“This intimate work implores, jerks us out of callousness, moves grief closer . . . Notes on Grief lays a path by which we might mourn our individual traumas among the aggregate suffering of this harrowing time. Our guide, Adichie, is uncloaked, full of ‘wretched, roaring rage,’ teaching us how to gather our disparate selves and navigate the still-raging pandemic. In the texture of many of these sentences you can almost feel where the writer has resisted bearing down with her refining tools—language and memory—so as to allow her emotional reality to remain splintered and sharp. Adichie is a consummate world-builder . . . Over the course of these 30 fragments, we witness a shift in perspective, an assurance that whatever comes next will never have been created before.”
—Sarah Broom, The New York Times Book Review [front-page review]
“A poignant reflection… Adichie recounts her efforts to cope with her loss, to accept condolences, to carry out the inevitable rituals of death. Her Dad emerges as a wise, kind, thoughtful and understanding presence throughout Notes on Grief . . .The loveliest writing, however, is not about James Nwoye Adichie, but about the anguish and longing his death produces in those who suffer his absence most acutely. In death, those we love become more than we understood, more than we can ever remember alone. Adichie appreciates this power.”
—Carlos Lozada, The Washington Post
“Adichie unflinchingly gazes into the black hole of grief as through a telescope, exposing intimate moments and public convulsions while tapping her roots to channel a spectrum of emotions . . . Candid, elegant . . . The writer meets the moment.”
—Oprah Daily, “20 Best Books of May”
“Fierce, tender and raw . . . In Notes on Grief, Adichie reveals a more private self. This is a cathartic work for Adichie, a way to keep alive the spirit of her father by telling his stories. And in her writing, her father shines as a man of deep kindness and integrity, a dry wit and successful academic who was unstinting in his support of his daughter’s ambitions.”
—Anderson Tepper, Los Angeles Times
“A story of loss achingly of its time . . . Adichie struggles not only with the shock of her unexpected loss but also with the impossibility of distance and by extension, access. She also realizes that each step toward the official recognition of [her father’s] passing will force her to accept that it has happened. I really appreciated Adichie’s discomfort with the language of grief. Books often come to you just when you need them . . . A book on grief is not the kind of book you want to have to give to anyone. But here we are.”
—Allison Arieff, San Francisco Chronicle
“Adichie’s exquisitely forthright chronicle of grief generously articulates the harrowing amplification of sorrow, helplessness, and loss during the COVID-19 pandemic . . . An intimate and essential illumination of a tragic time.”
—Booklist
“Elegant, moving . . . An affecting paean to the author’s father, James Nwoye Adichie. The first professor of statistics in his country, James lived an eventful and sometimes fraught life. Funny and principled, he died during the pandemic—not of the virus but kidney disease. Adichie moves through some of the classic stages of grief, including no small amount of anger. . . Eventually, she reflects on a newfound awareness of mortality and finds a ‘new urgency’ to live her life and do her work.” —Kirkus [starred review]
