Onyi Nwabineli

A stunning and witty debut novel about a young woman's emotional journey through unimaginable loss, pulled along by her tight-knit Nigerian family, a posse of new friends, and the love and laughter she shared with her husband. Onyi Nwabineli is a fresh new voice for fans of Yaa Gyasi, Queenie and I May Destroy You. Here are three things you should know about my husband: He was the great love of my life despite his penchant for going incommunicado. He was, as far as I and everyone else could tell, perfectly happy. Which is significant because... On New Year's Eve, he committed suicide. And here is one thing you should know about me: I found him. Bonus fact: No. I am not okay.

Someday, Maybe

Bria

This is so beautifully written and extremely sad. I always feel like media doesn't always capture grief in the way I experience it, but Nwabineli has!

Amelia C 

NOTE- if you are dealing with, or suffer with suicidal
Ideation and deep depression pls don’t read this book. 

This most beautifully heartbreaking book about grief. Living with, and trying to deal with grief and it’s effects on everyone, and everything around. 
The book opens with Eve, finding her husbands dead body after he committed suicide. What follows is how her life unravels and she attempts to put it back together. She has the most amazing family who stand by her, gently (and sometimes not so gently) pushing her. Onyi Nwabineli did an amazing job capturing the myriad of feelings around grief- how people intentionally (or not) have a timeline and expect that people “move on already”. The feelings of absolute heart wrenching pain the sufferer is in, and how they also understand that no one can help, or can grasp what they are going through. 
I’d definitely recommend this book, probably not to everyone because it was a hard read. Not in a bad way- but because damn life is hard.

aileeeeeeen

I don't know why I am hooked with sad books lately. and this, this was the book. the book is compelling but when I read it, it was tough. . like, I am going through something that I would never recover from. it is a story that mostly focused on healing after you went through a rough path. nevertheless, the writing is wonderful but quite overwhelming. therefore, before you pick the book please be prepared for the emotions.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.

this story is about grief, the darkest of it, the raw and gritty kind that will leave you breathless because you find yourself feeling the main character so well. and YET, somehow this story about deep grief and deep love is about the funniest and magnetic novel i’ve read in a while. the writer does such a beautiful manner of weaving one story and the individual developments of the supporting characters in a way that just tangles up your heart. i immediately cared about every character. 

Noemi Gonzalez

Naomi

There's pain and then there's PAIN. This book falls in the second category. It was just pure grief. It was nice reading how Eve dealt with the grief. Sometimes I hated Q for leaving without a note, sometimes I hated Eve for not picking herself up and moving on, sometimes I hated her family for presurring her so much, this book definitely evoked a lot of emotion in me. I the book honestly, the author knew what she was doing.
It was a beautiful read.

            I can count on one hand the number of books that made me cry.  It’s an incredibly rare occurrence.  I avoid crying, even if I’m alone and nobody can witness my tears, I will swallow those emotions down into the depths of my cold soul.  When Dumbledore died in the Harry Potter Series, I lost my ever-lovin’ mind (thankfully, I was alone when that happened).  I was furious with JK Rowling (over her writing, later I was furious with her for being a terrible human).  Then there’s The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks.  I can read that book over and over and it will make me cry every time.  I even made the hubs read it(no, it didn’t make him cry, dammit).  Then I read this one, that has the distinction of being book number three that brought me to tears. 

            This book made me feel.  That’s not necessarily rare, but the feels from this book dug a little deeper than others.  Nwabineli writes about Eve in the aftermath of her husband’s suicide.  She is, deservedly, a wreck.  Her family swoops in and envelopes her in their care, trying in vain to get her to eat, bathe, seek counseling, do anything.  They consistently fail, but thy don’t give up.  Thank goodness for families.  She is then faced with the evil mother-in-law, who does everything in her power to make everything so much worse.  Eve and her husband, Q, were at odds with his mother for the duration of their relationship, and dearest mother-in-law decided to blame Eve for her son’s death. 

            This one hit me hard, because I love my husband, he is the best decision I have ever made.  He is my best friend, my confidant, my lover, my everything.  I would have a hard time trying to find a reason to continue if he took his own life and didn’t at least give a why.  It would devastate me if he was having a hard enough time to contemplate ending his life but didn’t tell me.  However, as someone who struggles with depression (pretty much daily), I don’t tell him (why be more of a burden?), which is what makes this story so plausible. Depression is a wily devil, sneaking in so suddenly sometimes, there really isn’t time for “signs.”  Just knowing how easy it would be for this scenario to play itself out in ANY life broke me a little. 

            The tears came at the tail end of the ebook.  Like any other media that features suicide, the obligatory “If you or anyone you know are contemplating…” page is at the end, then as I flipped to the last page were the words “You are important.”  That was when I broke down.  Those of us that battle depression are frequently encouraged to flood our lives with positive mantras, one of them is “You are important.”  I can say that to myself at the top of every hour every day and it won’t do what is intended.  What works is when I’m told by others that I am, indeed, important.  That I am loved.  That I am wanted.  If you have made it this far, please take a moment to tell somebody in your life that they are important, that they are wanted. 

            This book is full of uncomfortable feelings, but it is well-worth the tears. 

Kristen Claiborn

            I can count on one hand the number of books that made me cry.  It’s an incredibly rare occurrence.  I avoid crying, even if I’m alone and nobody can witness my tears, I will swallow those emotions down into the depths of my cold soul.  When Dumbledore died in the Harry Potter Series, I lost my ever-lovin’ mind (thankfully, I was alone when that happened).  I was furious with JK Rowling (over her writing, later I was furious with her for being a terrible human).  Then there’s The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks.  I can read that book over and over and it will make me cry every time.  I even made the hubs read it(no, it didn’t make him cry, dammit).  Then I read this one, that has the distinction of being book number three that brought me to tears. 

            This book made me feel.  That’s not necessarily rare, but the feels from this book dug a little deeper than others.  Nwabineli writes about Eve in the aftermath of her husband’s suicide.  She is, deservedly, a wreck.  Her family swoops in and envelopes her in their care, trying in vain to get her to eat, bathe, seek counseling, do anything.  They consistently fail, but thy don’t give up.  Thank goodness for families.  She is then faced with the evil mother-in-law, who does everything in her power to make everything so much worse.  Eve and her husband, Q, were at odds with his mother for the duration of their relationship, and dearest mother-in-law decided to blame Eve for her son’s death. 

            This one hit me hard, because I love my husband, he is the best decision I have ever made.  He is my best friend, my confidant, my lover, my everything.  I would have a hard time trying to find a reason to continue if he took his own life and didn’t at least give a why.  It would devastate me if he was having a hard enough time to contemplate ending his life but didn’t tell me.  However, as someone who struggles with depression (pretty much daily), I don’t tell him (why be more of a burden?), which is what makes this story so plausible. Depression is a wily devil, sneaking in so suddenly sometimes, there really isn’t time for “signs.”  Just knowing how easy it would be for this scenario to play itself out in ANY life broke me a little. 

            The tears came at the tail end of the ebook.  Like any other media that features suicide, the obligatory “If you or anyone you know are contemplating…” page is at the end, then as I flipped to the last page were the words “You are important.”  That was when I broke down.  Those of us that battle depression are frequently encouraged to flood our lives with positive mantras, one of them is “You are important.”  I can say that to myself at the top of every hour every day and it won’t do what is intended.  What works is when I’m told by others that I am, indeed, important.  That I am loved.  That I am wanted.  If you have made it this far, please take a moment to tell somebody in your life that they are important, that they are wanted. 

            This book is full of uncomfortable feelings, but it is well-worth the tears. 

Someday, Maybe

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