One Day I Will Write about This Place: A Memoir (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781555975913)

*A New York Times Notable Book*
*A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice*
*A Publishers Weekly Top Ten Book of the Year*

Binyavanga Wainaina tumbled through his middle-class Kenyan childhood out of kilter with the world around him. This world came to him as a chaos of loud and colorful sounds: the hair dryers at his mother's beauty parlor, black mamba bicycle bells, mechanics in Nairobi, the music of Michael Jackson--all punctuated by the infectious laughter of his brother and sister, Jimmy and Ciru. He could fall in with their patterns, but it would take him a while to carve out his own.

In this vivid and compelling debut memoir, Wainaina takes us through his school days, his mother's religious period, his failed attempt to study in South Africa as a computer programmer, a moving family reunion in Uganda, and his travels around Kenya. The landscape in front of him always claims his main attention, but he also evokes the shifting political scene that unsettles his views on family, tribe, and nationhood.

Throughout, reading is his refuge and his solace. And when, in 2002, a writing prize comes through, the door is opened for him to pursue the career that perhaps had been beckoning all along. A series of fascinating international reporting assignments follow. Finally he circles back to a Kenya in the throes of postelection violence and finds he is not the only one questioning the old certainties.

Resolutely avoiding stereotype and cliché, Wainaina paints every scene in One Day I Will Write About This Place with a highly distinctive and hugely memorable brush.

Author: Binyavanga Wainaina
ISBN-10: 1555975917
ISBN-13: 9781555975913
Publisher: Graywolf Press
Language: English
Published: 07/19/2011
Pages: 272
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.19lbs
Size: 9.27h x 6.38w x 0.99d
Award: Hurston/Wright LEGACY Award - Finalist

Review Citation(s):
Library Journal 03/01/2011 pg. 59
Library Journal Prepub Alert 03/01/2011 pg. 59
Kirkus Reviews 04/15/2011
Christian Century 08/09/2011 pg. 41
New York Times Book Review 08/14/2011 pg. 12
New York Times Book Review 08/21/2011 pg. 30
Shelf Awareness 07/22/2011
Publishers Weekly Best Books 11/07/2011 pg. 23
NY Times Notable Bks of Year 12/04/2011 pg. 26