Americanah: A novel

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

May 2013 · Sold by Vintage

4.7

368 reviews

Ebook

496

Pages

Eligible

Switch to the audiobook

About this ebook

10th ANNIVERSARY EDITION • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A modern classic about star-crossed lovers that explores questions of race and being Black in America—and the search for what it means to call a place home. • From the award-winning author of We Should All Be Feminists and Half of a Yellow Sun • WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY THE AUTHOR

"An expansive, epic love story."—O, The Oprah Magazine

Ifemelu and Obinze are young and in love when they depart military-ruled Nigeria for the West. Beautiful, self-assured Ifemelu heads for America, where despite her academic success, she is forced to grapple with what it means to be Black for the first time. Quiet, thoughtful Obinze had hoped to join her, but with post–9/11 America closed to him, he instead plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.

At once powerful and tender, Americanah is a remarkable novel that is "dazzling…funny and defiant, and simultaneously so wise." —San Francisco Chronicle

Ratings and reviews

4.7

368 reviews

Sean Rollins

January 4, 2015

I have tried to finish this book 5 times now, and still can't get through it. I have never not finished a book, I even made it all the way through Stephen King's It. I was very interested in the content based on the author's interview on NPR, but the book just didn't deliver in the least. There were so many meaningless character introductions and encounters that in no way built a plot or storyline, that at times it felt like I was reading a series of separate essays. Unlikable characters, poorly executed.

1 person found this review helpful

Laura Stubblefield

April 19, 2018

It takes you to a world of the familiar, exotic, and emotional. The characters are brought to life while the reader travels through the same experiences. My written review pales in comparison to how I felt journeying page to page; more enthusiastic about what happens next but fearing the end of the trip. The Nigeria I remembered from the 1990s and early 2000s became nostalgic. Throughout, I felt what can only be explained in the defined spectrum of human emotions as sadness and happiness at the same time.

Sweet C Bloom

April 24, 2016

This beautifully woven story of feeling in between all your life really hit home with me. The struggle with seeing in other's what you find lacking in yourself, the insecurity of it all...just wow. It made me feel connected to the love and loss.

3 people found this review helpful

About the author

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie grew up in Nigeria. Her work has been translated into thirty languages and has appeared in various publications, including The New Yorker, The New York Times, Granta, The O. Henry Prize Stories, Financial Times, and Zoetrope: All-Story. She is the author of the novels Purple Hibiscus, which won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize and the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award; Half of a Yellow Sun, which was the recipient of the Women’s Prize for Fiction “Winner of Winners” award; Americanah, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award; the story collection The Thing Around Your Neck; and the essays We Should All Be Feminists and Dear Ijeawele, or A Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, both national bestsellers. A recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, she divides her time between the United States and Nigeria.

Rate this ebook

Tell us what you think.

Reading information

Smartphones and tablets

Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.

Laptops and computers

You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.

eReaders and other devices

To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.