Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Length: 384 pages
Audiobook Length: 12 hours and 6 minutes
First Published: 2020
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Rachael’s Review
This debut novel from Abi Daré highlights the coming-of-age story of a Nigerian woman. All Adunni wants to do is get an education so that she can craft her own future. When her father sells her as the third wife to a local man, Adduni runs away to the city, only to become an unpaid domestic servant to a wealthy family. Yet, Adunni finds that no matter her circumstances, she can still speak out for herself and all the other girls just like her.
I’d been putting off reading The Girl with the Louding Voice for two years because I knew it would be depressing. It is hard to read about Adunni’s traumatic experiences and to realize the second-class status that women hold even today. Yet Daré ends her inspiring novel on a hopeful note, highlighting Adunni’s indomitable spirit and reminding you that you need to use your voice for change.
Publisher’s Description
Adunni is a fourteen-year-old Nigerian girl who knows what she wants: an education. This, her mother has told her, is the only way to get a “louding voice”—the ability to speak for herself and decide her own future. But instead, Adunni’s father sells her to be the third wife of a local man who is eager for her to bear him a son and heir.
When Adunni runs away to the city, hoping to make a better life, she finds that the only other option before her is servitude to a wealthy family. As a yielding daughter, a subservient wife, and a powerless slave, Adunni is told, by words and deeds, that she is nothing.
But while misfortunes might muffle her voice for a time, they cannot mute it. And when she realizes that she must stand up not only for herself, but for other girls, for the ones who came before her and were lost, and for the next girls, who will inevitably follow; she finds the resolve to speak, however she can—in a whisper, in song, in broken English—until she is heard.
About Abi Daré
Abi Daré grew up in Lago, Nigeria before moving to the UK. She has degrees in law, international project management and creative writing. Her debut novel, The Girl with the Louding Voice, was published in 2020. She currently lives in Essex.
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