Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for ‘Yinka, Where is your Huzband?’ – thanks to Penguin/Viking Books for inviting me on the tour and for my copy of the book for review. As always, opinions are entirely my own.
The story centres on Yinka Oladeji, a thirty-one year old Londoner who is looking for love. Unfortunately, her extended Nigerian family don’t think she has time to waste and are praying for her – while constantly asking the whereabouts of her ‘huzband’. As her friends, cousins and sister get married and start families, Yinka seems to be treading a solitary path. When her cousin Rachel gets engaged, Yinka sets herself a challenge to find a date for the wedding – with some unexpected results.
I’ve seen a lot of press for this book that is touting Yinka as the new Bridget Jones. I can see the similarities – the book is written in diary form as we follow Yinka from a pretty bleak January party (where she becomes the subject of a very public and very embarrassing prayer to cure her singledom) to six months later…and a very different situation.
Yes, Yinka does have a lot in common with Bridget Jones, albeit with a whole lot less drinking, swearing and smoking (because Yinka is a good, church-going girl). Both characters are battling their mum’s cack-handed matchmaking, both have job worries and both are at the heart of a brilliantly funny friendship group.
Yet, Yinka is very much her own person.
She has the ability to tie herself in knots with her lies, something that takes this book on a slightly more serious path to Bridget. She also has the weight of expectations of her entire family on her shoulders – Yinka’s single status is no joke for her Nigerian family and they are not reserved in expressing their feelings. She has lost her father. Plus, Yinka is also navigating a contemporary dating world with very little savvy – she has only one ex-boyfriend to her name and a naive outlook that causes her problems.
Although Yinka’s issues are weighty, this is still a funny book. Yinka’s family (while sometimes unwittingly cruel) are humorous and there are some lovely touches – such as Yinka’s mum’s inability to operate anything more advanced than her Nokia 3410 or Yinka’s alphabet categorisation of bottoms (a D is apparently good, a J not!).
What’s particularly noticeable about the book is that it is essentially about women and community. While there are husbands, fathers, male friends and potential dates, it’s the women who are strong and at the fore. Yinka’s mum and aunties are formidable at the same time as they are funny. Yinka’s female friends, cousins and sister form her (mainly) supportive social circle. Even her counsellor is female. In a book about finding ‘huzbands’, there is a lot of evidence that female community is actually more important.
Visually, this book is engaging – as well as the diary entries, we also get Yinka’s texts, emails, post-it notes and even her planning grids. I liked the variety and appreciated being able to hear Yinka’s voice in different formats.
I also loved the Nigerian cultural element – it’s not something that I knew about before, so it was lovely to get an insight into a community different to my own. In particular, the food sounded amazing – sign me up for some jollof rice and beef suya!
Overall, I enjoyed this book. It made me smile and root for Yinka, even as I was annoyed at some of her unwise life choices. It also gave me a little window into a world outside of my own experience – and one I’d like to return to, especially if the awesome Aunty Blessing is there!
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Amazing review Kate. I’m glad you enjoyed it. I’ve seen this book about quite a lot and it has gotten some great reviews, so I might need to check it out even though it’s not my usual type of book. I am intrigued though! xx