Becoming Abigail

Categories: Staff Picks , Fiction

  One of my favorite things to do after finishing a good book, is to go directly back to page one and at least reread the first chapter. With Becoming Abigail, I reread the whole thing.

Becoming Abigail is an intense narrative full of beautiful prose. This 119-page novella is by Christopher Abani, winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for his previous novel GraceLand. Becoming Abigail tells the story of the title character, a young Nigerian who has moved to London with relatives who treat her harshly. Named for her mother who died giving birth to her, Abigail deals with growing up motherless by engaging in strange mourning rituals and other disturbing behavior. The language with which Abani delivers his story is spare and haunting, and the tale of Abigail, though devastating in many ways, is definitely one worth reading.