excluded everyone who was not of age. It's funny how faced now with America's obsession with hops, I gravitate most to the wheats that remind me of that period.

I'm enjoying this book more than I thought I would, especially Ifemelu's flashbacks to her teenage years in Nigeria.

"The wind came across the bay like something living."

What a line to open with.

"The Gangster We Are All Looking For" is a glorious title for a book (see Thi Diem Thuy Le) and a fitting reference for Belicia's second heartbreak.

"Spider Jerusalem: cheap, but not as cheap as your girlfriend." I need this on a shirt.

"What could I say to you that would be of value, except that perhaps you seek too much, that as a result of your seeking you cannot find." -- Siddhartha

The more I read, the more I find myself repulsed by Bigger Thomas. His impulses are deviant in the most base and animal way. There is little forethought to his actions. If this protagonist has any saving grace, I have still to find it.

Even I'm getting shivers from Cathy (and I'm usually good with the wicked).

"The hell with that; she's a bitch and a buzzard and a ball-cutter, and don't kid me, you know what I'm talking about."

Goddie, this "love" thing sounds terrible.