Things They Lost (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781982102579)

Named a Most Anticipated Book by Vogue and Vulture

"Alternately whimsical, sweet, and dark," this astonishing debut novel about a lonely girl waiting for her mother "brim[s] with uncompromisingly African magical realism" (The New York Times).

Ayosa is a wandering spirit--joyous, exuberant, filled to the brim with longing. Her only companions in her grandmother's crumbling house are as lonely 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; the Jolly-Annas, cruel birds who cover their solitude with spiteful laughter; the milkman, who never greets Ayosa and whose milk tastes of mud; and Sindano, the kind owner of a café no one ever visits. Unexpectedly, miraculously, one day Ayosa finds a friend. Yet she is always fixed on her beautiful mama, Nabumbo Promise: a mysterious and aloof photographer, she comes and goes as she pleases, with no apology or warning.

Set at the intersection of the spirit world and the human one, Things They Lost sets out a rich and magical vision of "girlhood as a time of complexity, laced with unparalleled creativity and expansion" (Vogue). Heartbreaking, elegant, and written in "giddily exuberant prose" (Financial Times), it's a story about connection, coming-of-age, and the dizzying dualities of love at its most intoxicating and all-encompassing.

Author: Okwiri Oduor
ISBN-10: 1982102578
ISBN-13: 9781982102579
Publisher: Scribner Book Company
Language: English
Published: 04/12/2022
Pages: 368
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 0.95lbs
Size: 8.10h x 5.70w x 1.30d

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal Prepub Alert 11/01/2021 pg. 10
Publishers Weekly 02/21/2022
Booklist 03/01/2022 pg. 26
Kirkus Reviews 04/01/2022
Library Journal 04/01/2022 pg. 80