This is a strange book. I didn’t really like it. The writing wasn’t to my taste. A disappointing book for me.

I got lost in the pages of this story of love, self sacrifice, misunderstandings and loss. It reminded me also a little of a real life story of someone I know, not the same but the grief is described so alike, Hold your loved ones close and forgive, it's a short life.

Deeply reflective and deeply lyrical, An Unusual Grief was beautiful and tough to read in equal measure. The grief in this book was authentic and tempering, and the self-discover of our main character is stunning in its deep and veracity. An exemplary character-driven novel of sadness and grief.

My thanks to Cassava Republic Press and NetGalley for a review copy of this book.

An Unusual Grief is a story of grief but it is also the story of a woman’s journey to understand herself, and her relationships—one might even say her life so far. Mojisola Owolabi has travelled to Johannesburg to pack up her daughter Yinka’s flat, after the latter’s death. Not having been very close to Yinka, through this experience Mojisola is also attempting to understand the person her daughter was while also coping with her grief at the loss and guilt over the matter. But while coming to terms with what has happened, Mojisola also begins to examine her own life—her childhood and upbringing by a strict and very religious mother with occasional visits by a more fun-loving aunt; her marriage to Titus (Yinka’s father), with whom we soon find she has a difficult relationship; her experiences in her work life; the move from Nigeria where they belonged to South Africa; the illness she has struggled with and much else. As we move through the book, various aspects related to Yinka as well as Mojisola’s own life are revealed in bits and pieces—like peeling away the layers of an onion. In attempting to understand Yinka, Mojisola ends up ‘becoming’ her and living her life for a while, which takes her into challenging territory and experiences she never would have otherwise even imagined, and in which she also breaks free from the bounds in which she has so far been living.

The novel is written in a stream of consciousness style so we keep floating between events taking place in the present to memories and occurrences from Mojisola’s past—childhood, marriage, work life and motherhood. Going back and forth (and not in any particular order), we find ourselves navigating dreams and reality, past and present, memories and experiences, but never once in this flow did I ever find myself lost or confused in any way as to what was being dealt with or where we were.

While the novel centres on Mojisola, we are introduced to various characters—her husband Titus of course, her mother and aunt, but also people from Yinka’s life including her landlady Zelda Petersen (with whom Moji starts off on a tricky note but soon ends up befriending), and others who were part of her life (her friends and contacts). Each of them (all well drawn-out) provides her with an insight into Yinka but also becomes part of her journey to find herself. Many of them (in fact most of the ones we get to know closely) carry their own burdens and have their own struggles of which we also get a glimpse and which helps makes sense of them somewhat. One feels for most of them (Mojisola herself, Yinka, Zelda, but perhaps not Titus) and all that they have had to deal with.

The book deals with a range of subjects from grief and loss to friendships and relationships, love and betrayal, art and expression, patriarchy and propriety, roots and culture and definitely gets us thinking; even when going into uncomfortable territory, the author raises questions that highlight the hypocrisies that define our societies (for instance, through the character D-Man, a friend of Yinka’s who is into BDSM).

This was certainly a unique read, and very different from other books—poignant and heart-breaking in parts, challenging, uncomfortable and shocking in others, but one which kept me reading all through.

4 stars

In the beginning I was not very intrigued about the story or the characters. After persisting in reading more and getting to know the history of Mojisola’s family it all took another shape within the story.

The way the main character chooses to handle her grief and make peace with her past, with the living persons in her life and the ones that were no longer near her, shows a complex character and a life lived under the traditions and influences of a family that obstruct her true passions and path in life: first her mother, her aunt and then her husband as well as her own limitations and barriers set each time she found some spark of courage.

When Yinka died, her mother Mojisola was preparing to visit her. The two women were no longer close and when Moji hears her daughter took her own life, she decides to spend a few weeks at her place to find out more about her life and her death.
The first half of the book was very touching and incredibly sad without falling into pathos, but I found the second part lacking. I don't know what the author wanted to do... The first part we hear of trouble in Moji and Titus's marriage, and in the second half it becomes more of a focus, as well as the relationship between Moji and other men. I did not think it fitted really well, and why I liked the book, I found it a bit disjointed at times.

"The pieces of a life, even when put together, assembled, never amount to the life itself."

How do you come to terms with the death of your only child? But how do you come to terms to the death of your only child "by her own hand"? How to piece together a motive, how to find out who is to blame? How to live with yourself and with guilt? How can you understand who your daughter was?

An Unusual Grief is a simple yet heartbreaking story of the unravelling of a mother in the aftermath of her daughter's suicide. In her quest of putting together her daughter's life after her death, she unravels all her life, all her emotions, all her pain, all her aspiration. Out of an excruciating pain, light emerges. In death, Yinka has given Mojisola a gift. There's a silver lining in everything, even in death.

Deeply reflective and deeply lyrical, An Unusual Grief was beautiful and tough to read in equal measure. The grief in this book was authentic and tempering, and the self-discover of our main character is stunning in its deep and veracity. An exemplary character-driven novel of sadness and grief.

Omotoso skilfully tells a story of a broken relationship, of a death that pries the doors of loss wide open allowing us to witness a mother's most dreaded reality; seeing how awkwardly we hold and navigate grief, the intricacies needed to process ot and the intimacy that is conjured at its culmination.

The prose is laden with the loss that Moji has suffered. And as she travels to perhaps face that grief, wallow within it, deny it or accept it, we get to know her through recollections; of her childhood, relationships, and mothering.

But the further into the story I got. I became disengaged from the character and the narrative.

An Usual Grief is a book that will stay with me for a long time.

Mojisola's estranged daughter has died and, after staying at her home and stepping into her shoes, Mojisola gains a better understanding of her daughter but also herself.

It is a book steeped in sadness, but not in a way that made me sad. It is bittersweet, poignant and touching.

Thank you to Cassava Republic and NetGalley for providing a digital ARC of An Unusual Grief in exchange for an honest review.

An Unusual Grief begins with a death. The protagonist, Mojisola, learns her daughter Yinka has died by suicide. She journeys from Cape Town to Yinka's apartment in Johannesburg and is left to collect what pieces she has left. This death comes after a period of separation between Yinka and her parents. Since this separation, or perhaps even earlier, she was something of an enigma to her mother, with a mind incomprehensible to her despite her deep yearning to "act as a mother" and shelter her daughter. By taking up in Yinka's apartment and uncovering what her life was before it wasn't, Mojisola tries to understand who her daugher was and why she is gone.

Omotoso's writing is poignant and distinct. As the title suggests, this novel felt unusual in its uniqueness. Mojisola's struggles with motherhood and grief are heavy yet Omotoso deals with this is a lyricism that tugs at the reader, The characters who once surrounded Yinka and come to revolve around Mojisola feel fully realized, particularly, Zelda, the pot smoking landlady and D-man, the BDSM-inclined businessman. Even her at first seemingly useless husband Titus has his own story to undercover. Yet, at the heart of this book is Mojisola and Yinka, one character we fully come to understand and another whose glaring absence is felt as much by the reader as it is by her mother. I really enjoyed this and look forward to reading more by Yewande Omotoso in the future.

<i>An Unusual grief</i> is a poignant story about a mother and the loss of mother losing her daughter. A conversation gone wrong, the mother-daughter pair are estranged and before this relationship can be fixed, the daughter commits suicide. Overtaken by grief, the mother moves to the daughter's apartment in an effort to understand and reconnect to her life, or what it was. With time and a little bit of help, the mother rediscovers not just who her daughter had become after she left home but also herself, the part of her that she had to repress so that she could put on an acceptable facade in front of the society.

The book deals with childhood depression, sexuality, expression of sexual desires in a very poignant way allowing the readers to settle into their own conclusions. In this lies the strength of the novel as Omotoso shows what people are without as much telling this is how people are. Truly good storytelling.

<i>Thank you to Netgalley and Cassava Republic Press for providing me with a free copy of this e-book in exchange for an honest review. </i>

Thanks to Netgalley and Cassava Republic for allowing me to read an ARC of this novel in exchange for a review.

In my first instagram post for this novel, I was about just under halfway through, and I described the story of one that explores motherhood and loss - two ideas that we don't typically think of together, and how when those two things clash, the interaction is a confusion of feelings and actions.

Reading further, I would amend my description to focus less on the idea of motherhood, and more on loss - a theme that permeates throughout the book, both directly and through wistful ideation. The loss of a daughter, a brother, the loss of routine, the loss of an established identity. There is the longing for relationships that have been fractured, and because of loss there is no way to repair(in our manner of repairing), there is a wistfulness for a different life, where this pain would not have happened.

Mojisola is an outstanding character - flawed, imperfect and lost, her arc of finding herself was a wonder to behold.

The writing style was straight-laced and permeated with the confusion of a grieving mother, I especially enjoyed the initial hollowness of writing about Yinka - we know about her but there is a gaping hole in the narrative. Eventually this hole is filled and we see her for the first time.

Overall, I was going through it at 1am yesterday morning when I finished this book, and I'll definitely pick it up again when it's published.

“She understood … that if you attempt to clean the messiness of life you end up scrubbing the life away from living.” (212)

An Unusual Grief follows Mojisola, a mother grieving her daughter Yinka. She’s trying to learn more about her daughter in the wake of her taking her own life, and ends up learning a lot about herself as well. This book is wonderfully written: Yewande Omotoso’s writing is superb, introspective and beautiful. I really liked the exploration of Mojisola’s conflicting feelings regarding her daughter, a combination of guilt and curiosity and some envy perhaps. Mojisola feels she has let Yinka down as a mother, and the book is heartbreaking at times but in no way feels hopeless. The relationship between Mojisola and Titus was also interesting and felt genuine. I appreciated reading about a story from the perspective of an older woman. All around a phenomenal story about grief and regret and finding yourself.

Thank you to NetGalley and Cassava Republic Press for a free review copy!

The writing of this book is something I appreciate from the writer. Although, I preferred their first book to this one.

An Unusual Grief takes us on a journey with Mojisola, who's just lost her daughter, Yinka for the second time. She lost her many moons ago when a broken conversation ruined their relationship, and now she is dead and there is no chance to reconnect with the woman she has become.

But Moji wants to know Yinka, to know her as the woman she was, not the child she fondly remembers. Moving into her old apartment, she tries to piece together her life and learn more about her estranged daughter, and as she does she finds she may be able to understand herself better too.

This story was bold, poignant and as the title suggests, unusual. A tale about loss, love and discovery; I'm sure every reader will be able to find something of themselves hidden in Moji. As we watch her try to wrestle with the fact she has always been called Mother but now nobody calls her that, so who is she really underneath all the labels assigned to her? I found this story rather difficult to connect with at times as the writing style felt somewhat detatched and clinical but that didn't take away from how striking this novel is.

This was a beautiful poignant story about a woman mourning her child. I absolutely loved the exploration not only into Moji's relationship with Yinka but also into the relationship between Moji and Titus, Moji and her Modupe. This book is about grief but its also about depression, and sexuality, and emotional intelligence, and parenting, and repressive religion. The writing was also so beautiful, I'm jealous of how good it was. Highly recommend this.
Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC.

A beautiful moving unusual book touching on difficult subjects with compassion and understanding
I was lucky enough to read an early copy of this book on NetGalley .I had read and enjoyed The woman next door when it was longlisted for the Booker prize in 2017 but had not connected the two books until afterwards
As parents we all wander how well we know our adult children ,we feel we know them so well as children but so suddenly they are adult and we have to learn to know them in a different way
This book deals with a mother desperately trying to get to know her daughter after her death as a young adult from suicide .The novel is touching and far reaching ,in order to know her daughter the mother must first know and understand herself and her own family relationships .
I found the characters deeply recognisable and well described and the books setting in South Africa was similar enough to my own life even as it was so utterly different and interesting
There were a few African words that I needed to look up ( the main joy of reading on kindle was the ease that I could do this ) They added to my feeling of immersion in the culture .
Some extremely memorable lines I particularly liked “ypu cannpt read the story when you’re the book “ the author writes in a fluent lyrical style which I very much enjoyed
I would recommend this book to those who love a literary novel with heart and beauty

An Unusual Grief follows Moji, a middle-aged woman, whose adult daughter Yinka has died at the age of 24. The story follows Moji trying to unravel her daughter’s final days, partly to try and discover why she died, and partly to reconnect with the daughter she felt she no longer knew.
The character of Moji is a warm, engaging woman who lost her way as an adult; she gave up her career ambitions thanks to her husband’s and the general misogyny of the era. She lost the relationship with her daughter thanks to a passing comment and a moment of lost conversation.
Through her search for her daughter’s life, she meets a curmudgeonly landlady, an Afrikaans carpenter, and a Nigerian businessman who emphasises her disconnect from her own history when she cannot recall the Yoruba he charms her with. Moji is relatable, and the way in which she is unmoored feels like something we can all relate to.
I would thoroughly recommend this book to anyone who has ever felt lost, though I don’t think you need to be as adrift as Moji to appreciate the sense of disconnect from her ambitions, hopes, and love.