Eduardo Santiago reviewed Someday, Maybe by Onyi Nwabineli
Review of 'Someday, Maybe' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
Quite a rollercoaster; I’m so glad it’s over. Wish it had ended a little before it did.
That doesn’t mean it was in any way bad... just... painful, and probably not for the reasons you might think: suicide I can handle, but drama, not so much, and Eve the narrator is tiresomely self-obsessed. Most of the book is beautiful, insightful, emotionally raw; but a lot of it is tedious self-pity. I was often tempted to DNF it but kept going because holy shit can Nwabineli write. Even though the Eve we read about is annoying, the Eve who’s writing—the older wiser Eve who made it through—her voice is exquisite. She writes with awareness and humility and sometimes even a little chagrin; not to excuse traumatized-whiny-Eve but to ... here I’m not so sure ... to help us learn from her? This is a tremendously compassionate, intelligent, and even …
Quite a rollercoaster; I’m so glad it’s over. Wish it had ended a little before it did.
That doesn’t mean it was in any way bad... just... painful, and probably not for the reasons you might think: suicide I can handle, but drama, not so much, and Eve the narrator is tiresomely self-obsessed. Most of the book is beautiful, insightful, emotionally raw; but a lot of it is tedious self-pity. I was often tempted to DNF it but kept going because holy shit can Nwabineli write. Even though the Eve we read about is annoying, the Eve who’s writing—the older wiser Eve who made it through—her voice is exquisite. She writes with awareness and humility and sometimes even a little chagrin; not to excuse traumatized-whiny-Eve but to ... here I’m not so sure ... to help us learn from her? This is a tremendously compassionate, intelligent, and even funny book, snarky and witty, and at the end I can’t tell you if it’s anti-suicide, pro-suicide, or some sort of mindful caring hey-it-happens. And I really loved that.
The story itself was a bit contrived and became ever more so as it progressed; some aspects of that were easier for me to accept than others. On the whole, despite the annoyances and inverisimilitudes, I found it hard to put the book down. Eve was surrounded by kind, caring, competent people, and I genuinely cared for each of them. I cared about future-Eve, too, the one narrating with so much heart, and wanted to know how the Eve in the book, the one who shows no promise, transforms.
Finally and most importantly, the book’s treatment of suicide seems fair. Not always—this was part of the rollercoaster, all the different takes and angles and perspectives she whirlwinds through—but at the end I feel satisfied that no corners were cut. Suicide is a ferociously complex topic, one that we rarely if ever talk about (except in overly simplistic, condescending fly-bys: “call the hotline mkay see ya”), and Nwabineli honors that complexity. Brava.
UPDATE, few days later: can't believe I forgot to mention my favorite topic, asymmetry. So many kinds of it in life and in this book! Some asymmetries can be rebalanced given time and energy and desire. The asymmetry of understanding—of being with others, seeing them, feeling them—that to me is the most mystifying one, and one that I seem to be devoting more and more of my life to addressing even while knowing how unsolvable it is. Death is the ultimate brick wall in that effort; unexplained suicides add a giant middle finger to those left behind. So if you’re considering suicide—and I hope you’re not, but can empathize if you are and can even accept under some circumstances—anyway, this is a great book to read, because it really helps one understand how not to be a dick about it.
