Book review: Tola Rotimi Abraham’s‘Black Sunday’

Tola Rotimi Abraham’s debut novel ‘Black Sunday’ is a great piece of work.

Tola Rotimi Abraham’s debut novel ‘Black Sunday’ is a great piece of work.

It presents a picture of life in Lagos that must be very familiar to African urbanites. At so many points in the book it felt as if there were the lives of people that I know and have interacted with.

Religion and spirituality is one of the major themes in the book and it’s explored nicely through the various characters. The grandmother who quits the church after being accused of heresy, the parents who give all their money to a church linked ‘business opportunity’ and lose it all, the brother whose girlfriend quotes Bible verses while they’re kissing. It’s the chasm that it creates between the main characters, twin sisters Bibike and Ariyeje that’s at the core of the novel.

The novel also explores hypocrisy in the church through a series of scandals — and the efforts to cover them up.

However, I was seriously underwhelmed by the ending. After a very diligent building of the characters and the story, the end feels hurried.

Also, the two brothers whose experiences give us an insightful look at various aspects of masculinity, disappear.

I feel the book would have been greatly improved by a few more chapters, to resolve the issues or by exploring a narrower range of themes with fewer characters.

Nonetheless, I think it’s a great debut novel that creates characters and places that are very relatable. I’ll be on the look out for her future books!